Fantastic Beasts (1)

It sounds like alternating between Gmin and Ahalfdim/G (Am7b5/G) to my ear.

 

When transcribing, and it is a functional harmony, I try to identify the tonic and dominant, then classify all the rest as some flavor of predominant based on the quality of the chord (major, minor, diminished, augmented, sus). This excerpt is a little ambiguous, but I'd tend to stick with the simplest explanation and chord spelling. Jazz chord notation doesn't really describe function the way we tend to look at Roman numeral analysis, but it is an easy mental substitution. Whether the second chord is Cmin/G or Ahalfdim/G is a pretty subtle based on the voice leading and if you hear the "A" strongly as a chord tone or melodic tone. As far as what you should focus on, I'd say quality and voice leading once you have the outer voices identified. With homogeneous sounds, like the string family, the inner voices can easily get lost or misidentified (viola for cello, or a resultant sound of the overtones that isn't really played).

 

This is a great point, and 100% correct IMO. Also, I can tell you from working on a few features myself, that often
extra pads are recorded as over dubs. I hear so many overtones that are open strings in this excerpt I do wonder if
a similar approach was used. So one recording take would be violas' and violins basically playing slow Gadd9 (just G,D,A,), that the mixer can bring up and down at spots to suit, and fill up space like a drone.

Here is a quick Sibelius rendering I did.

You know the older I get the less I understand what is taught in a lot in North America ....not everywhere.... there are fine schools. But "Tonicization", Moveable Do ONLY, and the fetish for Roman Numerals I do not understand. (Get off my lawn !!)

How would either chord symbols or numerals convey but only the "quality of the chord" for that single small snapshot.
There would be no information about the voicing, (aka spacing) nor about which direction the voices move to the next sonority. Does the melody ascend, or descend ?

Roman numerals work great for chorales, but inferior to figured bass.
But once you get into Motivic based pieces it becomes more trivial.

Personally, I think the pitch-set cats are onto something, and one of my rainy day projects is going to be taking a piece and seeing if any new insights some from using that method for clearly tonal works.

For example if we ordered the notes from G 0-11 (0 being the tonic).
Modal interchange would automatically be taken care of

7 ---- 8 ----- 7
3 ---- 5 ----- 3
-- ---- 2 -----

G----- G ----- G

( 3 would be Bb as it is 3 semitones above G. 7 = D. So the top voice is moving from D to Eb, Bb moves to C, and
the addition of 2 (A) shows the triad becoming expanded to a 7th chord)

 

@Doug Gibson I took that as shorthand for "what do you listen for when transcribing and internalizing this" but I agree with your points about the Roman numeral vs Chord symbol vs figured bass vs pitch sets. They're just different mental constructs to understand or describe in a snapshot what is going on. I think the best construct is to hear it, followed by the written score, and on down the rabbit hole from there in ever smaller and approximate incitements (numeral, symbol, pitch set).

Exactly, like a frame of a movie or storyboard image isn't the full scene - probably a terrible analogy.
I often listen to tonal functional music with an ear tuned towards those approaches (quality, voice leading, etc.), and describe it in those terms. The theoretical shorthand academics use I think assumes composers follow an established voicing pattern (similar patterns in Jazz resolutions too), but it is very incomplete. 7ths resolve to 3rds, leading tones resolve to tonic....except when they don't. I don't know how else we can discuss these questions (OP's questions) despite the limitations of these frameworks. The pitch set idea may be more descriptive than numeral or chord spellings and is worth a look - it'd need to be more mainstream.

This shorthand approach also takes the time element out of music and divorces relationships from harmony to harmony, or moment to moment. That may be why transcription is often a better tool for developing understanding than an analysis of the written score. It requires the listener to engage with the time element.

Sidenote: I really enjoy JNH's work, good choice Blaz.

 

Voice leading predates harmony and is inseparable from understanding harmony. SATB rules for voicing developed because: the human voice has a limited range and the desire to retain the independence of each vocal line. These "rules" also predate instrumental writing (and functional tonality). It applies to instrumental writing only in the sense that early instrumental works (I'm talking early chamber and sacred music) supported & imitated the vocal parts. Instrumental writing descends from these general rules, but has more freedom because of the larger ranges and development of pure instrumental music.
Modern theorists (Schenkerian, Neo-Rienmannian, etc.) emphasize voice leading, but most music education gets stuck in the studying the harmony/form of the common practice era and Romantic eras with a touch of serialism. The "general rules" should be understood, but there's entire styles/genres of writing that make exceptions or disregard them altogether:

• Movement by smallest step (parsimonious motion), retain unisons, contrary motion
  
• Singable intervals (leaps followed by steps, and steps by leaps, often contrary to what precedes them)
  
• Retain independence of line by avoiding consecutive parallel perfect intervals

As far as orchestrating (spacings), a lot of it has to do with psycho-acoustic stuff (inability to hear close intervals clearly below a certain threshold, resultant/sympathetic tones of the harmonic series, etc.). Throw on top of that the wizardry of mixing and anything is possible. As for why JNH chose that particular Fmajor voicing (Octave Roots with spread 3rds & 5ths), I can't say, but the octave roots would carry up the F harmonic series and the other notes are defining and outlining that series of overtones. It only takes 1 third to establish the major or minor quality of a chord, which is why it typically wasn't doubled (in SATB writing), but in orchestration there's more freedom to voice how you'd like.

I look forward to hearing Doug's thoughts on this too because this topic is more in his lane.

 

Things are getting a little conflated so I won't have time right now to address everything.

Kent Kennan's book on orchestration addresses this very issue.
I probably shouldn't do this, but maybe it will inspire you to buy the book. It's very good.

In this example he takes a Bach Chorale and shows numerous ways it can be orchestrated for string orchestra.

So what began as this



Get's turned into

 

There are audio examples of each. I think he shows 11 variations in all.

Bradley is right (of course) in that orchestral doublings are not the considered changes in the underlying structure of the work.

If your aim is to write music like JNH, then don't get distracted thinking about why someone did or did not tell you something.
All rules are meant to be principles that lead to discoveries, and perfect the difficult art of listening. A rule guarantees a result.
It's not a LAW. Recipes, if you will.

Bradley covers it, but to emphasize two points from his post

• Carry over common tones
• Oblique motion is the most commonly neglected devices and perhaps the most useful of all

(because by default it creates a rhythmic independence)

 

Two thumbs up for this. Also, I like how often some of your responses (and Mike's) come back to food!

Speaking of exercises, Blaz, you could try any of the following:

• Take a jazz standard and re-harmonize, re-arrange it in a different style (if Bossa original, then swing, if ballad, then uptempo). You get the idea.
• Re-harmonize a chorale/hymn, write some descants that go with it, and compose a brief chorale prelude.
• Take a verse/chorus from a pop tune you like, and harmonize it for barbershop quartet
  
• Arrange a holiday tune for various chamber ensembles (wind quintet, brass quintet, string quartet).
  
• Or, my favorite, take a vocal solo chart and transpose the melody and instrumental accompaniment by like a major 3rd. You'll quickly see that some of the voicings need tinkering with to fit within the idiomatic ranges of some instruments.

I could go on, but the idea is to find something that appeals to your way of studying (or a genre/ensemble you need more exposure to) and dig into it.

 

Man, I casually check out a thread on RB and down the rabbit hole I go. Thanks for the insights.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who struggles with this! It's embarrassing how often this seems to happen with more dense chords.