harmony (redirected from Centripetal harmony)

harmony, in music, simultaneous sounding of two or more tones and, especially, the study of chords and their relations. Harmony was the last in the development of what may be considered the basic elements of modern music—harmony, melody, rhythm, and tone quality or timbre. The polyphonic superposition (see polyphony; counterpoint) of horizontal melodic lines prevailed until the 16th cent., when the vertical or harmonic construction of chords was established. Rameau, in 1722, presented the idea that different groupings of the same notes were but inversions of the same chord. During the 18th cent. the concept of tonality, with the major and minor modes as its basis and with a certain chord serving as the key center of a composition, became general. The polyphonic music of Bach has a harmonic structure. As the system of triads and their relations was explored, the principle of modulation appeared, and composers developed freer concepts of tonality; Liszt, Wagner, and Richard Strauss greatly expanded the chordal vocabulary of tonal harmony. Finally, in the 20th cent., some have discarded tonality in favor of music that is composed in terms of horizontal contrapuntal lines. See atonality; serial music.

Bibliography

See W. J. Mitchell, Elementary Harmony (3d ed. 1965); A. Schoenberg, Structural Functions of Harmony (rev. ed. 1969); W. Piston, Harmony (5th ed. 1987).

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harmony

In music, the sound of two or more notes heard simultaneously. In a narrower sense harmony refers to the extensively developed system of chords and the rules that govern relations between them in Western music. Harmony has always existed as the “vertical” (the relationship between simultaneous melodic lines) aspect of older music that is primarily contrapuntal; the rules of counterpoint are intended to control consonance and dissonance, which are fundamental aspects of harmony. However, the sense of harmony as dominating the individual contrapuntal lines followed from the invention of the continuo c. 1600; the bass line became the generating force upon which harmonies were built. This approach was formalized in the 18th century in a treatise by Jean-Philippe Rameau, who argued that all harmony is based on the “root” or fundamental note of a chord. Tonality is principally a harmonic concept and is based not only on a seven-note scale of a given key but on a set of harmonic relations and progressions based on triads (three-note chords) drawn from the scale.

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harmony

1. Music

a. any combination of notes sounded simultaneously

b. the vertically represented structure of a piece of music

c. the art or science concerned with the structure and combinations of chords

2. a collation of the material of parallel narratives, esp of the four Gospels

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Harmony

Concordia

goddess of harmony, peace, and unity. [Rom. Myth.: Kravitz, 65]

Harmony

child of ugly Hephaestus and lovely Aphrodite; union of opposites. [Gk. Myth.: Espy, 25]

Polyhymnia

muse of lyric poetry; presided over singing. [Gk. Myth.: Brewer Dictionary, 849]

yin-yang

complementary principles that make up all aspects of life. [Chinese Trad.: EB, X: 821]