# Romanticism: Against Tonality?



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

The description of _Audacious Euphony_ by Richard Cohn:

*Music theorists have long believed that 19th-century triadic progressions idiomatically extend the diatonic syntax of 18th-century classical tonality, and have accordingly unified the two repertories under a single mode of representation.

Post-structuralist musicologists have challenged this belief, advancing the view that many romantic triadic progressions exceed the reach of classical syntax and are mobilized as the result of a transgressive, anti-syntactic impulse.

In Audacious Euphony, author Richard Cohn takes both of these views to task, arguing that romantic harmony operates under syntactic principles distinct from those that underlie classical tonality, but no less susceptible to systematic definition.

Charting this alternative triadic syntax, Cohn reconceives what consonant triads are, and how they relate to one another. In doing so, he shows that major and minor triads have two distinct natures: one based on their acoustic properties, and the other on their ability to voice-lead smoothly to each other in the chromatic universe.

Whereas their acoustic nature underlies the diatonic tonality of the classical tradition, their voice-leading properties are optimized by the pan-triadic progressions characteristic of the 19th century. 

Audacious Euphony develops a set of inter-related maps that organize intuitions about triadic proximity as seen through the lens of voice-leading proximity, using various geometries related to the 19th-century Tonnetz. This model leads to cogent analyses both of particular compositions and of historical trends across the long nineteenth century. Essential reading for music theorists, Audacious Euphony is also a valuable resource for music historians, performers and composers.*

So here is yet more evidence that tonality "progressed" toward chromaticism, leading ultimately to total chromaticism and the break with tonality.

Blame it on Beethoven and Liszt, not Schoenberg!


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Oh, yes... each one 'ruined' all music thereafter.
Destroyers, ALL! 

(But they did not just 'tear it down,' which no one else going in that same direction while making something new does either. These are 'the extenders,' just as most of the famous painters from past to present have been. (Artists and innovative thinkers in all disciplines tend to do this... shocking.)

But thanks for the quotes from the doc written in uber academese 'proving the posit.'


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## Couchie (Dec 9, 2010)

millionrainbows said:


> Post-structuralist musicologists


Get the tear gas!


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

"Whereas their acoustic nature underlies the diatonic tonality of the classical tradition, their voice-leading properties are optimized by...pan-triadic progressions..."

And thus the seed of destruction was planted, in the form of polyphony and independent melodic lines...Let's blame it on Bach instead.* :lol:
*


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## Klavierspieler (Jul 16, 2011)

millionrainbows said:


> The description of _Audacious Euphony_ by Richard Cohn:
> 
> *Music theorists have long believed that 19th-century triadic progressions idiomatically extend the diatonic syntax of 18th-century classical tonality, and have accordingly unified the two repertories under a single mode of representation.
> 
> ...


I'm not sure if this is deep, or meaningless, or both.


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## quack (Oct 13, 2011)

Tonality is like vampires. Everyone is sure someone killed it once, a long time ago, but there still seems to be lots about.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

"...develops a set of inter-related maps that organize intuitions about triadic proximity as seen through the lens of voice-leading proximity, using various geometries related to the 19th-century Tonnetz. This model leads to cogent analyses both of particular compositions and of historical trends across the long nineteenth century."

I love it when he talks like that! :lol:


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Re: Originally Posted by millionrainbows

"Post-structuralist musicologists"



Couchie said:


> Get the tear gas!


At last, one thing you and I agree upon. Though I would be more inclined to think my instant and painless death-ray (plugs in to any standard 14 amp electrical outlet) is the more prudent choice in this matter -- must exterminate these aliens from outer space before they infect / take over the music theory departments of the world.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

millionrainbows said:


> "Whereas their acoustic nature underlies the diatonic tonality of the classical tradition, their voice-leading properties are optimized by...pan-triadic progressions..."
> 
> 
> 
> ...


I say blame it on the Catholic church and Gregorian Modes... less nutters to offend, at any rate.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

^ Yea what ever you do, just don't mention Wagner sssshhhhhhhhhhhish


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Ah, philosophical postmodernism... it's really an art... all that jargon and without the most remote substance.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

Grant applicants take note: the more you can make a construct in the manner and linguistic style of the OP, compressed into a brief paragraph which then reads like a description of a valid university course as listed in a syllabus, the more likely you are to get your grant.

Young adjunct teacher take note:
All the above is also true in case you are hoping to design and pitch a new course -- because you need another class to boost your income -- follow that model, and the more likely it is your proposed course will approved.

Ah, Academe.


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

PetrB said:


> Grant applicants take note: the more you can make a construct in the manner and linguistic style of the OP, compressed into a brief paragraph which then reads like a description of a valid university course as listed in a syllabus, the more likely you are to get your grant.


You mean all this time I could have been a great academic?! What a world...


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Crudblud said:


> You mean all this time I could have been a great academic?! What a world...


Indeed!, you can *make* and submit your Phd thesis right now with this!: _The Postmodernism Generator_

http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo/


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

aleazk said:


> Indeed!, you can *make* and submit your Phd thesis right now with this!: _The Postmodernism Generator_
> 
> http://www.elsewhere.org/pomo/


Ah, Dr Crudblud I presume


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

EddieRUKiddingVarese said:


> Ah, Dr Crudblud I presume


Have you read Dr's last essays?, they are intriguing!. Such masterpieces of social criticism, like "_The Circular Key: The material paradigm of discourse in the works of Tarantino_", also "_Subcultural Deconstructions: Lyotardist narrative in the works of Glass_", or the classic "_Deconstructing Expressionism: Neocultural Marxism and subcapitalist constructive theory_".


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## Crudblud (Dec 29, 2011)

Here's a taster of my latest essay on Godard's _Film Socialisme_.

"It is a beautiful study of human communication in the face of death, love, life, tragedy, pain, humanity, positively existential in the manner most befitting the protean accomplishments of post-Wittgenstein philosophy filtered through a Freudian critique of Descartes running up a hill and saying to himself "aha, the view is lovely" but is the view really lovely I don't think it is quite as lovely as he thinks Freud thinks he thinks in fact thinking thoughts is not what it is about it is about thinking of thoughts not thoughts themselves of thoughts in a simulacrum in the form of a quincunx walking back down the hill and saying god where is god the search for god in god in in in in life futility beauty preraphaeliteinwordsinthoughtsinhearts for godard's sake cows cartesian copernicus carter moliere leviticus shakespeare an acid polemic against slavery beckett on ibsen on pinter on beckett on shakespeare on dasher on dancer on comet on cupid on pythagoras on beckett said this that and I said oh sam you are a devil meets met wanted mete want with thou art more art d'art d'amore cicero but and and and truffautwasinthesameroomasmeonetimeandheblewhisnoseandgavemethehandkerchiefandokaysoifisheditoutofthebinandlickeditacoupleoftimesbeforeitriedtosellitonebaysomedayimgoingtoselevrythiniownanlivonamtnaiwlffhyblsbiaiaowtuys. It's a masterpiece, I've seen it like seven times."

The formatting is less screwed up in the duodecimo print, I assure you.


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## Guest (Apr 11, 2013)

quack said:


> Tonality is like vampires. Everyone is sure someone killed it once, a long time ago, but there still seems to be lots about.


I'm sure I killed one the other day; I'd stake your life on it!


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## Guest (Apr 11, 2013)

> "In the age of Mozart, distance between keys is linear and easily calculated. In the age of Beethoven, the matter is more complicated"


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Audacious-Euphony-Chromatic-Harmony-Studies/dp/019977269X

I always said Mozart was easy listening!



> "I have aimed to make my ideas about nineteenth-century music accessible to readers uncomfortable with or uninterested in the technical literature in scholarly journals. The core of the exposition assumes no knowledge beyond a semester of undergraduate harmony."


But to explain the exposition to a non-specialist, you might need a post-grad in...whatever it is that Crudblud has!

Come on you eggheads, tell me what this all means...with pictures too please!


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## Sid James (Feb 7, 2009)

Convoluted, pretentious and jargon-laden language (or just distortion of the English language?) aside, that paragraph has a point which I think few musicologists would disagree with regarding the emergence of atonality and its various offshoots in the early 20th century.

A book aimed at anybody wishing to get into classical music which I use as a general primer is _The Rough Guide to Classical Music_ (4th ed., 2005). It lays it down straight in a section called "The Crisis of Tonality." This excerpt (which I put in green italics) is preceded by a basic explanation of concepts such as tonal music, tonal centers, major and minor system (diatonicism), modulations and chromaticism:

_In the nineteenth century, composers started using increasingly prominent chromatic notes and modulating to ever more "distant" keys. Their musical language became increasingly rich and complex - you only need try humming along to Beethoven's Grosse Fuge to realize that chromaticism had come a long way since Mozart. The result was that music began to feel less secure and stable, and it became harder for the listener to predict what will happen next. Many composers such as Schubert, Liszt and Chopin built on Beethoven's chromaticism, but it was Wagner - specifically with the opera Tristan und Isolde - who took tonality to the edge of breaking point, with music in which there are so many and such extreme modulations that it is very difficult to keep up. The famous "Tristan chord," the first chord heard in the prelude and the musical seed of much of the rest of the opera, is the ultimate paradigm of tonal ambiguity: each time it is used it can lead the music into one of many different keys, creating a sense of moving towards ever shifting harmonic goalposts.

Wagner's precedent was taken up by many composers such as Strauss, whose musical language is characterized by unpredictable changes of key - one can feel almost musically sea-sick listening to Metamorphosen - and Mahler, who exploited large-scale tonal ambiguity and sometimes ended symphonies in different keys to which they had begun. But for Schoenberg and Debussy, Wagner's language represented only a starting point._

& I'd add we can go back before Romanticism or even the Classical Era. In an interview which is on a cd I got of his second recording of Bach's _Goldberg Variations_, Glenn Gould says one of the variations (that beautiful and long canon before the end, I think) Bach used the heaviest chromatic loads (Gould says something like that) between Gesualdo and Wagner. EDIT - The wikipedia aritcle on the Goldberg Variations has that very Gould quote under the description of Variation #25.

& as for Schoenberg's contemporaries, Scriabin and Ives where doing similar things (so where others). & another great composer into progressive tonality, other than Mahler, was Nielsen. So I think that blaming Arnie is just silly (& the man was a No. 1 fan of not only Wagner but also Brahms, as is commonly known). So if we blame him we may as well blame all of them (maybe even "God" himself, ol' J.S.?).

Or maybe just better not to blame anyone, just see it as something that happened in music. It's history now - whether you like the music of these composers or not. & judging by the members of this forum, many people listen to them, all of them. So?


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

EddieRUKiddingVarese said:


> Ah, Dr Crudblud I presume


Herr Doktor Doktor Crudblud to you, bud


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

aleazk said:


> Have you read Dr's last essays?, they are intriguing!. Such masterpieces of social criticism, like "_The Circular Key: The material paradigm of discourse in the works of Tarantino_", also "_Subcultural Deconstructions: Lyotardist narrative in the works of Glass_", or the classic "_Deconstructing Expressionism: Neocultural Marxism and subcapitalist constructive theory_".


Careful, someone might toss a grant your way and you'll have to keep that up for at least one year.


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## PetrB (Feb 28, 2012)

millionrainbows said:


> The description of _Audacious Euphony_ by Richard Cohn:
> 
> *Music theorists have long believed that 19th-century triadic progressions idiomatically extend the diatonic syntax of 18th-century classical tonality, and have accordingly unified the two repertories under a single mode of representation.
> 
> ...




Where I come from, that, plus $2.25, gets you on the bus.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Someone needs an emergency remedial course in Strunk and White.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

I'll translate and simplify some of the "gobbledegook" for this unruly classroom of adolescent joker-skeptics, and hopefully we'll see where they stand on some issues of historical perception. Or not... :lol:

The book recognizes the common perception that the Romantic era is part of, and an extension of, the Classical era:
*
Music theorists have long believed that 19th-century triadic progressions idiomatically extend the diatonic syntax of 18th-century classical tonality, and have accordingly unified the two repertories under a single mode of representation. 
*
The opposing "post-structuralist" (modernist) view asserts that Romanticism, although it extended the resources of Classical tonality, was actually undermining it, on the way to a "total chromaticism" which defies tonal analysis, and begins using a syntax which is at odds with CP tonality, even undermining it:
*
Post-structuralist musicologists have challenged this belief, advancing the view that many romantic triadic progressions exceed the reach of classical syntax and are mobilized as the result of a transgressive, anti-syntactic impulse. 
*
I'm not sure where the author stands on this, or how far into the 20th century late-Romanticism he proposes to take this, not having read the tome, but eventually a break with tonal thinking occurred, taking music into chromatic thinking, at which point traditional chord function no longer applies. I'm speaking of Bartók, Stravinsky, and Debussy.

*In Audacious Euphony, author Richard Cohn takes both of these views to task, arguing that romantic harmony operates under syntactic principles distinct from those that underlie classical tonality, but no less susceptible to systematic definition. 
*
Hmmm....chromatic thinking can be systematically defined as well, but its tenets - division of the octave at the tritone, symmetries, localized tone-centric areas, diminished and whole tone ideas - are distinct from both Classical and Romantic practices. A line has been crossed, but that line is difficult to pinpoint, because the change was so gradual, and there are still elements of tonal thinking in all of the composers mentioned above.

So what does the author attempt to accomplish? I'm not sure; at first glance, he seems to want it both ways. He expounds a "major/minor" theory which supposedly resolves any conflict:

*Charting this alternative triadic syntax, Cohn reconceives what consonant triads are, and how they relate to one another. In doing so, he shows that major and minor triads have two distinct natures: one based on their acoustic properties, and the other on their ability to voice-lead smoothly to each other in the chromatic universe.

Whereas their acoustic nature underlies the diatonic tonality of the classical tradition, their voice-leading properties are optimized by the pan-triadic progressions characteristic of the 19th century.

*Hmmm...if, by this, the author is bringing the minor triad into equal stature with the major triad, he is on the right track: the minor third, as a projected interval, becomes more and more prevalent in Romantic minor-tonality, and also in chromatic thinking.

...But "reconceiving what consonance is" seems at odds with the acoustically-defined principle of such, and is really a concession to an expanding view of what dissonance will be _tolerated, _not what it actually _is_.

So, are the Romantics becoming more expansive in their attitude and use of tonal resources? Yes, by using minor keys, which are by their nature more chromatic, which leads to wandering into more distant key-areas via voice-leading...but I must clarify that any "reconception" of consonance/dissonance is just that, a "reconception" of what will be tolerated, since this principle is a well-defined given _(see my blogs, and the chart of consonant/dissonant intervals)._

There comes a time when you must call a spade a spade, and admit that modern chromatic thinking has superceded Classical and, yes, Romantic notions of tonality. Where does one draw this line? The acoustic dimension just seems to perpetuate the ambiguity, since the vertical harmonic dimension is an essential dimension of all "tone-centric" music, a larger category of which tonality is a subset.

I think that most listeners simply decide for themselves what is "pleasant" listening, and do not care whether the bounds of Classical or Romantic tonality have been exceeded.

...But what the author seems to be trying to do is assuage the conflict between "traditional music theorists" (traditionalists) and "post-structuralist musicologists" (pro-modernists) by using a re-definition of musical elements (triads, tolerance of dissonance, and the resultant voice-leading), when in reality, he might be simply placing the differences under a microscope, which excludes macro-attitudes, and which solves nothing.

The real conflict is not in the musical materials (major/minor triads, consonance/dissonance, function/chromaticism), but in the larger historical view of how we interpret these "nuts and bolts" and perceive music's trajectory.

This view of music's historical trajectory is simply a matter of how we view music:

*Do we wish to see Romanticism as the beginnings of a breaking point, leading naturally to modernism and totally chromatic thinking as an undermining of tonality, or do we wish to "absolve" Romanticism by seeing it as an "expansion" of Classical tonality?

*For myself, I see into the chromatic thought-process, and prefer to view it as forever tied to the same tonal resources which are inherent, and common to both, since the twelve-note chromatic scale is common to both.

Yet, tonally-derived chromatic thinking leads away from tonality into ways of thinking and composing which are based on distinctly different ways of treating the twelve-note resource, i.e. "modernism," serial-derived thinking, and the myriad other ways music can be created.

The author, in attempting to smooth-over this rift, has left us "in the lurch." By relating Romanticism to later tonal chromaticism, which is self-evident, he is not telling us anything new;

...and by not touching on how tonally-derived chromatic ways of thinking led to serial thinking, he aids in the removal of the "traditional pedigree" of serial/non-tonal music, and neatly ties-in Romanticism with earlier tradition, thus solidifying its link to tradition.

I don't know if this is by design or out of ignorance; I'd have to read tha book in order to absolve him of being "anti-modernist."


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

Tonality may be like vampires, but it sure doesn't suck !


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## Guest (Apr 11, 2013)

Weston said:


> Someone needs an emergency remedial course in Strunk and White.


Had to look up 'Strunk and White' and found this article, critical of the S and W primer.

http://chronicle.com/article/50-Years-of-Stupid-Grammar/25497

What's interesting is it shows the risks inherent in criticising the grammar and style of other writers, especially when what other writers are doing is criticising the grammar and style of other writers! For example, he criticises their recommendation that 'none' should be followed by a singular, merely on the basis that because Wilde and Stoker use it with a plural, it must be alright.

What I would say about Cohn - and similar technical writers - is that if you're already baulking at the technical vocabulary (which, as a lay consumer of music, I do) you'll struggle to identify poor grammar unless it jumps out and bites you.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

superhorn said:


> Tonality may be like vampires, but it sure doesn't suck !


Tonality has a sense of gravity, so in that sense, it does.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

The connection of Romanticism to Classicism is easily traceable to Neo-Riemann theory, which is described in WIK as follows:

[Neo-Riemannian theory refers to a loose collection of ideas present in the writings of music theorists such as David Lewin, Brian Hyer, Richard Cohn, and Henry Klumpenhouwer. What binds these ideas is a central commitment to relating harmonies directly to each other, *without necessary reference to a tonic. *Initially, those harmonies were major and minor triads; subsequently, neo-Riemannian theory was extended to standard dissonant sonorities as well. Harmonic proximity is characteristically gauged by efficiency of _*voice leading*_. Thus, C major and E minor triads are close by virtue of requiring only a single semitonal shift to move from one to the other. Motion between proximate harmonies is described by simple transformations. For example, motion between a C major and E minor triad, in either direction, is executed by an "L" transformation. Extended progressions of harmonies are characteristically displayed on a geometric plane, or map, which portrays the entire system of harmonic relations _(check out the "moving doughnut" in WIK-ed.)._ Where consensus is lacking is on the question of what is most central to the theory: smooth voice leading, transformations, or the system of relations that is mapped by the geometries. _The theory is often invoked when analyzing harmonic practices within the Late Romantic period characterized by a high degree of chromaticism, including work of Schubert, Liszt, Wagner and Bruckner.]

_Well, there ya go! "Without necessary reference to a tonic" sounds awfully close to being "atonal" to me; I would describe these as "free-floating tonal centers" at best. Plus, in looking at the lattices, which describe a C-Eb-G or m3-M3-5 relationship of major/minor triads, one can see how the existing "tonal/triadic" lattice contains diminished seventh intervals, seen by simply following one of the diagonal lines: A-C-Eb-Gb, etc. (thus graphically demonstrating how tonality contains its own "undoing").

It's easy to see how an alternate lattice could be constructed using three alternate intervals, and violá! You're thinking serially!

_(sarcastically)_ Oh, but this geometry is too complicated for a sensitive, intuitive Romantic like me, who simply likes what he likes, and doesn't need any "rocket science" tone-lattices. :lol: 
I hope you're not in charge of anything complicated in real life, like driving a bus!


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## Petwhac (Jun 9, 2010)

As for the proposition that 'serial thinking' is an inevitable consequence of the romantic era's expansion of classical harmony and tonality; I must refer you to the common logical fallacy-

POST-HOC ERGO PROPTER HOC


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

PetrB said:


> Herr Doktor Doktor Crudblud to you, bud


How could I resist, you mean like this: Dokter Frank Frankenstein Crudblud









Or Doktor Karl Crudblud














Take your pic- vote now!


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## Guest (Apr 12, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> There comes a time when you must call a spade a spade, and admit that modern chromatic thinking has superceded Classical and, yes, Romantic notions of tonality.


Your point here, and the premise of the book seems to dwell on the notion, inherited from history, that there is a natural hierarchy of triads, and of triadic progression and that composers who moved away from the hierarchy were subversives, undermining the natural order of things.

Presumably, most (all?) composers would not have been composing in isolation from either their peers of from history. Aware of what was precedent and current, they would either conform, subvert or experiment, with or without conscious reference to the context of their present and their past.

For some, such experimentation was merely musical; for others, it would have been political: a deliberate act to try and speak using a different musical grammar (or, depending on your point of view, a different language).

None of this is either inevitable, or traceable as a line of deliberate progression, merely enjoyable.


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## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

Romanticism: Against Tonality? Incorrect. 
Desperately searching for minimal similarities to justify your movement? Correct.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Arsakes said:


> Romanticism: Against Tonality? Incorrect.
> Desperately searching for minimal similarities to justify your movement? Correct.


Your pithiness here is in exactly inverse proportion to the truth value of the statements.

Romanticism did indeed lead away from tonality. The fact that concert composers don't use common practice tonality anymore (in any way that composers from Beethoven through Brahms would have recognized) seems to indicate this.


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

The chromatic scale is what led us away from tonality; there are twelve notes, and there always have been. Thus, the chromatic alterations of minor-key scales are really the "gateway into the stronger drug" of chromaticism.

Since tonality is based on a vertical harmonic model, I would argue that tonality is best served using older HIP tunings, tunings which sought to preserve the sonic integrity of its constituent intervals. These older tunings allowed only a limited range of usable key areas.

It's really the rise and gradual emergence of *equal-tempered tuning *which undid tonality; all notes became equal, and the internal workings of tonality, based on scale hierarchies, became undermined. After all, tonality is based on an hierarchy of function and dissonance/consonance which all takes place within a closed circle of a key note; the "key note" to which all other members of the scale refer to, and gain their identity from.


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## Vasks (Dec 9, 2013)

I once was told that everything went downhill harmonically the day some Medieval composer used musica ficta. :lol:


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## Guest (Dec 20, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> The chromatic scale is what led us away from tonality; there are twelve notes, and there always have been. Thus, the chromatic alterations of minor-key scales are really the "gateway into the stronger drug" of chromaticism.


There is a convention that there are 12 notes. In fact, there are more.


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## Guest (Dec 20, 2013)

Hahaha, it's true.

In both senses.

Anyway, I don't see how Romanticism or anything else can be called "against" tonality. Tonality is a particular kind of thing. It not only transmits the illusion of movement (kind of like perspective in art transmits the illusion of three dimensionality), but in its operation, it literally does move. And how it moves is away from wherever it was. It's a developmental kinda thing. And as it develops, it moves farther and farther away from its beginnings. 

Naturally. 

"Against" tonality in that regard would be continuing to write with the same progressions and the same harmonies as your predecessors. That would be truly against the fundamental nature of the beast. 

And if, ultimately, there is no tonality left, that is, no room left to develop any further along the lines that that procedure sets out, then that's OK, too. Ultimately, the roots leave off, and there's a trunk. Ultimately, the trunk leaves off, and there's stems. Ultimately the stems leave off, and there's flowers.

You might as well say that flowers are "against" roots.


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## Funny (Nov 30, 2013)

Lots of good points made, but the underlying "debate" seems about as fruitful as calculating angels on the head of a pin. Clearly there is a steady progression of chromaticism and weakening of tonality from the early Baroque up through Shoenberg. Draw a line anywhere to delineate some quantum change and there will be contradictory examples on either side of it. I don't get what the benefit is of even trying - other than, say, finding a topic for a thesis.


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## Guest (Dec 20, 2013)

If you're a medieval scholar, with medieval presuppositions, then debating the number of angels who can dance on the head of a pin is quite fruitful.

(Well? Somebody hadda say it!)

Anyway, my point is that "steady progression of chromaticism" does not mean "weakening of tonality," any more than "rose blossom" means "weakening of the rose bush's root system."

(And it's "infinite number of angels," by the way.:angel


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