<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; ">Timothy Sullivan is right of course that the Bb forms a common tone through all four chords. I left it out on purpose because I was transcribing the uptempo version (#3 - Dream is collapsing), in which the Bb is an ostinato in the violins above the low chords, which are all triads, at least for awhile. In the slower version (#4 - Radical Notion), I noted in my original post that the last chord is B maj7.<div><br></div><div>But since there's almost always a major 7th somewhere in the musical texture for the last chord, I probably should have included it. (I was transcribing from memory, I didn't know about the YouTube until I was done.) And it makes Howard Cinnamon's voice-leading graphs work even better.</div><div><br></div><div>All these comments are fascinating - I'm particularly taken by Scott Murphy's idea of "recombinant progressions" to invoke the fantastic in Hollywood film music. </div><div><br></div><div>Steve</div><div><br><div><div><div>On Aug 14, 2010, at 14:44, TIMOTHY SULLIVAN wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><blockquote type="cite"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; font-size: medium; "><div class="hmmessage" style="font-size: 10pt; font-family: Tahoma; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Tahoma, Verdana, Arial, sans-serif; color: rgb(42, 42, 42); "><br style="line-height: 17px; ">There is one critical flaw in your transcription which no one in the thread has yet pointed<div style="line-height: 17px; ">out: the final chord is not a C flat major triad, but a Cb major seventh chord. The tonic-seventh</div><div style="line-height: 17px; ">dissonance is actually enhanced through orchestration in the horns. This means that</div><div style="line-height: 17px; ">the B flat remains the common-tone througout the "progression" (chord cycle). The stepwise</div><div style="line-height: 17px; ">voice-leading which expands and contracts around this Bb is strongly referential to Glass's</div><div style="line-height: 17px; ">common-tone chord cycles. Historically, it recalls Mussorgsky, Sibelius and possibly Rimsky-Korsakov,</div><div style="line-height: 17px; ">just to name a few.</div><div style="line-height: 17px; "><div style="line-height: 17px; "><div style="line-height: 17px; "><font class="ecxEC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond" style="line-height: normal; "><font class="ecxApple-style-span" face="'Comic Sans MS'" style="line-height: normal; "><font class="ecxApple-style-span" face="Garamond" style="line-height: normal; "><i style="line-height: 17px; font-style: italic; "><br style="line-height: 17px; "></i></font></font></font></div><div style="line-height: 17px; "><font class="ecxEC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond" style="line-height: normal; "><b style="line-height: 17px; font-weight: bold; ">Dr. Timothy Sullivan</b><br style="line-height: 17px; "></font><div style="line-height: 17px; "><font class="ecxEC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond" style="line-height: normal; ">Composer, Artist, Educator</font></div></div></div></div></span><br><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond"><i>Although we aren't in control of circumstances,</i></font><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond"><i>We are in control of our reactions to them.</i></font></div><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="'Comic Sans MS'"><br></font><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond"><br></font></div><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond"><b>Timothy Sullivan</b><br></font><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond">Composer, Artist, Educator</font></div><div><font class="EC_Apple-style-span" face="Garamond">416-557-2838</font></div></div></div><br><br><br><br><hr id="stopSpelling">Date: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 10:49:21 -0500<br>From:<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:smurphy@ku.edu">smurphy@ku.edu</a><br>To:<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:staylor7@illinois.edu">staylor7@illinois.edu</a>;<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:smt-talk@societymusictheory.org">smt-talk@societymusictheory.org</a><br>Subject: Re: [Smt-talk] Inception chord progression<br><br><font face="Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial"><span style="font-size: 11pt; ">I don’t know of any<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><i>exact<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></i>instances of this 4-chord progression<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><i>in toto<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></i>within art music or film music repertoires (assuming transpositional and permutational equivalences (i.e. disposition of notes within each chord)). But it breaks down into contiguous chord pairings that are more or less commonplace or at least well precedented (assuming the same equivalences) when Hollywood wants to invoke the fantastic sonically. In my experience with listening to popular film music, it seems that many composers fashion new kinds of such fantastic harmonic progressions through the use of what might be called “recombinant progressions.” One could certainly hear or propose an underlying logic for the whole (voice leading, collectional, etc.), but I think it’s worth keeping in mind with these progression-strings that the composer may be striving, certainly among other things, for novelty within the constraints of stitching together such triadic pairings that are well-worn yet still immediately significant and surprisingly resilient.<br><br>-Scott<br><br>--<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br>Scott Murphy<br>Associate Professor of Music Theory<br>University of Kansas School of Music<br><a href="http://smurphy@ku.edu" target="_blank">smurphy@ku.edu</a><br><br><br><br>on 8/10/10 4:30 PM, Stephen Taylor at<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://staylor7@illinois.edu" target="_blank">staylor7@illinois.edu</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span>wrote:<br><br></span></font><blockquote><font face="Calibri, Verdana, Helvetica, Arial"><span style="font-size: 11pt; ">I've seen Inception twice and there's a chord progression I just can't get out of my head - the entire score is by far the best I've heard from Hans Zimmer & co. (and the slowed-down Edith Piaf is excellent). The progression's clearest instance is the scene in Paris where the streets and buildings start folding over themselves.<br><br>G min Gb Maj/Bb Eb Maj B Maj<br><br>...<br><br>Steve<br>_________________________________<br>Stephen Taylor<br>Associate Professor of Composition-Theory<br>University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign<br><a href="http://www.stephenandrewtaylor.net" target="_blank">http://www.stephenandrewtaylor.net</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><<a href="http://www.stephenandrewtaylor.net/" target="_blank">http://www.stephenandrewtaylor.net/</a>><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><br><br><hr align="CENTER" size="3" width="95%"></span></font><font size="2"><font face="Consolas, Courier New, Courier"><span style="font-size: 10pt; ">_______________________________________________<br>Smt-talk mailing list<br><a href="http://Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org" target="_blank">Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org</a><br><a href="http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org" target="_blank">http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org</a><br></span></font></font></blockquote><br>_______________________________________________ Smt-talk mailing list<span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="mailto:Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org">Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org</a><span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span><a href="http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org">http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org</a>_______________________________________________<br>Smt-talk mailing list<br><a href="mailto:Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org">Smt-talk@societymusictheory.org</a><br><a href="http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org">http://lists.societymusictheory.org/listinfo.cgi/smt-talk-societymusictheory.org</a><br></div></span></blockquote></div><br></div></div></body></html>