The Red Chord

follows only the second and third refrains, and an outro. The melody is undoubtedly bluesy, but further innovates on the blues form by adding a flatted III chord into the standard three chord progression of I, IV, V. It emphasizes this flat III chord – this serves to create dissonance and lends an interesting contrast to the main A major chord structure.…

This is because for popular music there is a specific style for the chord progression that makes a pop song a pop song. In a chapter in the textbook The Musician’s Guide to Theory and Analysis, it talks about the popular music chord progression. The textbook says the chord progression is I V VI IV (Clendinning). This progression makes the popular music stand out and catchy to some. The textbook says that these chords are the base for the song and that all a musician has to do it repeat them…

basic harmonies in D-flat major before moving into the coda (Figure 3). The climax begins with a tonic triad in second inversion which leads to a vi then a I in first inversion before a ii minor seventh chord in first inversion gives way to the pinnacle harmony of the climax in mm. 60: a V chord with a suspended fourth that does not resolve until a measure and a half later giving us a V7 and resolves naturally to a I. During the Vsus4 harmony, there is a massive, sweeping arpeggio outlining the…

The IV Ciclo Nordestino Op. 43 In order to understand the IV Ciclo Nordestino Op. 43, it would be empirical to understand Nobre’s first three piano cycles. “According to Bernardo Scarambone, “Ciclos Nordestinos” are Cycles from Northeast Brazil, where Nobre was born and spent part of his life. Nobre had as main goal to preserve his cultural identity as a composer. The first “Ciclo Nordestino Op. 5 was composed in 1959 and dedicated to Mozart de Araújo who was a Nobre’s friend.” The…

is a series of different performances. Each song that I play possesses its own unique rhythms and strumming patterns, but the chord progression remains the same. Each task that I take on includes its own circumstances and barriers, but the attributes remain the same. Although I continue to grow and strive to determine my identity, I recognize that these three reliable chords represent the three qualities I possess: determination, charm, and versatility. As I have grown, these three…

entrainment as opposed to other cognitive training processes. For example, it is expected for harmonies to resolve in a specific manner. This can be demonstrated through chord progressions, especially in Western music of the eighteenth century. In his article, Emotion and Meaning in Music, Leonard B. Meyer gives the following chord progression as an example of the expectation of resolution (example 1). When listening to this harmonic sequence, it is expected that it ends with the tonic, C…

explore within it. A well-known Caribbean musician is Bob Marley and I know that he uses a lot of syncopation in one of his best songs “three little birds”. In this song you can hear the syncopation in the hi-hat, cymbals, organ and guitar; playing the chords. In this way, he plays with our expectations of where the beat should occur and loosen up the rhythm and give it life. I chose AoS1 because wanted to explore syncopation in both melodic and the rhythmic section lines. I have done this…

progression in g minor again, but changes from the original statement by staying in g minor and using a iv-i progression to provide a plagal cadence feeling by the repetition of the iv chord in mm.6-8. The first phrase of the consequent is parallel to the first phrase of the antecedent, but the difference is that it is over a v6 chord in measure nine, which created a HC to resolve the second phrase of the antecedent. The fourth phrase (mm. 13-16) mimics the beginning motif again but uses a…

Talent from the 1960’s vs. Today’s I’ve always wondered what happened to the music industry? What happened to the simpler music about love and peace? Now a-days there’s hardly ever any meaning to lyrics. All we here about are breakups, parties, the luxurious life that these artists are living, or artists hating on other people. We have artists that always take it that extra step when it comes to tuning their voices on their tracks that it makes them sound like robots, or take it that extra step…

Standardizing the visual language has always proved to be a challenge amongst all kinds of artists especially filmmakers. This, in turn, has spawned a collection of individualistic visual expressions in respect to every different director and filmmaker. Through the visualisation of elements within both our daily lives and those of imaginative scapes, the audience are subsequently exposed to an array of overt influences that minutely alter their subconscious mindsets. These messages and symbols,…