Timeline for Is Fantaisie Impromptu actually in G# Phrygian?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
16 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| S Apr 12, 2023 at 4:05 | vote | accept | chopinliszt | ||
| Apr 12, 2023 at 4:04 | answer | added | chopinliszt | timeline score: 1 | |
| Dec 18, 2022 at 18:25 | answer | added | Lazy | timeline score: 1 | |
| Dec 18, 2022 at 12:51 | vote | accept | chopinliszt | ||
| S Apr 12, 2023 at 4:05 | |||||
| Dec 17, 2022 at 18:20 | comment | added | Aaron | I'm repeating myself, but you really should open a separate question for this. The question and answers here are clearly focused on the Chopin piece. But since your question is really about how to analyze a melody in isolation, you would get the most understandable answers if you create a new question, write out only the melody line absent any of the rest of the piece, and ask how one would go about analyzing that melody. | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 17:11 | answer | added | Dekkadeci | timeline score: 3 | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 12:59 | comment | added | chopinliszt | I’m having trouble with explanations of the tonality which are based on the harmony because to me this melody has an existence separate from the chords in the left hand. If I play the melody on its own without the embellishments, just the first note of each bar, it still sounds the same. The addition of the harmony doesn’t radically change my perception of the melody. So I find it difficult to believe the harmony is establishing the tonic. It seems like the melody has its own tonic, which may not be the same as the harmony’s. | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 12:43 | comment | added | chopinliszt | @Dekkadeci but if we consider the melody in isolation, without the harmony, what reason at all is there to consider C# the tonic? The melody begins and resolves on G#, and if you play an additional C# at the end, or replace the final G# with a C#, it doesn’t sound right. How do you draw the line between the melody merely emphasising the 5th scale degree and the 5th scale degree actually being the tonic? This is what I’m asking. | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 7:27 | comment | added | Dekkadeci | The entire section you added in an edit has its tonic be E, not G#. Again, music and melodies can strongly emphasize scale degrees other than the tonic. (I am reminded again of one of the second final boss's themes in Kirby Star Allies, "La follia d'amore", and how strongly it emphasizes the 5th scale degree in the melody.) | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 5:52 | comment | added | Aaron | Your recent edit should be asked as a new question so as not to invalidate the current answers. The analysis of a melody alone is potentially quite different than one that is embedded in a harmony. | |
| Dec 17, 2022 at 5:40 | history | edited | chopinliszt | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Responded to answers
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| Dec 17, 2022 at 2:32 | answer | added | phoog | timeline score: 4 | |
| Dec 16, 2022 at 23:13 | comment | added | Todd Wilcox | Baroque, classical, and romantic music is rarely strictly in one key with no chromatic alterations. In particular, a piece or movement in a major key will very often explore the major key that is a fifth higher, and a piece in a minor key will often explore the major key a third higher and/or the minor or major key a fifth higher. For there to be material leading to a cadence in G# in a piece that is mostly in C# minor would not be unusual at all. It doesn’t change the key of the piece and it’s very rarely helpful to interpret any key areas modally. | |
| Dec 16, 2022 at 19:01 | answer | added | Michael Curtis | timeline score: 4 | |
| Dec 16, 2022 at 16:46 | comment | added | Dekkadeci | I strongly believe the tonic of the first section is still C# - the music comes to rest on a C# into a C# minor arpeggio in Bar 3, and the previous Bars 1-2 are on G#s that we later find were unresolved. Music and melodies can strongly emphasize the 5th scale degree instead of the tonic - even Chopin's "Ocean" etude (in C minor) ends with the 5th scale degree in the melody! | |
| Dec 16, 2022 at 15:19 | history | asked | chopinliszt | CC BY-SA 4.0 |