Am I worrying about concepts I'm better off leaving for later?

[karlhenning]

Ah, the Hammerklavier . . . an age since I've heard it.

[Scarpia]

Not a rule, an observation. And, one does not necessarily fault a composer for doing something otherwise than it is normally done.

So, brief me: where did LvB do this? : )

Famously in the Hammerklavier

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neapolitan_chord

[karlhenning]

Yes, well I suppose the first substitution of a ii/6 chord for IV was once famous, too ; )

[Scarpia]

Yes, well I suppose the first substitution of a ii/6 chord for IV was once famous, too ; )

Anyone remember those old commercials which portrayed fictitious inventions of the Reese's Peanut Butter cup in which someone carrying a jar of peanut butter would collide with someone holding a chocolate bar.  I assume these modified harmonies were first invented by inept students with poorly controlled fingers or error-prone reading of musical notation.

[Palmetto]

Yeah; what you guys said!  I agree completely!

[[ backs slowly away, never making direct eye contact, hoping they can't smell the fear  ]]

[Opus106]

[[ backs slowly away, never making direct eye contact, hoping they can't smell the fear  ]]

Psst... you can usually distract them with a large-sized image of an album cover.

[Scarpia]

Psst... you can usually distract them with a large-sized image of an album cover.

Especially of a nubile young violinist, I'm afraid.   

[karlhenning]

Psst... you can usually distract them with a large-sized image of an album cover.

(* chortle *)

[DavidRoss]

Especially of a nubile young violinist, I'm afraid.   

My thoughts exactly! (Though even a nubile violist would do, in a pinch!)

[Brahmsian]

Ah, the Hammerklavier . . . an age since I've heard it.

Karl, to me, the Adagio of the Hammerklavier is the most sublime thing Beethoven penned (perhaps excluding movement #3 of SQ#15).

[Mirror Image]

Yeah; what you guys said!  I agree completely!

[[ backs slowly away, never making direct eye contact, hoping they can't smell the fear  ]]

Did you listen to that link I provided. I think you'll enjoy this very short choral work by Stanford. It is simply sublime.

[(poco) Sforzando]

It does not much matter, imo, how a person refers to a harmonic event.

It matters because there is a shared vocabulary that musically educated people understand and use to communicate with each other. If you want to refer to a Neapolitan as a Pekinese, that's your privilege, but no one else will know what you're talking about.

[(poco) Sforzando]

Maybe I've missed something, but the Neapolitan Sixth is normally (per the name) in first inversion.

Could, I suppose, voice it in root position, and have that chromatic slide in the bass down to a first-inversion Dominant chord . . . .

Check the score, Karl. The chord (flat II) is voiced initially in root position on the downbeat, then it moves to first inversion on beat 4 of the 6/8 measure. I think it's precisely because the chord is not initially heard as an N6 is what gives the progression its magic - sounding more like an excursion to a remote key until it finds its way back to the tonic F# minor.

[Scarpia]

Well, we essentially disagree on the significance of labels for musical events.  I know music theory, and can analyze the harmony in a Beethoven piano sonata - but that in no way enhances my enjoyment of it (and in some ways can detract from it).  As a corollary, someone who does not know music theory and has no idea the theory behind the harmonic progression or the traditional name of a specific chord among music academicians can also enjoy a Beethoven sonata and experience the surprise and magic of it.

Then you are quite fortunate that you know as little as you do.   

[Scarpia]

I don't understand your comment.  If you think I am ignorant, you are mistaken.

An attempt a humor.  Since you seem to feel that knowledge only enjoys spoils enjoyment, the less known the better.  I've always found the opposite to be true, in my personal experience.

[Scarpia]

I think it depends on the knowledge. 

Knowing the term used to describe a chord that Beethoven employed in a piano sonata, a term which was probably unknown to Beethoven, I think is not real knowledge but information.  As far as I can tell the frst use of the term Neopolitan Sixth was in 1845 by Alfred Day in his Treatise on Harmony.  However the chord was used by composers writing long before Beethoven.  So I hardly see how knowing the term that post-dates the music by several decades in the case of Beethoven, or a century in the case of Bach or Scarlatti, will enhance the enjoyment of music written before the term existed.

The important point, imo, is not the term for the chord, but its function in the music, which is to offer a surpising substitution for the sub-dominant, approaching the cadence.  To appreciate thiis effect one need not know that later music theorists would call this chord a Neapolitan Sixth because of the fondness for it many Italian composers had.

Sorry, I thought it was self evident that it was the harmony, and not simply the term used to describe it, that being discussed. 

[(poco) Sforzando]

The important point, imo, is not the term for the chord, but its function in the music, which is to offer a surpising substitution for the sub-dominant, approaching the cadence.

But that is not how Beethoven uses flat II in the Hammerklavier Adagio. Or in the op. 131 finale (where, in a C# minor movement, he recapitulates the second subject in D major before restating it in C# major; and where he also uses those rushing scale passages built on flat II in the coda). Here the Neapolitan takes on a very distinct character of its own that is more than a substitute for IV.

[Mirror Image]

Palmetto:

Have you listened to that link I provided?

[(poco) Sforzando]

That only underscores the surprise the chord/harmony would create since Beethoven was employing it outside the norm (which is what I was referring to) - but, in any event, my point was to say that knowing the term N6 is immaterial to enjoying the music.

If all you're saying is that someone can enjoy 131 without ever having heard the term N6, that's a truism. But it's not a particularly interesting observation. What's more interesting is to ask in what ways so-called technical knowledge either interferes with or enhances musical pleasure among those who have acquired such knowledge. You claim to know something about harmony: "I know music theory, and can analyze the harmony in a Beethoven piano sonata - but that in no way enhances my enjoyment of it (and in some ways can detract from it)." But how can you state with certainty that such knowledge does not enhance enjoyment? It is not as if you can revert to a tabula rasa condition where you don't know what a V7 is. It is a part of your education that evidently has stayed with you. Am I to believe that your ability to enjoy music has somehow suffered because you've acquired this knowledge? If so, how, and how can you be sure of that?

[Luke]

If all you're saying is that someone can enjoy 131 without ever having heard the term N6, that's a truism. But it's not a particularly interesting observation. What's more interesting is to ask in what ways so-called technical knowledge either interferes with or enhances musical pleasure among those who have acquired such knowledge. You claim to know something about harmony: "I know music theory, and can analyze the harmony in a Beethoven piano sonata - but that in no way enhances my enjoyment of it (and in some ways can detract from it)." But how can you state with certainty that such knowledge does not enhance enjoyment? It is not as if you can revert to a tabula rasa condition where you don't know what a V7 is. It is a part of your education that evidently has stayed with you. Am I to believe that your ability to enjoy music has somehow suffered because you've acquired this knowledge? If so, how, and how can you be sure of that?

Well, exactly (and also 'exactly' for some of the pertinent things Scarpia has said in the last two or three pages - I've really enjoyed reading it all, thanks!). When Leon says:

The important point, imo, is not the term for the chord, but its function in the music, which is to offer a surpising substitution for the sub-dominant, approaching the cadence.

he's showing that his understanding of the effect of the Neapolitan 6th has indeed affected the way he hears music - his knowledge that it is a surprise, that it replaces a more 'standard' harmony, his knowledge that is used in preparation... perhaps he would have sensed these things in a vague and generalised way without his technical knowledge, but it is the naming and the describing that helps us and him pin down the efect of the chord, the whys and hows. And once one understands one listens in a different way, one is able to mentally compare and contrast similar effects in the same piece, in other pieces, by the same composer, by different composers, one feels the larger context, one savours and appreciates all the more. Well, I do anyway. In a sense, one takes a more active role in the listening - it is not just submitting to the alien, mysterious beauties of the sound now, it is, in some ways, more like taking part in the music - it speaks your language and you speak its.

Leon's argument, then, is that we don't need to know the terminology to enjoy the sound of the musical event itself, and that is certainly true. But the terminology also helps to talk about it and discuss it, and that in turn can help us enjoy it more. It can help us to hear things we might not have heard before, or to listen in different ways. In the passage I just quoted, Leon uses other technical musical language - cadence, sub-dominant, substitution, even function and chord. His argument is that we don't need to know those terms to enjoy the music...nevertheless, he couldn't have written that sentence meaningfully without them, and, in turn, it's conceivable that someone reading that sentence is helped, through the implicit categorisations it contains, to listen to a certain sort of music in a different way and thus have their appreciation enhanced. This is certainly how things have worked in my life - that reading a particularly illumminating book (Charles Rosen's are springing to mind...) has helped me to understand what is below the surface, and in turn how to access this area in my listening. Result - not just my understanding but also my enjoyment increased a hundred fold, in some cases.