Schenker’s Concept Schenker’s Concept ofof

Melody IMelody I

^1 ^2 ^3 ^4 ^5 ^6 ^7 ^8^1 ^3 5 ^8

^2=upper LT

1. Understanding tonal melody=acquiring feel for stablility/instability of tones.

2. Notes of the tonic triad are the most stable.

3. Because triad tones arise from the overtone series, they are like a force of nature (to Schenker, a manifestation of divine), & capable of generating more music.

4. Less stable tones, tendency tones (e.g. LT, upper LT)

5. Resolutions can be long-range

6. Ultimate stability requires scale degree 1, supported by the tonic in bass.

7. Melodic and Harmonic resolution can therefore be “out of synch”

8. Falling melodic motion is most natural, providing closure/completion.

9. Melodic fluency means stepwise or predominantly stepwise motion

10. Carrots show scale degrees (^1 ^2 ^3 )

Schenker’s Concept of Melody

11. Schenker theory distinguishes structural tones from ornamental tones

13. In great music, structural tones connect to form melodically fluent lines.

14. Great music is rich in motivic parallelisms, short ideas that replicate themselves in various forms. Square brackets show motivic parallelisms.

12. Key concept: A dissonant note is never a structurally important tone (and is generally incapable of further prolongation).

15. In minor, ^6 usually functions as a N. N. to more stable ^5

16. Melodies with leaps suggest voice-leading connections between nonadjacent tones.

17. In great music, such connections can suggest two (or more) melodically fluent voices in different registers. (= compound melody or polyphonic melody)

18. Surface leaps in melodies can occur without destroying underlying melodic fluency. =registral transfer

19. To Schenker a melodic leap is often not a mere skip, but a temporary switch to a new voice or new register.

20. Structural melodic tones can be prolonged by NNs and by linear progressions into or away from the structural note.

21. In Schenkerian graphic notation, a long slur groups linear progressions.

22. A dotted slur often connects a tone that is prolonged over a long period (aural retention of the tone).

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^5 prolonged by chordal skips

^5 prolonged by NN

^5 prolongedby filling in ^5-^3(linear progresson)

Melodically fluent structuralMelody ^5-^4-^3-^2-^1

^2 prolongedby choral skips

I ________________________ Parallel 6ths connect V7 I I to II6 (interm) smoothly

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