<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><blockquote type="cite"><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">2. For this discussion to get anywhere, it is necessary that we rigorously distinguish phenomenology from syntax. It's reasonable to say: "The I-IV6/4-I progression gives me a neighboring feeling." I have no quarrel with that psychological statement, though I do not share it. It is another thing to say: "The I-IV6/4-I progression results from a more general contrapuntal process, namely neighboring motion; this contrapuntal process licenses a chord progressions that are not accounted for by standard harmonic rules." This claim is false: the *only* common sorts of "neighboring 6/4" progressions are those that conform to familiar harmonic principles -- that is, there are no common "neighboring 6/4" progressions that can't also appear in root position.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>Personally, I think a lot of music-theoretical confusion results from the failure to distinguish psychology from syntax; they're very different enterprises. When people on the list talk about "general principles," I suspect they're talking about the psychological level -- they're saying "the IV in IV6/4 feels neighboring to me." They are not talking about a general syntactical principle like "in general a chord can be embellished by neighboring motion," because that general principle is manifestly inaccurate.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div> <br></blockquote><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Two comments:</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">1. I agree that I–IV6/4–I and I–IV–I are not far from each other (either phenomenologically or syntactically). So do Aldwell and Schachter, for that matter, as is made very explicit in their discussion of the theme of Brahms's Haydn variations (p. 309). The point of calling IV6/4 neighboring is not to distinguish it from root-position IV; both can be called neighboring when they support 3^–4^–3^ and 5^–6^–5^ upper-voice patterns. </div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">I do not think that it is necessary to appeal to phenomenology or "feelings" for describing the sense of "neighboring" here; rather, this label indicates (1) that these progressions are characteristically/normatively used for harmonizing the above-mentined upper-voice patterns and (2) they do not have independent <i>harmonic</i> significance in the manner of I–V–I (tonal phrases can be based on I–V–I but not on I–IV–I, clearly a syntactic feature). To what extent (1) is substantiated by explicit compositional features in music by different composers is, of course, a legitimate and interesting empirical question.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">2. A more general question: Are you sure, Dmitri, that you make a sufficient distinction between syntax and frequency of occurrence? Consider language. There is an infinite number of syntactically correct sentences that are never used (like "The river is eating English."). There are also syntactically correct sentences that are used in a certain style but not in another ("This f*cking f*ck won't f*ck.") Similarly, there might be syntactically correct chord progressions that never occur in a certain repertoire of music. In fact, I am not at all convinced that your ii–V6/4–ii example is non-syntactic. Consider for example (/ = bar line):</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">vi / ii–V6/4–ii / cad. 6/4–V / I, with upper voice 3^ / 4^–5^–4^ / 3^–2^ / 1^</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">I do not think the second measure breaks the limits of tonal syntax here. Although I don't have any real example in mind, I could well imagine a tonal idiom in which this progression is used for some expressive purpose, even though Mozart and several others had no use for it.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Hence the syntactical principle you mention above might be correct after all, but we simply need more than syntax (or this aspect of syntax) for explaining actual usages and their frequencies.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(Of course, these additional aspects are largely different in language and music, since semantics plays a much stronger role in the former, but I will not pursue this interesting question here.)</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Olli Väisälä</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Sibelius Academy</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><a href="mailto:ovaisala@siba.fi">ovaisala@siba.fi</a></div></body></html>