Chapter 15 - Aural Skills 3: Harmonic Dictation

Skills Required for Successful Harmonic Dictation

  • Understanding the relationship of chords to the tonal center
  • Discriminating between chord qualities and recognizing inversions
  • Recognizing familiar melodic patterns (linear movement) in the melody and bass and their placement
  • Recognizing and notating cadences
  • Understanding the norms of the common-practice style

\

  • Three harmonic areas or functions   * Tonic - I and vi   * Subdominant or Predominant - IV and ii or ii7   * Dominant - V or V7 and vii° or vii°7
  • Other harmonic truths:   * Root position chords are considered strong   * The supertonic and leading-tone chords are commonly found in first inversion   * The supertonic in first inversion is a strong subdominant harmony
  • Second inversion and sometimes first inversion harmonies are often used to prolong stronger harmonies. There are four basic ways to prolong a harmony:   * Passing harmonies   * Neighbor harmonies   * Arpeggiated harmonies   * Cadential harmonies

 

  • Harmonic progressions move from tonic to subdominant to dominant to tonic (T-S-D-T)

 

  • Dominant harmonies don’t move to subdominant
  • Chromatic chords prolong the harmony they lead to

 

  • Significant harmonic function changes usually occur on strong beats
  • When the bass line is conjunct, harmonies are generally being prolonged
  • When large skips or leaps occur in the bass it often signals a change of function

Connecting the Dots Between Hearing and Notating

  • Understanding what commonly ends a phase   * Understand that only I, V, or vi can be the last chord   * Understand cadential patterns (bass and soprano)   * Listen for basic patterns in the bass line   * Be able to aurally identify cadences   * Understand what harmonies are implied from knowing the bass line
  • Understanding what commonly begins a phrase   * Return to tonic   * Listen for basic patterns in the bass line
  • Understanding what commonly occurs in the middle of a phase   * Common subdominant function   * Possible use of chromatic harmony   * Possible use of inverted chords   * Listen for common basic patterns in the bass line

Implied Harmonies

 

  • This is a list of what harmonies are implied from knowing the bass line

Recognizing and Notating Cadences

  • Cadence - The way phrases end.
  • Most common bass line endings   * So-So-Do

      * Fa-So-Do

 

  • With Fa-So-Do in the bass, these are the common melodic patterns:   * ii6−V7−IcanharmonizewithRe−Re−Doii6-V7-I can harmonize with Re-Re-Do; IV-V-I can’t because there’s no Re in the IV chord.   * IV−V−IcanbeharmonizedwithDo−Ti−DoIV-V-I can be harmonized with Do-Ti-Do, but not Do-Re-Do.   * ii6−VorV7−Iii6-V or V7-I can be harmonized with Re−Re−DoorRe−Ti−Do.Re-Re-Do or Re-Ti-Do.

 

Recognizing and Notating the Mid-Phase

 

  • These are common progressions, implied harmonies, and other elements that might be featured in the middle.
  • The middle section uses inversions if the bass is moving stepwise.

\ \