Aaron Rabushka wrote:
Perhaps it may be a geeky pecadillo on my part, but "tonal" requires that the tonal center (or the tonal center of the moment, as it may be) be established by it's own dominant and leading tone (thank you IU theory department!). So modal (including the pentatonic modes with no 7th and the hexatonic with a flatted 7th) doesn't qualify. And of course (and fortunately) it is not necessary to agree with this (or even understand it) to enjoy the music.
That seems to be a totally arbitrary distinction, since lots of songs which can be harmonized very easily with typical I and IV and V chords don't use the leading tone at all, not even a flatted 7th.
Does that make them nontonal when they don't include a chordal instrument and tonal when they do?
I would think that tonal music would be music where anybody could easily point to the tonic and say "That's the tonic."
And non-tonal music would be where nobody could point to such a thing. -- David H. Bailey [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [email protected] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
