Hi Christopher,
There you go again giving concise, intelligent, informed, and pretty
thorough responses.
Chuck
On Nov 21, 2007, at 5:57 AM, Christopher Smith wrote:
On Nov 21, 2007, at 8:23 AM, Lawrence David Eden wrote:
Greetings Listers,
I need an (elementary) book that explains how to make smooth key
changes in compositions.
I hope that some of you can recommend a title or two.
Hmm, I find the books always go on in great detail about how
Beethoven did it, and little else. They also seem to have a great
liking for the pivot chord method, which is very smooth, but it is
not the only game in town. Maybe they talk about it so much because
they have a lot to say about it...
Anyway here are my three ways:
1.) Direct. Just leap into the new key with no preparation. Having
a common melody note or bass note can take some of the jarring out
of it. ("Smoke Gets In Your Eyes" by Jerome Kern, going into the
bridge) Gets more and more common in modern music (well, modern
music that is tonal, that is!) Issues relating to key relationships
can be dealt with according to the style and era. Basically,
anything goes these days.
2.) Tonicisation. Precede the new key with its V or some other
equivalent chord(s) in the bar(s) before that indicate a resolution
into the new key. This is so easy that there is almost literally
nothing more to say about it. Cocktail musicians use this almost
exclusively when faking a sequence of tunes that have to sound like
a medley. Barry Manilow (over)uses the previous tonic to become the
new leading tone when he modulates up a semitone, which is widely
considered to be tasteless these days. Sometimes composers/
arrangers try to lead nicely from the previous key into the
dominant, which brings us to:
3.) Pivot chord(s). At some point before you get into the new key,
there is a chord or two or three that can be construed as being in
the old key, or in the new key. This ambiguity is exploited to lead
the chord to the new place, rather than back to the old place. Lots
of ink spilled on this one. Allen Forte's book "Tonal Harmony in
Concept and Practice" is as good a book as any. I suppose this is
what you wanted. It might be more intermediate than advanced, but
if somebody is writing modulations, they aren't really at an
elementary stage any more, I would say.
Hope this helps.
Christopher
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