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  • At the second bar where the notes are A,D,C

is this D/A ? but isn't the third note (F#) something you can't omit ?

  • Through out this piece there is a bunch of sudden inversion the makes a lot of gaps..

like at the beginning bar G to C/E ? and going back to C ?

isn't this kind of weird ? I don't know but I feel awkward and weird when the inversion chord appears first and go back to the regular form.

I also feel the song is somehow unorganized because of all this inversions going all over the place.

But when I here the song it sounds great. Am I analyzing this wrong ?

Because on my last question (Analyzing Tschaikowsky's "Wintermorgen" 3)

Richard told me

"In this repertoire, it's not always important to label every single chord. Sometimes a composer just moves some pitches around by step and the "chord" that it creates is just an accident. I really think that's what's happening here. I don't personally think it's important to label "G7/F" in the second measure of the second system; I think it's much better to see the larger pattern of the voice exchange between the alto and bass."

Then how do I analyze pieces the right and accurate ways ?

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    This isn't physics, chemistry, mechanics or any other science. It's an art form, and as such will often defy being analysed, especially using chord theory. I often wonder what the points of analysis are, especially when an analysis may well be flawed in itself.
    – Tim
    Commented Mar 3, 2019 at 8:30
  • @Tim I analyze songs so I could know how was the song built and learn from it so I could adapt to my work
    – Hyun Yoo Park
    Commented Mar 3, 2019 at 10:50
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    Well, it appears that you've learned that Tschaikowsky decided to make some chords without all the 'right' notes. He did it because he could.Maybe this underlines the oft-quoted 'it's only theory'?
    – Tim
    Commented Mar 3, 2019 at 12:09

2 Answers 2

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There's a reason there are so many inversions in this particular piece: notice that the bass is in parallel thirds with the melody the entire time!

As for an inversion appearing before the root-position version of a given chord, that's not unheard of or rare by any means; it's actually relatively common.

And you're correct that you usually don't omit the third. But in a piece with as sparse a texture as this, occasionally composers will bend the rules a bit, and this is one of those instances; we still understand this chord at the end of the second measure to be a V43 even if there isn't an F♯ in it.

(PS: This is great repertoire that I didn't know; thanks for introducing it to us!)

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  • What do you mean by "the bass is in parallel sixths with the melody the entire time" ? are you talking about the intervals between the melody and the bass ? Because I don't see any six
    – Hyun Yoo Park
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 7:51
  • @HyunYooPark Oof, I meant parallel thirds! Thanks, I'll fix it.
    – Richard
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 14:36
  • Wow I never noticed that ! That's awesome ! But why did he do it ? Like what effect does that have ?
    – Hyun Yoo Park
    Commented Mar 5, 2019 at 15:54
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Guess you have seen that the bass line is the 2nd voice following in thirds. The eighth notes accompanyment are the fifth or root between the melody notes. This aspect may be more import than the analysis of the chords.

You can say its a dominant with a missing third (or it can be interpreted as a passing tone).

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