Chapter 1 Flashcards
Tension Resolution and the power of V
How do good songs build to a climax?
Like good sex, good songs build to a climax, a moment of truth when music and lyrics combine to reach a peak of emotional intensity with which the listener can instinctively identify. Even humble nursery rhymes tend to feature a natural focus of energy – whether at the end of a verse, bridge or chorus - that defines their structure as our brains subconsciously process the natural ebb and flow of sounds that we call music.
How is the tonic or I chord used differently from the dominant or V chord?
While the tonic, the I chord in a key, acts as a stable, peaceful sense of musical ‘home’, the V is an inherently unstable beast used deliberately to create essential musical tension – without which there is no song.
The Fab Four’s cover of ‘Twist And Shout’. As every budding muso knows, the vocal arrangement here spells out, very precisely, the notes of an A7 chord, the dominant in the song’s key of D. The A in the guitars set the scene but The Beatles reinforce the sound and power of the dominant with an ear-grating statement in the vocals. There’s really no need to refer back to Appendix 1 for the formal process of building a dominant seventh chord by harmonizing the major scale. The Beatles do it for us, as John’s A note, George’s C# and Paul’s E stack up, respectively, the root, major 3rd and 5th degrees of an A triad, before John extends the chord with a 7th by jumping to the high G.
A7
Note A C# E G
Degree 1 3 5 7
A D (G) (A)
Ah—————— Shake it up baby now
ah ah ah ah
V————————-V7—————-I (IV) (V)
Tension Resolution
How do we hear the V chord in Twist and shout?
Even this humble episode of Beatlemania demonstrates the fundamental musical truth that, by virtue of its intrinsic instability, we hear the V chord as a tense sonority that demands resolution. This can be achieved, to a greater or lesser extent, depending on the chord it moves to – with the change to the ‘I’ providing a particularly satisfying resolution. Having coiled their harmonic spring, The Beatles finally release it when the V7 eventually moves to I (at 1.36), the ‘home’ D chord our ears had been craving. ‘The ascending arpeggio moment in ‘Twist And Shout’ perfectly conveys the dominant’s wants-to-go-somewhere quality … it lands on D with quasi-orgasmic relief
Central to the understanding of most musical moves is the notion of dissonance in relation to consonance, the generation of tension and its release through resolution. The V7-I change epitomises this as it unwinds the dominant’s inherent tension in what three specific ways ?
a) By resolving the leading note tension
b) By resolving the ‘tritone’ tension through ‘close’ voice-leading.
c) By the natural tendency for ‘perfect fifth’ root-movement
What is the leading note effect?
In the same way that the leading note of a major scale takes a simple melody ‘home’ to its tonic, ‘7-to-8’ (or, Julie Andrews-style, ‘ti-do’), so the presence of that same unstable 7th degree – now recast as the defining major 3rd of the basic V triad – is central to the power of the dominant. In ‘Twist And Shout’ the leading note within the A triad is the C# note which duly slides up that effortless semitone to its home target of D, thereby helping to restore our sense of musical ‘order’. The leading note effect is an essential form of musical propulsion that occurs in any V triad as it moves home to its I chord.
The leading note effect is an essential form of musical propulsion that occurs in any V triad as it moves home to its I chord. Sometimes it may be masked within the musical mayhem, while at other times it may be the focus of attention especially when reinforced by the melody, as captured so clearly in ‘In My Life’. Here the G# leading note found at the end of the pretty, six-note ‘theme’ guitar riff repeatedly drives the song by wanting to move upwards to the tonic. The tension is only released at the very end when the melody finally slides up that satisfying semitone, delivering a textbook Perfect cadence where a song (or a discrete section within it) comes to rest with a feeling of V-I finality.
Tension
G# 3rd of E major stressed
I
I Relaxation
I G# resolves as
I a leading note
I up to tonic A
/ A / E / A /
you more
I V I
Tension Resolution
what is the concept of ‘Perfect fifth’ root movement?
V-I motion isn’t just about the leading note and tritone – the move is essentially named after the root movement that follows one of the most natural moves in music: the descent of a perfect fifth. After all, chord progressions are so called because they do just that – they progress to a destination – with this forward motion usually provided by a strong bass line that creates a root progression. V-I is the strongest of all the many root movements that we will be covering.
How did Paul McCartney instinctively describe the power of V-I root action?
‘If you’re in C and you put it on G – something that’s not the root note … it’s great … By the time you go to C it’s like ‘Thank God he went to C!’ … you can create tension with it. I didn’t know that’s what I was doing. It just sounded nice.’
McCartney is referring to the trick he picked up of playing the fifth degree of the chord in question as the bass note. This has the effect of creating an inversion of the triad, a more unstable sound than if the root had formed the foundation. The point here is to show how McCartney confirms the strong ‘pull’ which the root of V exerts towards the I chord. If this natural tendency is not satisfied, the listener is left with a feeling of suspense.
In a bizarre sense, The Beatles have left us hanging in mid-air for decades with a rogue variation on the fifth-in-the-bass that McCartney describes. For the very last sound on Abbey Road is a nonchalantly plucked A note that ends ‘Her Majesty’. And yet, we are in the key of D and, really, we could do with a D root note for ‘closure’.
/ B7 / Em7 / A7 / D /
Some day make mine
ii V I
Final unresolved A note
note D F# A
Degree 1 3 5
D Major
The 5th of D Major
How does the V-I chord change show us how music works?
The structure of a dominant chord and the V-I chord change shows us how music ‘works’, and why we need tension and resolution to drive a song forward through localised climaxes. Indeed, the self-contained I-V-I theme riff of ‘In My Life’ demonstrates in a nutshell how we only really need the tonic and dominant to create an entire songwriting premise. Not too ambitious, admittedly, but The Beatles used simple I-V-I alternations on several occasions, both as a band and in their solo careers. Just listen to the nursery rhyme verse of ‘All Together Now’ (G-D-G); the chorus of ‘Yellow Submarine’ (again, G-D-G); and the anti-war-mantra-turned-football-chant of ‘Give Peace A Chance’ (D-A-D).
What did Schenker conclude about the V-I ?
Schenker concluded that the presence of V-I is intrinsic to every piece of what he defined loosely as ‘good’ music. His definition related to works widely accepted as tonal music (music that revolves around, and resolves to, a tonic) and in which he observed certain fundamental patterns. Schenker described particularly a ‘vertical’ move that starts on the tonic I chord, develops (or ‘arpeggiates’, as he called it) to V, before returning to rest on I.
How are Dramatic Dominants used in songs?
Notice again how, in so many of these cases, the dominant occurs at the end of a section – usually a bridge, where it is often spotlighted by a ‘stop’ as the instruments drop out, leaving the vocals to deliver the most important line of the song.
How is the V used in Anna Go To Him?
Lyric= What am I supposed to do? Oh oh oh oh oh oh
V=A
How is the V used in It Wont Be Long?
Lyric= You’re coming home
V=B
How is the V used in You Can’t Do That?
Lyric= Because I told you before
V=D7
How is the V used in What You’re Doing?
Lyric= A love thats true its meeeeeeee
V=A
How is the V used in The Night Before?
Lyric= It makes me wanna cry
V=A7
How is the V used in Drive My Car?
Lyric= you can do something in between
V=A7
How is the V used in And Your Bird Can Sing?
Lyric= I’ll be round. I’ll be round.
V=B
How is the V used in Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band?
We’d love to take you home.
V =D7
How is the V used in I am the Walrus?
Lyric= I am the walruss goo goo gojoob
V=E
How is the V used in Birthday?
Lyric= Daaaaaaaance
V=E
