I perceive that there is a hang up on this thread, that we gotta have
a leading tone present to qualify for tonality. Tonality can also be
established by just plain harmonies or single chords. If you have a
perfect fifth, or perfect fourth in a vertical aggregate, you have,
according to Schenker, a tonal center present.
Dean
On May 26, 2007, at 7:03 PM, Andrew Stiller wrote:
On May 26, 2007, at 5:53 PM, Phil Daley wrote:
Rock music is non-tonal? That's news to me. Doesn't it do 1-4-5-1?
No it doesn't. The vast majority of rock music is cast in the
dorian or mixolydian modes, neither of which possesses a leading
tone. Furthermore, it is derived from the 12-bar blues, which is
itself decidedly non-tonal (3 parallel, four-note chords,
including what in tonal music would be a [forbidden] retrogression).
It's non-tonal nature allows rock music to be unusually flexible in
its chordal sequences, and a strong final cadence can be formed
from any chord directly to the home chord. The one exception to
this is the authentic cadence, which is for the most part found
only in parodies of classical style (e.g. in "Bohemian Rhapsody").
Because the music is not tonal, some chords that are routine--even
banal--in tonal music have a strikingly different effect when used
in a rock song. My favorite example of this is the song "She's Not
There": the chorus rocks gently between D minor and A minor (the
home key is A dorian), until the words "Don't bother trying to
find her, she's not there," where the progression is Dminor, C, E.
Now, E major is the ordinary dominant chord in A minor and is
utterly routine for music in that key; but in this song it strikes
the ear as a completely unexpected altered chord, whose uncanniness
perfectly illustrates the text.
It is not tonal.
Andrew Stiller
Kallisti Music Press
http://www.kallistimusic.com/
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Dean M. Estabrook
http://deanestabrook.googlepages.com/home
Of all hoaxes, the one which is my most vexing bête noire on a
quotidian basis, is the cereal box top which informs simply,
"Lift Tab to Open." Then, "To Close, Insert Tab Here ." Yeah,
right! In attempting to accomplish the first direction, not only
the tab but also the slit intended to accept the aforementioned
protuberance have both been irreparably disfigured and rendered
dysfunctional. This debacle is then amplified by the misbehavior
of the recalcitrant inner bag, which can not be unsealed sans
mangling it, and hence, will not disperse its contents without
exiting the box itself. All I wanted was a bowl of cereal.
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