Wednesday, November 22, 2006
Lesson - 63 : Chords and Harmony writing - A Perspective Insight - Part-2
In our last session we saw the enormous permutation & combination possibilities of writing a chord for a single note.
Of course, the choices can be narrowed down, if the Scale of song is fixed, and if the position of the given note is fixed i.e. whether given note shall be at bottom, or middle, or top is made clear.
As touched upon earlier, the formulation of a problem in a Harmony writing situation is as follows :
(very straightforward & simple case, 3 notes chord formation, or 3-part writing…)
In a song composed of single line, (as is always done initially), there are sequence of notes written horizontally & arranged with its time duration.
Now the task given to us is to add the other two parts below it for each note……
Meaning……you add two other notes below for each note to make that appears as a sequence of Chords…..! Placed side by side....!
Here, the position of each notes is fixed, ie each of the given note shall be at top.
Also, given the song in particular scale, the Scale is also known (unless the scale is modulating, which will make the case further complex ...)
For example, Imagine the first note as C……!
As seen above, you can visualize that note as
the root of C-Major Chord (C-E-G), or
3rd of A-Minor Chord, (A-C-E) or
5th of F-Minor Chord…….. (F-A-C)
Agreed……?
Again whatever chord selected you can have two other variations based on the type we want as the root chord or, 1st inversion chord or 2nd inversion chord….!
Agreed…..?
So atleast 6 possibilities are there for you to select from….!
This situation is For ONE SINGLE NOTE at any given moment……! ……..And a song consists of hundred of such notes……..! ….
Mind blowing possibilities of writing chords……!
Can you visualize that mathematical / flow chart model which demands you to make a decision on every note by note and proceed…..????
Testing your skills and abilities to ANALYSE and DECIDE …. ! for each note of the song.....!
Its TERRIFIC…..!
Even the CEO of any Corporate Giant will be doing such decision making job….?….I doubt…!
Even in their life time put together….they may not have such tense moments of requiring hundreds of instant decisions… !
And please mind the fact, music is not such mathematic complexity alone…..!
Its a matter of Creativity...!
Its about the quality of sound ...! …..Feeeeeling……!
…..Sound quality ….that is Acceptable, Un-acceptable, Desirable, Tolerable, Manageable (after treatment)… etc etc…….!
So, it is not just making the chords mathematically….!
Now, one more dimension of the complexity is arising when two such chords are placed adjacently side by side….further there is inter-relationships develop,
Between notes to notes….vertically……as well as horizontally…… ! as well as development of chord-to-chord relations..!
which again needs to be examined microscopically……! based on various harmony rules etc..!
and again to be decided on the selection of individual notes and chord formations….!
A cylce of iterative processes to be done, still one is satisfied quantitatively, qualitatively and creatively..!
Let us see a little bit more on this aspect in our next session.
Of course, the choices can be narrowed down, if the Scale of song is fixed, and if the position of the given note is fixed i.e. whether given note shall be at bottom, or middle, or top is made clear.
As touched upon earlier, the formulation of a problem in a Harmony writing situation is as follows :
(very straightforward & simple case, 3 notes chord formation, or 3-part writing…)
In a song composed of single line, (as is always done initially), there are sequence of notes written horizontally & arranged with its time duration.
Now the task given to us is to add the other two parts below it for each note……
Meaning……you add two other notes below for each note to make that appears as a sequence of Chords…..! Placed side by side....!
Here, the position of each notes is fixed, ie each of the given note shall be at top.
Also, given the song in particular scale, the Scale is also known (unless the scale is modulating, which will make the case further complex ...)
For example, Imagine the first note as C……!
As seen above, you can visualize that note as
the root of C-Major Chord (C-E-G), or
3rd of A-Minor Chord, (A-C-E) or
5th of F-Minor Chord…….. (F-A-C)
Agreed……?
Again whatever chord selected you can have two other variations based on the type we want as the root chord or, 1st inversion chord or 2nd inversion chord….!
Agreed…..?
So atleast 6 possibilities are there for you to select from….!
This situation is For ONE SINGLE NOTE at any given moment……! ……..And a song consists of hundred of such notes……..! ….
Mind blowing possibilities of writing chords……!
Can you visualize that mathematical / flow chart model which demands you to make a decision on every note by note and proceed…..????
Testing your skills and abilities to ANALYSE and DECIDE …. ! for each note of the song.....!
Its TERRIFIC…..!
Even the CEO of any Corporate Giant will be doing such decision making job….?….I doubt…!
Even in their life time put together….they may not have such tense moments of requiring hundreds of instant decisions… !
And please mind the fact, music is not such mathematic complexity alone…..!
Its a matter of Creativity...!
Its about the quality of sound ...! …..Feeeeeling……!
…..Sound quality ….that is Acceptable, Un-acceptable, Desirable, Tolerable, Manageable (after treatment)… etc etc…….!
So, it is not just making the chords mathematically….!
Now, one more dimension of the complexity is arising when two such chords are placed adjacently side by side….further there is inter-relationships develop,
Between notes to notes….vertically……as well as horizontally…… ! as well as development of chord-to-chord relations..!
which again needs to be examined microscopically……! based on various harmony rules etc..!
and again to be decided on the selection of individual notes and chord formations….!
A cylce of iterative processes to be done, still one is satisfied quantitatively, qualitatively and creatively..!
Let us see a little bit more on this aspect in our next session.
# posted by CSR @ Wednesday, November 22, 2006 
