Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-03T01:51:36.624Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

7 - Harmony

from Part II - Techniques and Technologies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2022

Tom Perchard ,
Stephen Graham ,
Tim Rutherford-Johnson  and
Holly Rogers
Tom Perchard
Affiliation:
Goldsmiths, University of London
Stephen Graham
Affiliation:
Goldsmiths, University of London
Tim Rutherford-Johnson
Affiliation:
Independent Music Critic and Editor
Holly Rogers
Affiliation:
Goldsmiths, University of London
Get access

Summary

Harmony is a very large area of musical debate and practice. As with our previous chapter on ‘Rhythm and Time’ (➔Chapter 6), we must begin with a brief definition. In popular usage, the word ‘harmony’ often refers to something pleasurable, calming and consonant: think of ‘sweet harmony’ or ‘peace and harmony’; things are also good when they are ‘harmonious’. In this chapter, however, ‘harmony’ will be used in a more pragmatic way to refer to the sound of two or more pitches sounding together to create intervals and chords, and the various practices developed by musicians to organise those chords, not only in isolation from one another but also in larger networks to create harmonic languages and musical structures. Nevertheless, those popular idioms reveal something of harmony’s potential to invoke ideological, social and even political systems of value, and it is these that will be the subject of this chapter.

Type
Chapter
Information
Twentieth-Century Music in the West
An Introduction
 , pp. 179 - 201
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2022

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×