Roman Numerals and VII#

Question

The following is an excerpt from this Wikipedia article:

[The Lydian cadence] is so-called because it evokes the Lydian mode based on its final chord as a tonic, and may be construed with the chord symbols VII♯6/3-I (if the final is taken as a Lydian-mode tonic) or III6/3-IV (if the final is taken as a scale degree 4 in major).

I'm having immense trouble trying to wrap my head around VII# -- which after looking around I've come to the conclusion that it's just a sharpened VII chord.

But... wouldn't VII# = I ?

If, in C major,

VII = B D# F#

VII# = C E G

= I

? I have to be misunderstanding something or else would that not mean the cadence goes from itself to itself, only 1st inv. to root position?

I'm thoroughly confused and would be grateful for some guidance...

Answer 1

The notated tones of the penultimate chord are F# A# D# - D# minor - and the final chord is E B E.

If the D# chord were diatonic is would simply be a viio6/3, D# diminished in first inversion, spelled F# A D# with an A natural.

For the Roman numeral I would think it should be lower case vii for a minor chord, but some systems just use upper case for all chord qualities.

For the numeric figures the chromatic change needs to be on the third to raise A natural to A#. That's raising the fifth of the chord or fourth of the scale. So I would think the # is for the 3 rather than the 6. Like vii(6)/(#3).

Roman numerals weren't developed for 14th century music so the figures for this particular chord are clunky. Nevertheless, the penultimate chord is a minor chord in first inversion rooted on the leading tone.

For a C tonic the penultimate chord would be B D F with the fifth raised B D F#, finally inverted to D F# B.

You might want to read another source like the Harvard Dictionary of Music.

...no figures are given and the basic definition doesn't seem different, but it's more authoritative than the wiki article.

Answer 2

The link says: *...construed with the chord symbols VII♯6 3-I (if the final is taken as a Lydian-mode tonic) or III6 3-IV (if the final is taken as a scale degree 4 in major). This must be clear.

It is not VII# refers to the example in E, 6/3 means 1st inversion. The VII degree of Em is D. VII# = D#.

So III63-IV is analog to VII#63 - I ...

But if we are in C or F there is a major 7th (B respectively E) and the sharp must refer to the augmented 3rd and 6th.

Answer 3

In a minor key, the subtonic triad is usually represented by VII. In a harmonic minor context, it becomes necessary to use an accidental to modify the root of this chord into the leading tone. Some authors prefer to write this as ♯vii°, with the ♯ "sharpening the subtonic into the leading tone.

Personally, I prefer to write this as ♮vii°, using the natural sign to represent this leading tone, because Roman Numeral Analysis should be able to represent any arbitrarily chromatic triad in relation to a specified tonic. I like to use the major scale as the unmodified scale degrees, so in C minor, ♮vii° would represent B°, and if for whatever ungodly reason I wanted B♯°, ♯vii° would be the symbol I'd use. Under this system, it becomes necessary to write in the accidentals even for lowered roots of diatonic chords in minor keys, but I think it's fine to leave those out if they're obvious in context (i VII7 VI7 V7), using accidentals for any other modifications (i VII ♮vi° VI V). When in doubt, accidentals on everything outside of the major scale.

To me, ♯7 should mean sharpen the 7th degree, and ♮7 naturalise it, and it makes more sense to me to "unflatten" the degree than "sharpen" it.

Also, be aware that this answer is only talking about accidentals in front of a roman numeral. This is different from the figured bass tradition where the symbols might include a 6 with a sharp on it, for example.