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I've recently had a go at analysing Arctic Monkeys' song R U Mine and was wondering about this part shown here: enter image description here

The key of the song is F# minor and and the measure shown starts with a non-chord tone. this is because the chord used is a B minor in second inversion and the C# in the melody is a a neighbouring tone. it was prepared by a B and resolves to a B.

What I'm having trouble with is that the B chord continues and the melody Leaps down to a G# and then leaps back up/resolves to a B. I don't know of any non-chord tone that is prepared and resolved using leaps.

So I was wondering if it still a non-chord tone and if so what kind, or is this perhaps a different chord?

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  • There is something very weird with this sheet music - your vocal part has been written as a transposing part, i.e. with a different key-signature. Do you know why this is? If you could tell us, this would help us analyse the pitches in the harmony/melody for you.
    – Bob Broadley
    May 29, 2018 at 15:16
  • It looks as though the melody part is a Bb part, i.e. sounding two semitones lower. This would make the last two melody notes F#-A, which would make more sense with the F#s in the other parts.
    – Bob Broadley
    May 29, 2018 at 15:20
  • Thank Bob. i have no idea why the melody was written in a different key. this was the only version i could find. also what do u mean when u say that the last melody notes are two semitones lower?
    – Sa'dMaudarbux
    May 29, 2018 at 15:22
  • Ah-hah, that makes sense. The key signatures work out. And that would mean the melody goes from B down to F# and ends with a bend from A up to C# (I'm assuming that number is counting semitones). From a quick listen to the start of the song, that looks about right.
    – Bruce Fields
    May 29, 2018 at 15:25
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    If it was written for sax, it'd be either tenor or soprano. Although a 5 semitone bend is not going to be easy...
    – Tim
    May 29, 2018 at 16:18

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So as Bob Broadley points out in the comments, the top part is written for a Bb transposing instrument (maybe tenor sax?), which means it actually sounds a whole step lower than written. So the melody in that bar starts on B, goes down to A then F#, then ends on a bend from A up to C#.

All the notes in the accompaniment are just F#'s.

From a quick listen to the song, that looks approximately correct.

The F#'s don't give us much information about the harmony, but I would have called it just a plain F# minor. Then the ending is just bending from the minor third to the fifth of that chord.

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If you want to do a pitch analysis of this piece, you need to make sure you know what the actual sounding pitches of all parts are. As you are using a score with a transposing instrument on the vocal line (Tenor Sax), these pitches sound differently to how they look on the score. So, before starting an analysis, it would be easiest to transpose all of the melody line pitches down two semitones. (If you want to save yourself a lot of hassle, you could just write the sounding pitches in next to the notes on the score using their letter names, instead of rewriting the actual music.)

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