4 Part Writing

[pianohenry]

Sorry to be annoying, ive posted about this before...

Working on a particular excercise. Its in B flat major, im given the melody line and have to fill in the bottom 3 parts in the style of a bach chorale.

Im stuck on the cadence. the melody goes B-^b, B^b, C. So for the harmony i figured, VI --> IV --> V (thats Gm. --> E^b --> F. Im assuming you ALWAYS HAVE TO HAVE THE ROOT OF THE CHORD (of course you do!) - so i have an E flat in chord IV. Now, heres the problem. Where does the E flat move to?

E flat --> F then i have a consecutive 5th with the B flat --> C in the melody line, so i cant do that.
E flat --> A gives an interval of a diminished 4th, which sounds awful.
E flat --> C means ill be doubling the 5th in the next chord (chord V). ok, thats not strictly against the rules but it doesnt sound brilliant, and its at a cadence so id prefer to have the root doubled rather than the 5th.

so which note in chord 5 can i go to without a problem arising? Or, should i KEEP the E flat and have V⁷... but then it should resolve to chord 1... and i have another C in the melody line after that so that doesnt really work either.

any ideas?

[desordre]

 Dear Henry:
 In this kind of exercise, the only possibility is Eb-C, and you explained why. Two questions:
 - why do you think that is some problem with doubling the 5th of the chord? It's not wrong, and it sound far more brilliant that the root doubling.
 - why do you have to use a V? Did you try ii6 instead?
 By the way, if you really need some help, post the whole melody, and your plan of harmony to it.
 Best!

[pianistimo]

the basic outline of voice moving is in fux's gradus ad parnassum which is outlined here:
www.threereelscore.com/PortfolioStuff/PDFFiles/CounterPointFux.pdf

also, purchase js bach's 371 four-part chorales and work through a few - or just copy.  you'll begin to see the patterns.  i had a hard time with this as well until i took a harmony class.  it's been a few years, now.

B b major.  ok.

[pianistimo]

if i remember right - i was postulating a long time ago about making myself a chord wheel.  i think you can buy them in some music stores and they are at the back of some music books.  but, you can elaborate and make a wheel for each major and minor key.  you know, what you can move to and from (all the possibilities).

[pianistimo]

#192  uses a Bb to C cadence and the notes for the Bb chord are (G, Bb, Bb)  passing tone of E-natural  to F, F, A, C.    basically moving from dim iv to major V?  that wouldn't be moving upwards a true second, right?  because the chord is diminished and uses an E natural? 

[pianohenry]

all of those comments were Extremely helpful, thank you both

hehe... i worked on it a bit more, and i ended up doing:

vi --> ii⁷ --> V which is Gm --> C⁷ with an E natural moving to F.

with these notes: Sop. --> B b, B b, C
                           Alt. --> D, E, F
                           Ten. --> G, G, A
                           Bass --> G, C, F

it was only later that i read pianistimo's post - it looks like what i did was right - the use of the E natural and all :p so yeh im pleased, i did what bach did without knowing bach had already done it (though, with 371 of the things, hes probably done every single combination  )

i have the reimenschneider - best harmony book in the world, my teacher says ill have a look at 192.

the chord wheel thing sounds interesting, i might give it a try.

thanks all.

henry

[asyncopated]

In short, there is no way to tell you what you might write until i actually see the melody you have to write against.

During the renaissance several people studies counterpoint writhing.  In particular, there was this guy called Fux, who i think many composes studied.  Bach's chorals follow this style of writing, and in general, (species) counterpoint is very difficult to write.  Most of the style is written horizontally instead of vertically.  This means that you don't really stack chords up.  Instead you write lines for each part, and there are many rules for what is allowed and what is not.  The chords that one normally sees are a result of counterpoint writing rather than an aim. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterpoint

There are two main aims in counterpoint writing are that each line is weighted equally,  no one line is less important than others.  Each line is distinct in the sense that in can easily (?) be indentified whilst weaving throught other lines.  Hence parallel thirds and sixths are ok, but parallel fifths are not -- they sound to similar together.   The second main rule is that they must sound harmonic with respect to one another.  There are basically three main desonances, the second, the tritone and the seventh.  If you do have to introduce a dissonance, it creates tension and thus you should only introduce it on an off beat and resolve it immediatly at the next strong beat.  The one place that you are allowed a dissonance in the form of a seventh (the leading note) is just before the cadance.

You get the idea, there are a whole bunch of rules.  I'm just wondering who gave you this exercies.  Its no simple feat!  I don't know if this helps.

If i really had to write, I will try a two species counterpoint first.  I.e. given the melody line  (Actually most people start from the bassline, I'm a bit suprised you were given the melody/top line),  I would start by writing the bass line.  Once you are more or less happy with how it sounds, write in the third (and if you really had to, forth) line(s) in.     

Good luck.

[asyncopated]

all of those comments were Extremely helpful, thank you both

hehe... i worked on it a bit more, and i ended up doing:

vi --> ii⁷ --> V which is Gm --> C⁷ with an E natural moving to F.

with these notes: Sop. --> B b, B b, C
                           Alt. --> D, E, F
                           Ten. --> G, G, A
                           Bass --> G, C, F

it was only later that i read pianistimo's post - it looks like what i did was right - the use of the E natural and all :p so yeh im pleased, i did what bach did without knowing bach had already done it (though, with 371 of the things, hes probably done every single combination  )

i have the reimenschneider - best harmony book in the world, my teacher says ill have a look at 192.

the chord wheel thing sounds interesting, i might give it a try.

thanks all.

henry

Hi looking at your solution, it seems fine from here.  Most of the motion between the first notes are oblique.  The two lines that have similar motion are into thirds, so that's fine.  The dissonance is carred by the top line (B b). 

If you started in the Key of Bb, you have introduced an imperfect cadence and are thus modulating to F, which is the V.  So the you should expect to start the next section with a F as the tonic. 

Good work.

[ksnmohan]

Hallo pianohenry,

Glad that you have found a satisfactory solution  for your 4-part score.

When you look to someone great like Bach (e.g. Choral works) for the voice notations, you naturally tend to emphasise on the melodic aspect of the harmony parts. That's fine - Bach's music is ofcourse divine. But to locate that exact note - before and after a particular  melody/harmony sequence - can pose some problems, as you originally had encountered. I too have encountered this myself.

You can - and must - look at discordardant harmony. 20th & 21st Century composers like  Pendereki, Richard Strauss, Wagner are classic composers who have mastered haunting voice melodies with discordant harmony.

No disrespect whatsover to the great Bach - but let us admit, Music has changed a lot over the past 300 years.

I would have in your place experimented with a multitude of minor/major/dim/aug/6, 7.....11 chord progressions of the Root and not just search among the basic Flats and Sharps - which of course give you that perfect harmony.

Warm Regards and all the best!

Prof K S (Mohan) Narayanan
Musicologist, Teacher, Composer
Chennai, India

[asyncopated]

You can - and must - look at discordardant harmony. 20th & 21st Century composers like  Pendereki, Richard Strauss, Wagner are classic composers who have mastered haunting voice melodies with discordant harmony.

I think we have a discussion going here.  I would like to make the claim that actually bach was just at home writing discordant harmonies (when the situation called for it) as he did concordant harmonies.  Although of the bulk of this work is based on having concordant harmony, perhaps due the influence of the rennaissance period and ideas about perfection and god. 

One place that springs to mind where he writes pretty chromatic and discordant stuff is in the St. John's passion.  If i recall correctly it's in with the Kreuzige, kreuzige section.  but in that work, there are quite a number of dishamonous lines.  I suppose the idea of sweetness and perfection isn't really conjured up went the chorus is meant to be going curcify him!  I'll go hunt for more examples.

The ideas of harmony did stay until the late romantic period where must writers would try to hide the dissonances amougst lushes melodies.  Anyway, harmony is type of musical language, just as atonality is, and just as valid.  One should certianly study harmony because it is after all the lingua franca of music.

Just my thoughts.

[pianistimo]

yes.  poulenc was a composer that decided to go back and study ancient music to derive some satisfaction from unusual harmonies that sound pleasing with repeated listening.  also, he took ideas from gregorian chant to mass to motet.  i studied his salve regina a bit.  he is one of the few 20th century composers to work with four part vocal  harmony in this 'style' and yet add his own harmonies as well.  very open.  very modal sounding and yet in a key.  he picked a different tone than the tonic to focus on and that note was repeated more than the tonic.  i'm not sure what he used at cadences (but seems that i remember he did stay within a key).

here's some 20th composers that specifically wrote masses:  britten, durufle, poulenc, stravinsky

poulenc's motets:  hodie christus natus est, O magnum mysterium, timor et tremor, tristes est anima mea

way back when - scarlatti wrote several masses too, i believe, and they are quite interesting in harmonies.  one is the 'madrid mass.' 

[asyncopated]

yes.  poulenc was a composer that decided to go back and study ancient music to derive some satisfaction from unusual harmonies that sound pleasing with repeated listening.  also, he took ideas from gregorian chant to mass to motet.  i studied his salve regina a bit.  he is one of the few 20th century composers to work with four part vocal  harmony in this 'style' and yet add his own harmonies as well.  very open.  very modal sounding and yet in a key.  he picked a different tone than the tonic to focus on and that note was repeated more than the tonic.  i'm not sure what he used at cadences (but seems that i remember he did stay within a key).

We are singing Poulenc's gloria currently.  It's really a #$@$ to sing .  Beautiful nonetheless.  I will look out for what you are saying, and do some reading on Poulenc.  Thanks for the post.

[pianistimo]

you sing, too?  that's great!  so much can be learned from vocal music and added to increase knowledge of how to create a flowing melodic phrase (even within modality).  isn't there another composer that wrote a Magnum Mysterium?  it was performed last year by the temple university singers, i believe.  also, they performed belshazzar's feast by ?  and it had some interesting harmonies. 

so nice to chat with all of you.  i am nowhere near a professor - just adding my two cents.  sometimes it's fun to experiment with less rules in the head.  but, of course, when you are a professional composer - you don't necessarily have the rules as foremost , but as a guide.  thereby, not writing crap most of the time.  or, something that never gets an ending.  or perhaps never really gets off the ground in the first place.

very interesting what you wrote about st. john's passion and how it is so chromatic - expressing the angst of the crucifixion.  btw, at my son's school - the tardy slips are signed 'angst.'  at first i thought it was a real person. now, i see!

[ksnmohan]

 

Quote from asyncopated

I would like to make the claim that actually bach was just at home writing discordant harmonies (when the situation called for it) as he did concordant harmonies.

Fully agree. 

Even in  Brandenburg Concert No 3 - from the six considered the most pleasant and popular of Bach's Chamber Music works.  Of course in both St. John's and St Mathews Passions, where there is plenty of story and drama to resort to  discordant harmonies.

The suggestion to study more on atonality (in our Indian classical music it is called "VAKRA" - a sanskrit word) and discordant harmonies, just as creating new rhythm
patterns (not just new percussion instruments/sounds) should be some of the objectives of  budding composers.

Thanks for the suggestions!

Prof K S (Mohan) Narayanan
Musicologist. Composer, Teacher
Chennai (Madras), India 

 




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