Group 3
ENHANCE YOUR INTERPRETATIONS THROUGH HARMONIC ANALYSIS WITH BEN LAUDE
Led by tonebase Head of Piano Ben Laude, youâll also be receiving direct feedback from two special guests: Curtis/Juilliard music theory professor and new tonebase artist Eric Wen and pianist/composer/Indiana University music faculty member and tonebase blogger Nicole DiPaolo!
This Intensive is meant for pianists of different skill levels and music theory backgrounds. If youâre new to music analysis, youâll find all the prerequisite knowledge youâll need and more in Ben Laudeâs âMusic Theory Basicsâ course.
Whether youâre just getting your feet wet with Roman numeral analysis, want a better grasp of figured bass, or youâre ready to ascend to the high art of Schenkerian analysis, you WILL improve your skills in music theory and analysis.
Assignments
Follow these steps:
- Submit a piece/passage for approval! Choose a piece of tonal music whose harmony youâd like to understand better. It can be a piece youâre working on, or just one youâd enjoy. For longer works, choose a section that youâd like to focus on.
- Attempt a roman numeral analysis! Begin identifying harmonies and labeling them with roman numerals, either directly to your printed score or digitally using a PDF annotation app. See below for more details (1a, 1b)
- Post your analyses to the thread for feedback! Either take a picture of your handwritten analyses or save a digitally-annotated analyses and upload into the thread below, along with any questions you might have for me, Eric, or Nicole.
- Recommended: Let's hear how your interpretation evolves with your analysis! Post videos to show how your harmonic understanding is influencing your performance.
- Optional: Try out formal analysis, chordal reduction, and more! If you've completed a harmonic analysis and are satisfied with it, move on to analyzing the form of your piece, attempt a chordal reduction, or explore other analytic techniques. See below for more details (2, 3, 4)
For printable staff paper, click here!
More instructions:
- Depending on your music theory background, consider starting at either 1a or 1b and consider how far you'd like to progress beyond harmonic analysis. There's not shame in staying at 1a the whole time!! It can take a while to get the hang of this:
1a. Roman numeral analysis - Diatonic. If youâre new to music analysis, this is a good place to start. Pick a work from the classical period (Mozart, Haydn, Clementi, or Beethoven), identify the key, determine the chord scale, and begin labeling your score with Roman numerals under each distinct harmony. Look out for ânon-chord tones,â notes that donât belong to the given triad or extended chord, but live in between or next door to chord members. When you see accidentals, look for clues in the harmonic progression to help you determine if it's a passing tone/embellishment or if you're entering chromatic harmonic terrain (see 1b). Your piece might modulate, but still remain diatonic to the new key (as in simpler classical works).
1b. Roman numeral analysis - Chromatic. If youâre comfortable analyzing mostly diatonic works from the classical era, consider choosing a romantic piece that features more chromatic progressions (late Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Grieg, Tchaikovsky). Label your score with Roman numerals, indicating modal mixture, applied chords (secondary dominants/leading tone chords), and modulations. Identify what keys you visit and keep track of how you get there.
2. (Optional) Formal analysis. If you've grasped the harmonic content of your piece/passage, you can then move on to analyzing its larger form â how phrases connect to larger sections, what key areas you visit along the way, and how the composer journeys from the tonic to the dominant and back to tonic over the course of the work. Most 18th-19th century music is in one of the following forms: binary form (A/B), ternary form (A/B/A), and sonata form (exposition/development/recapitulation). Romantic works might have more varied forms.
3. (Optional) Chordal reduction. Using voice leading principles, try constructing a chordal reduction of your piece/passage and be able to play it musically.
4. (Optional) Explore other analytic techniques. If you feel confident in your harmonic and formal analysis, consider strengthening your understanding of figured bass (thoroughbass), species counterpoint, schemas (voice leading patterns), and Schenkerian analysis.
RECOMMENDED TONEBASE COURSES
Primary resource
- Ben Laude: Music Theory Basics [Elementary concepts, Roman numerals]
Further resources for more advanced analysis
- Derek Remes: Harmony and Composition in J.S. Bachâs Circle [Intermediate-advanced concepts, figured bass vs roman numeral analysis]
- Derek Remes: Reverse Engineering Bach[Chordal reductions]
- Eric Wen: Music Theory for Pianists through the lens of Schenkerian Analysis [Intermediate-advanced concepts, Schenkerian Analysis]
Recommended reading
- Nicole DiPaolo: Composing for piano â 3 ways to get started [featuring overviews of schemas, scale degrees, and other theory concepts applied to composition]
Fellow Participants in Group 3:
Group 3
priscillayam
Cheryl
Chi Tong
StacyA
Taylor Ma
Don Allen
Chris Griffin
Harriet Kaplan
karin
Amy Reichel
John Mowry
Robert
Randi
Lily Li
Midori
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I'm learning Janacek's In the Mists movement 3 and 4 and here's my attempt at analyzing the piece.
There are several points in the score where I was confused about whether I should interpret a chord as a key change or try to stick with the original key.
I would love to learn how you think the Schenkerian Analysis applies to this piece!
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Ben Laude Just wondering if you, Nicole or Eric had a chance to look at my post for Janacek In the Mists? Thank you!
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Chi Tong I'm so sorry for the delay! It has been a very crazy week for me. Here's some feedback:
- Pretty good work with your labels. I recommend you use the convention of lowercase roman numerals for minor/diminished harmonies, and capitalized roman numerals only for major harmonies.
- Bar 2: Technically you're right, it's the notes of vi. But it's not actually functioning as a vi. This is where you need to listen and see if there's a structurally significant harmonic shift or not. Here, I think not. Rather, the E-flats in the melody can be understood as upper neighbords above the Db in a Gb major tonic chord. Think of bars 1-2 as all roman numeral I, with some non-chord-tones.
- Bars 3-4: Good for you in recognizing it's a V7 chord. Notice the neighbor tones though (Gb and Bb) as they add to the color.
- Bars 5-8 are amazing. You basically got it right, Janacek is abruptly shifting to B minor. But how? He does it through what's called an enharmonic common tone progression, and also through modal borrowing. In other words, the G-flat can be enharmonically respelled as an F-sharp, which he keeps in the bass as a pedal tone through the first 8 bars. The B minor harmony that emerges in bar 5 could be spelled as a C-flat minor chord, which would be minor iv in Gb major (the iv chord borrowed from the parallel minor, Gb minor). Since Cb minor is an awful key with lots of double flats, Janacek uses the enharmonic equivalent, B minor. But now you see how it's related to the tonic.
- Bar 9: Lowercase iv :)
- Bars 9-10: Same thing as 1-2, don't be fooled by the F-sharps. They're actually just upper neighbor tones to the E in the iv chord.
- Bars 11-15 are really unusual. I actually think 11-13 can sort of be heard as functioning as a passing tonic in B minor, with lots of non chord tones (the persistent B and F-sharp in the top voices, and the walking bass down from D to C# to B make me hear it this way). It passes down to an F# bass in bar 14 which is a straightforward V chord in B minor (with an added 9). Bar 15 then shifts our attention to C# minor (through its iiÂș chord), which I actually think is the first hint of a return to Gb major. Why? Because C# minor is enharmonically Db minor, with is minor v in Gb.
- Thinking this way helps us understand what Janacek us up to in 16-30. Quickly, if interpreted in Gb, you can analyze it like this:
C#m (iv) - E major (bVI) ... enharmonic common tone modulation to Ab (V/V) - Db (V)
He then goes through E major again (bVI), visiting A major (V / bVI), which shares an enharmonic common tone again (C# - Db), which helps him get back to Db major (V) via C-sharp major (its enharmonic equivalent).
- You analyze it as modulating to Db. That's fine too, so long as you see that the purpose is ultimately to return to the tonic, Gb. It's such a chromatic passage that the simpler you can keep it, the better. You could even analyze the whole page in Gb, and just call the move to B minor a tonicizing of minor iv (Cb minor spelled enharmonically).
Good work for a very, very advanced analysis! This is post-Wagnerian harmony, which really extends beyond the scope of this two-week intensive, but it was fun helping you with it. I hope what I wrote made sense, and can help you understand what's actually simple underneaht Janacek's otherwise complex surface â namely, that he never really loses his Gb tonic, but only visits strange parallel universes through enharmonics and common tone relations.
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Harmonic Analysis Group 3 For those waiting on feedback, I will get to you tomorrow (Tuesday) morning first thing! Nicole might also be able to help you in the mean time. Thanks for your patience.
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Harmonic Analysis Group 3
Dear all! Just a few words on how I'm approaching closing out this Two Week Intensive:- If you haven't received direct written feedback from me, you will. I've just been juggling a few commitments at the moment and it will probably take me through tomorrow (Wednesday) evening to get to everybody. Nicole will be making her last round as well!
- If I've already responded to you, I likely will not have time to follow up with another written response. However, on Thursday I'm planning to record a video commentary in which I follow up with each participant one final time. This will be much more efficient for me, and also allow me to show you a few things at the piano that I take away from your analyses. I encourage you to watch the whole video, not just the part responding to your analysis, as there is much to learn from everyone's submissions.
- I am recording a Zoom call with Eric Wen tomorrow morning in which he'll discuss 6 pieces, 2 by Bach, 2 by Beethoven, and 2 by Chopin, each of which is among the submissions across the four groups. I encourage you to watch this video too, as his perspective is very rich and filled with implications for performance.
- As we wrap up our analyses and start thinking about implications for performance, I once again encourage you to post videos of yourself playing the passage we studied to together, and offering a word or two about how your newfound harmonic understanding has influenced how you approach the piece. It needn't be profound! And, if you're not sure exactly how your analysis should translate to performance, that's okay. But I'll try to offer some ideas in the video I create.
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Harmonic Analysis Group 3 Dear all - as promised, here is the analysis session I recorded with Eric Wen, especially for this Two Week Intensive!
Wen and I break down passages from Mozart's Sonata K. 545 and Fantasy K 397 before turning to the first page of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata to discuss what's so enchanting and tragic about the harmonic motion. We finish with a peek at the opening of Chopin's E-flat Nocturne, Op. 9 No. 2.
I believe you will all find it helpful to watch us analyze and play this music. I chose the pieces and topics directly from this Intensive. Even if the piece you analyzed isn't present here, you'll likely find many insights that do apply to your piece.
It's a long, unedited video, so there will be some down time as we transition between pieces. Apologies in advance for my clumsy use of the editor in my PDF Preview. Not ideal. But I eventually get the hang of it!See the description for chapter timecodes!
