WESTERN HARMONY How to learn it and use in in compositions. Help me please.

[musicioso]

Hallo dear people,

In another topic someone said: to teach western harmony is to teach Bach.

I have the ambition to learn composing music. I know how to improvise on several scales so when i have good inspiration I often come up with real nice melodies. But I cant fill my music with those nice spherical harmonies you know..  I mean chords that suite my melodies well.

Some times i have some very nice things i my HEAD, but i cant bring it out because playing and recognizing chords by ear is to difficult for me. Do you guys know some theory, exercises and books that teachs this kind of things?


For example, this one. The melody is very easy here, but those sounds at the backgrounds makes this piece amazing. And I know i cant be Hans Zimmer, but is there any way to learn to compose A LITTLE BIT like this?

[quantum]

A New Approach to Keyboard Harmony.  Has you learning harmony at the keyboard.  Exercises are intended to be played.  Great if you have basic training in harmony or if you study with a teacher.  The book works mostly with music examples rather than detailed explanations.  
https://www.amazon.com/New-Approach-Keyboard-Harmony/dp/0393950018

Harmony and Voice Leading (3rd Edition).  Very detailed with verbose explanations.  The functions of chords are discussed at length.  Many musical examples from the Western Art Music canon compliment the text.  
https://www.amazon.ca/Harmony-Voice-Leading-Edward-Aldwell/dp/0155062425

The two books above may go well together.  

[quantum]

For composition, I'd think it would benefit you to listen to many different works by composers.  Listen and follow the score. See how they use harmony and their use of orchestration. 

Don't be afraid to experiment with harmony.  Use what sounds good to the ear rather than trying to stick to theoretical conventions.  Play a bunch of notes on the piano, if you like the sound make a note of it.  If you don't like it change part of the chord, or play a succession of chords and find the one that fits the best. 

Remember that harmony also works horizontally, good harmonies are not isolated chords, but often occur as a progression of chords.  You need to put the harmony in context. 

Example: 

Take this collection of chords:

C, D7, G, Bb, C7, F

Now put in some inversions:

C, D7/C, G/B, Bb, C7/Bb, F/A

Beethoven must have liked that  so did Rodgers and Hammerstein. 

[ted]

In addition to what quantum says, I suggest you make improvisation a habit. Literally hundreds of new musical ideas, including harmonic ones, can be tried and experienced in a few minutes of improvisation, and allowed to sink into the brain for assessment of value and later use. The relation between improvisation and composition is variable, complex and personal, but I cannot think of a really good composer of piano music who was not also a fluent improviser. There has to be some relevance to this fact.

 

[keyboardclass]

Here's a good book and it's free! https://www.archive.org/details/exercisesinmelod00goet

[mad_max2024]

I am also interested in knowing more about harmony and will maybe give those books a go.

Does anyone know of any books/website/database/etc where we could find detailed analysis of famous piano pieces?