Class 11

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you all had lots of food and fun times yesterday. I am in Virginia with family right now and was just thinking that I hadn't posted yet. So here it is.

Last class was sort of a continuation of last week's class. We talked about the diatonic chords in a minor key. You remember the diatonic chords in a major key, right?

I ii iii IV V vi vii°

The diatonic chords in a minor key are similar, with one exception. First, think of the minor chords as the relative minors to the major chords. If we begin on scale degree 6 (vi) and turn it into our new 1 (i), we can write our minor chords as follows:

i ii° III iv v VI VII

Does that make sense? The relative minor of a major key (take C major, for example) is a 3rd below the tonic (so the relative minor of C major is A minor). So our tonic chord (the one chord) for A minor is the same as the vi chord in C major.

Here's the exception I was talking about. Remember minor scales -- natural, harmonic, melodic? I talked about how the harmonic scale was the most used minor scale. This is because the 7th scale degree is raised a half step. This raised 7th scale degree creates a nice lead-in to the 1, and is used more than the regular, diatonic natural 7. Anyway, if we raise the 7th scale scale degree in our minor chords, we change the chords that use the 7th. This means the v chord, whose middle tone is the 7th degree, becomes major (V) and the VII chord, whose root is the 7th degree, becomes diminished (vii°). We will leave the III chord alone for right now, even though its top note is the 7th degree. So with those two changes, we now have:

i ii° III iv V VI vii°

If you don't quite understand yet, don't worry. We'll review much of this next semester as we get into more composition. For now, just remember that the V chord is major whether you are in a minor key or a major key (and also that the vii° chord is diminished).

By the way, we do have class this coming Monday (December 1). Thanks again for your faithfulness. God bless!

Josh

P.S. Here's a link to the homework.

Class 10

Wow. Ten classes so far. You guys have really come a long way really fast. I'm proud of you all for sticking with it and learning some great stuff. Last class was another sort of "practice" day where we tried out some things we've learned. We transcribed sets of four notes in a given key signature. We looked some more at analyzing hymns (which we will do more of next semester). I've decided to go ahead and have class today (November 24) in spite of the fact that some of you are out of town. You should be fine if you check the blog later on after class. There will be a pretty substantial homework sheet for today's upcoming class, so make sure you take a look at it. I will let all of you know about next week.

later!

Josh

Class 9

Okay, so I'm a week late with this post. Sorry. We didn't go over much new information in this class, which is fine because we're getting into some pretty thick theory.

Roman numeral analysis is tedious at first, but I promise it gets easier. Remember when you were learning to read? (I don't actually remember that far back, but I'm imagining here.) You knew your alphabet already, and you knew how to speak. Learning to read was simply a matter of putting together these letters you knew into words you knew. Well, maybe it wasn't as easy as that, but you get the idea. Think of chords as words. We're taking the notes you already know and putting them together to form sounds you already are familiar with. This median process of reading the chords is much like reading words. Once you begin figuring out patterns and common happenings (like cadences), the whole thing becomes much easier.

In this class we learned about secondary dominants. A secondary dominant is any non-diatonic chord that functions as the dominant (leading) to its own tonic. For example, say we're in the key of G. You're going along minding your own business when all of a sudden you see an A chord. Well an A chord has a C#, which is not in the key signature, so you make a guess that this chord may be a secondary dominant. You look at the next chord and see that it's a D chord. You think about it and remember that an A chord is the dominant of D (in other words, an A chord is the dominant -- 5th -- in the key of D). This A chord is functioning as a secondary dominant.

More on secondary chords later. Your homework was to analyze the hymn "Holy, Holy, Holy." God bless!

Josh

Class 8

In today's class we transcribed a song from memory and began analyzing a hymn. Both of these exercises combine a lot of what we've learned from all previous classes -- such as key signatures, intervals, chords, etc. To me, this is where the rubber meets the road. As you keep practicing skills like transcribing and analyzing music, you will become more comfortable with the language aspect of music. Some day I hope it becomes second nature to you so that you can think and "speak" in the musical language.

In transcribing music, it is important to recognize the tonal center of the song, which is the tonic, or first scale degree. Then you can relate all the other pithes to it and to each other. We will be doing some more transcription from memory soon.

Roman numeral analysis is a much more scientific exercise. I haven't yet formalized any set of steps for analyzing a piece of music, but this might help you if you're having some trouble:

1. First write down (somewhere on the page) all of the diatonic triads of the key the song is in. This will help you unscramble the notes of each chord.
2. Figure out if the chord has three notes or more than three notes. Three notes equals a triad, so one of the pitches is being doubled. Ignore the doubled pitch and then figure out what chord it is.
3. If there are four pitches, think dominant 7th. It could be something else, but it is most likely a dominant 7th (meaning it is a V chord).
4. Figure out the inversion. The inversion is determined by the bass note. No exception. If the bass note is on the root, the entire chord is in root position, et al.

Also be on the lookout for notes that are hanging over. Any note that is sounding counts as part of the chord.

I talked to some of you about your thoughts on the class so far and whether or not to continue next semester. I got good feedback and am definitely thinking about continuing next spring. There is so much left to learn, and I don't claim to know it all. But there is a lot left we could learn and compose. I'll keep you updated.

One more thing. Some of you mentioned you won't be here the Monday of Thanksgiving week. Let me know if you'll be here or not. Either email me or leave a comment or text me (859-2298). Thanks!

Josh

P.S. Here's a link to the homework.