Ever build harmony by stacking down?

Now that I think about it I am not sure why throughout music history harmony has been understood to be grounded on the bass note and elaborated by stacking intervals up from that root or ground.  I guess since we live on a planet with gravity that forces us to stand on the ground the analogy between the ground and the lowest notes of music forced us to think of harmony as originating from the bass.

But what would an alien who lives on a gas giant and flies around in it's clouds hear music like?  Would they hear harmony as originating in the highest notes and stacking downwards as it defines itself?

It's easy to say from our perspective that harmony is defined as it is stacked upwards although usually after the 5th or the 7th, any additional factors of chords tend to become "color tones".  Stacking chords from the top down on the other hand tends to have a completely transformative effect on the notes above it.  But maybe that's just our bias as "ground-based" musicians?

Example:  Starting with a major chord and stacking upwards basically leaves the "quality" of the chord unblemished (i.e. a major chord with some extensions).  Starting with a major chord and stacking downward a minor third leaves you with a minor 7th chord - a completely different sound than what you started with.  Stacking downward a major third leaves one with an augmented major 7th chord - another totally different quality/character of chord.  With each new stack downwards the overhanging harmony can often be radically transformed into something completely new.  I don't know if anybody here besides myself sometimes thinks of harmony in this way.  My personal favorite is using bass notes that are non-harmonic tones such as having an 11th in the bass.

Harmony generally is stacked down when dealing with soli.

Harmony in the sense of determining a root note isn't subjective (overtone series and so on). That's why it's not stacked downward.

17 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

Harmony generally is stacked down when dealing with soli.

What do you mean exactly?

17 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

Harmony in the sense of determining a root note isn't subjective (overtone series and so on).

That makes sense.  Still it was fun to think about while it lasted LoL...

1 hour ago, PaperComposer said:

What do you mean exactly?

So if you want to harmonize a lead line in thirds, generally you harmonize it in thirds downward so that that the top note is the original melody, unharmonized. Otherwise, the harmony notes start to sound like the main melody because the ear will be drawn to the higher note.

Like Hedwig's theme from Harry Potter, for example.

3 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

So if you want to harmonize a lead line in thirds, generally you harmonize it in thirds downward so that that the top note is the original melody, unharmonized. Otherwise, the harmony notes start to sound like the main melody because the ear will be drawn to the higher note.

If a composer were to harmonize a melody above, couldn't the melody just be brought out by using dynamics?  Also, Ravel uses a technique of harmonizing the melody above in his Bolero by reinforcing the harmonic series of the original melody tone hence somewhat hiding the harmonized notes in plain-sight (or plain-hearing or ... whatever).  Also, barbershop quartet harmonizations usually place the melody one voice below the highest voice being sung (as I understand it).  I am not as confident in this statement as in the others but I could've sworn that there are also plenty of pop-music examples of a melody being harmonized above.  Could be wrong though.

1 hour ago, PaperComposer said:

If a composer were to harmonize a melody above, couldn't the melody just be brought out by using dynamics?  Also, Ravel uses a technique of harmonizing the melody above in his Bolero by reinforcing the harmonic series of the original melody tone hence somewhat hiding the harmonized notes in plain-sight (or plain-hearing or ... whatever).  Also, barbershop quartet harmonizations usually place the melody one voice below the highest voice being sung (as I understand it).  I am not as confident in this statement as in the others but I could've sworn that there are also plenty of pop-music examples of a melody being harmonized above.  Could be wrong though.

 

Most chorale type compositions put the melody as the soprano voice.

But what I'm talking about is not as in putting chords to a melody, but harmonizing the melody line itself. Like a guitar lead in thirds or something.

Example

Don't like Jazz or Adam Neely, but he illustrates the concept here

and yes, in the example I am describing, you could use dynamics to bring out a lower voice, but then why bother at that point? Generally, this would all use the same instrument timbre (to keep it stable of course) so the easiest way and to keep all the voices at the same strength is to just leave the main melody as the top voice.

10 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

and yes, in the example I am describing, you could use dynamics to bring out a lower voice, but then why bother at that point? Generally, this would all use the same instrument timbre (to keep it stable of course) so the easiest way and to keep all the voices at the same strength is to just leave the main melody as the top voice.

Well - there are plenty of reasons why one might want to harmonize a melody above and just bring out the melody with elaborate doublings and dynamics in say, a thick orchestral texture.  Can't just ignore all those creative possibilities.

And even though you don't like Adam Neely or jazz - nice video.  It really illustrates how one can come up with a tutti orchestration in any style not just jazz.

1 hour ago, PaperComposer said:

Well - there are plenty of reasons why one might want to harmonize a melody above and just bring out the melody with elaborate doublings and dynamics in say, a thick orchestral texture.  Can't just ignore all those creative possibilities.

Yeah, but if you're doing that, then you're not giving equal weight to all the voices and probably using different instruments. 

Which is generally not what one is doing if you're harmonizing a lead line. Like if you harmonize an electric guitar melody in thirds, but you put the third above and lower the dynamics of it, you should hear the melody clearer, yeah.

But you have the option in that case of harmonizing in sixths downward or whatever, can still hit the same chords tones, and leave the two at equal dynamics with no worries.

I'm using this because it's the most common example of harmonizing downward.

5 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

But you have the option in that case of harmonizing in sixths downward or whatever, can still hit the same chords tones, and leave the two at equal dynamics with no worries.

True but if your melody is already in the tenor range and harmonizing it at a 6th below might start sounding muddy or too close a voicing with the bass - one might opt to harmonize it a 3rd above.

7 minutes ago, AngelCityOutlaw said:

I'm using this because it's the most common example of harmonizing downward.

I originally thought to brought up the topic because of how cool an effect one can get if one uses non-harmonic tones in the bass such as the 7th, the 9th or the 11th.  Used sparingly one has many alternate options for the bass note that still sound decent.

6 hours ago, PaperComposer said:

True but if your melody is already in the tenor range and harmonizing it at a 6th below might start sounding muddy or too close a voicing with the bass - one might opt to harmonize it a 3rd above.

Indeed. Or you could make the melody the "third above" and the tenor part the harmonization. 

6 hours ago, PaperComposer said:

I originally thought to brought up the topic because of how cool an effect one can get if one uses non-harmonic tones in the bass such as the 7th, the 9th or the 11th.

People do tend to right root-heavy basslines.

I remember Schenker had stated in his books (I don't remember which one, is that his Counterpoint? But that's why he LOVES using the ursatz) that the overtone series is the only gift nature gives to music; other arts like painting, drama, literature has far more resources then music from the nature to use in their arts. The history of Western Music is just the discovery and upheaval of that particular overtone series: Monody, parallel octave organum, parallel fifth organum, then common practice period, then at last the abandonment of that series. It will be quite unnatural to stack down harmonies instead of stack up. But after all it will be funny to do so as Schoenberg has already broken the rule whatever.

Henry

Well ... at least there is such a thing as an undertone series:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Undertone_series 

I regret to have to say I always work from the top down, relying on motifs more than extended melodies.  Perhaps it goes back to secondary school days when we'd be given a melody and told to harmonise it (in those days with traditional voice leading). It seemed to let us find less obvious solutions. Now it's about the overall sound or timbre that accompanies a fragment - how the total leads into whatever comes next - although sometimes one harmonises above a fragment (to achieve some effect) but I'd count that as a vertical inversion of some kind. 

In fact aside from strict counterpoint and traditional polyphony I wasn't aware that the general practice was bass-upwards. In that situation the rules tend to provide a melody in the top (polyphonic) line. Perhaps the idea took root in the homophonic interludes in otherwise polyphonic works.

Interesting, your point about the 11th in the bass. In a dominant chord this is the tonic root. I've used V11 but with the 11th closer to the top, the 3rd deeper.  Something worth exploring with a few non-triad notes in the harmony.

Undertones....alas there are too many undertones in the situations we encounter in our days without bringing them into music!

I work religiously from the bass-up, but there are three concepts that come to mind:

The Undertone series

The minor mode system as a reflection of the Major system

Negative Harmony

There is also this, you'd think it would sound awful but it's ethereal: