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Posted

In the key of e minor, the Neapolitan sixth chord is an F major with an A in the bass.

oh no... I am looking at a baroque menuet and it lays on an A# in bar 6, I thought i had worked out where it came from!

I cannot work out where this A# is from, does anyone know....I will post it up tomorrow...

Posted

oh no... I am looking at a baroque menuet and it lays on an A# in bar 6, I thought i had worked out where it came from!

I cannot work out where this A# is from, does anyone know....I will post it up tomorrow...

What do you mean emphasise? I second what Daniel said (flattened supertonic major 1st inversion).

Posted

The Neapolitan sixth chord can never be in 'root position' by definition - it's a Neapolitan sixth chord! (I.e., first inversion)

If it's in root position, you can't call it N sixth.

@Andy UK. If there's an A# it's probably either a chromatic auxilliary / passing note, or it's being used to modulate to the dominant, B.

Posted

Daniel, of course! There is no word 'sixth' in my post. jawoodruff, yes.

I tried to open the link, but it looks like I have temporary connection problems, I'll check back later.

Posted

here is a link to the music:

http://picasaweb.goo...feat=directlink

Bar 6 confuses me (where is the A# from).... its probably obvious to you lot!

It looks like the composer is chromatically messing with the sense of tonality in this piece. The A# would serve as a leading tone to the dominant - which gives away that is what he is doing.

He also moves between E minor and E major regularly through this.

Posted

Yeah, as jawoodruff said, this has nothing to do with a N6. It's an ordinary double dominant (V7/V).

Personally, I don't quite see how this constitutes a messing with the sense of tonality though. This is one of the most typical harmonic progressions you'll find in piece of this time, and a modulation to the dominant may ultimately even stabilize a key more than doing no modulation at all.

Posted

I checked the piece, too. As was already said, A# is not part of the N6 chord in E min (as well as F#). At bar 6, A# is the leading tone to V, being the third of V/V, and then you also have F# at the second beat, which is the root of V/V. So what you have is a secondary dominant (or DD, as Gardener said, since it is a dominant to the dominant).

But I didn't quite understand what you mean by the word 'emphasize'. :huh:

Posted

Yeah, as jawoodruff said, this has nothing to do with a N6. It's an ordinary double dominant (V7/V).

Personally, I don't quite see how this constitutes a messing with the sense of tonality though. This is one of the most typical harmonic progressions you'll find in piece of this time, and a modulation to the dominant may ultimately even stabilize a key more than doing no modulation at all.

Well, as I said the last sentence.. the impression is there that he's moving between E major and E minor.

Posted

Well, as I said the last sentence.. the impression is there that he's moving between E major and E minor.

That may be a matter of perspective. To me it didn't seem like moving between E major and E minor, but a rather clear E minor, where "E major" appears once in measure 10/11 (but -not- as an alterated/major tonic, but as the dominant to the subdominant, which again is a common thing and it doesn't really affect the role of E minor as the tonic).

  • 3 weeks later...
Posted

Gardener and Daniel have been correct in all his postings here.

Just a reminder to all - when analyzing the harmony and voice leading of a piece be sure to do the following:

a) Look ahead to see WHERE the music is going. Music is sound (and its absence ) IN MOTION.

b) Pay attention to the rhythm and non-harmonic tones.

c) Practice reducing pieces to harmony and melody whenever possible when doing harmonic analysis.

PS. The E major chord is serving solely as the dominant of A major which is the subdominant of the home tonality E minor.

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