Thread: Baroque "chord progressions"

Originally Posted by millionrainbows

That's correct. If it was applicable, we'd have Bach using what could be called major seventh chords. You said "chord progression," not "CP chord progression."

In Bach's chorales (see the "bible" known as the Riemenschneider 371) we see many examples of IV7 (in major keys).

Originally Posted by EdwardBast

No, it's not correct. Of course the concept of chord progression applies to the Baroque Era. It's just that certain dissonant tones, as in MRs example of a major 7th, weren't considered harmonic tones at the time. They were understood as linear phenomena. Later on such dissonant tones came to be interpreted as chord tones.

See my post just above to MR.

Originally Posted by EdwardBast

You mean where they is treated as a chord tone rather than a contrapuntal dissonance (suspension, passing tone etc.)? Have any handy examples?

I do, mainly IV7 (in the major) and VI7 (in the minor). Do you want the precise bar numbers or will just the title of the chorales suffice?

Originally Posted by EdwardBast

You're right. I think I let my discomfort with using harmonic explanations when linear explanations are available get the better of me.

You had me sweating, Dr. Bast. I like debates where everyone is right.

Originally Posted by TalkingHead

I do, mainly IV7 (in the major) and VI7 (in the minor). Do you want the precise bar numbers or will just the title of the chorales suffice?

I have an old Kalmus edition. Can you cite a few titles?

I'm late responding, but I was in fact thinking of that very part of the first prelude in WTC Book 1.

I agree fully with Woodduck's take on the role of music theory here.

Perhaps more controversially, I think the same idea is applicable to Wagner and the dissolution of tonality. I've started to write a post about that a couple times and may yet finish it in the future.

Originally Posted by isorhythm

I'm late responding, but I was in fact thinking of that very part of the first prelude in WTC Book 1.

I agree fully with Woodduck's take on the role of music theory here.

Perhaps more controversially, I think the same idea is applicable to Wagner and the dissolution of tonality. I've started to write a post about that a couple times and may yet finish it in the future.

You've piqued my interest. You can't back out now.

In the Bach Prelude No. 1, there's a B-C-E-G-C which occurs early on, before the F chord.

In measure 8 of prelude 1 of WTC1 the B in the bass is a suspension that resolves down to A with the change of harmony from C major in m.8 to Am7 in m.9. Dissonances resolving at the change of harmony is common in CP music.

The B in the bass is treated as a dissonance, a suspension, a purely linear event, not as a chord tone. It also sounds, quite obviously, like a suspension.

Any more examples?

P.S. Bach never wrote a maj7 chord. Ever.

Well it has all the notes of a maj7, it sounds like a maj7, it has all the harmonic flavor of a maj7. Call it what you want.

Originally Posted by tdc

Well it has all the notes of a maj7, it sounds like a maj7, it has all the harmonic flavor of a maj7. Call it what you want.

Ok, go ahead and think what you want to, instead of what's right.

I don't think there's any disagreement among us about the harmonic and contrapuntal origin and function of these maj7 chords in Bach. We'd can all see what's happening in the music (can't we?). The disagreement is in the use of the term "chord," which has more than one usage. This strikes me as a meaningless dispute.

It's obvious that Bach doesn't land on seventh chords out of the blue, just for the "color" of it, as happened in the 19th and 20th centuries. But it's interesting to observe what he does with them when they occur. In measure 21 of the WTC first prelude, where the melodic element is more implied than defined, the color of the chord really takes center stage, all the more so because it resolves into a dim7. Of course Bach was not averse to interesting harmonic effects, as heard in some of the extraordinary, expressive chromatic passages in many of his works (the Goldberg Variations and the "Crucifixus" from the B minor Mass come to mind).