Welcome to 2019!

Welcome to my advanced composition students! I look forward to working with you this term.

At the end of this morning's class, I played an example of a short, character piece for piano and flute in which all chords were classifiable as "poly-harmonies," which means the superimposition of different tonal harmonies to produce a non-tonal (i.e., post-tonal) result.

Be aware that some chord superimpositions do not produce a non-tonal sonority, however. For example, if you superimpose an F chord over a G chord, the result is a G¹¹ chord, not a new, post-tonal sonority. If you want to try writing a piece using poly-harmonies, make sure the resulting chord is not classifiable as an existing tonal harmony, and, more importantly, make sure that a chord that might possibly be classifiable as an existing harmony does not function or progress in the way that chord would in tonal music.

One of the most famous examples of poly-harmonies is the so-called "Petroushka Chord," in which F# major and C major triads are superimposed; this was the starting point of the piece played in this morning's class.

If this topic interests you, check out the three blog posts I wrote on Post-Tonal Harmony Ideas; each has audio examples and score examples to follow:

Post-Tonal Harmony Ideas (1)
Post-Tonal Harmony Ideas (2)
Post-Tonal Harmony Ideas (3) – This is the post that contains the piece played in this morning's class.

Finally, although this next link takes you to one of the posts I wrote on a different topic (ostinatos), it has examples of a related topic – bitonality – from The Rite of Spring: Ostinatos; making a lot from a little (2. Rite of Spring). This too may interest you.

If you read any of the above blog posts and find them interesting, please leave a comment in the "Post a comment" section below (you have to be signed-in to your Google account in order to post comments).