[Smt-talk] I - II- IV as a progression (counterpoint)

[Murphy, Scott Brandon]

Nice, John.  Also, see the opening of the theme of Mendelssohn's Variations
serieuses for another minor-mode, transpositional i-II-iv-V, although, as
the title suggests, here it's more serious than Puckish.  (The I-II-IV in
the Dvorak Symphonic Variations I mentioned earlier is not transpositional,
and the 5-#4-4-(3), discussed earlier in the content of popular music, is
often prominent.)

Scott

-- 
Scott Murphy
Associate Professor, Music Theory
University of Kansas
smurphy at ku.edu
 


on 9/4/09 9:45 AM, John Snyder at jlsnyder at uh.edu wrote:

> For an interesting instance of this progression in the minor
> mode, see Grieg's Lyric Piece, op. 71 no.3, "Kobold" (usually
> titled "Puck" in English translations), in E-flat minor. The
> piece begins with a 2-bar vamp, followed by the progression
> i - II - iv - V, all over a ^^1&5 double pedal. The second half
> of this is simply a transposition of the first half, up a fourth
> (except, of course, for the pedal). So voice-leading seems
> to be secondary to the chord progression here (but I hasten
> to stress "seems"). The motion from II (F major) to iv
> (A-flat minor) is quite striking, the more so (to my
> ear, anyway) because of the voice-leading discontinuity.
> ...
> The whole piece has, as the title suggests, a Puckish
> character. I think the unusual (for this style) harmonic
> progressions and voice-leading have a lot to do with that.