# 15 sets of bones...(about Stravinsky and harmony)



## thesteelydane (Jan 18, 2018)

A very refreshing (and delightfully straight forward) look at Stravinsky’s harmonic choices, why they work, and how we got there by the brilliant Anthony Newman.

What came first in video 1, and Stravinsky and what came after in video 2. Hope you enjoy as much as I did.


----------



## joebaggan (Jan 18, 2018)

Thanks for sharing. What Stravinsky accomplished is mind blowing, and there's nothing more humbling and awe inspiring than going through the score of Rite of Spring.


----------



## thesteelydane (Jan 18, 2018)

joebaggan said:


> Thanks for sharing. What Stravinsky accomplished is mind blowing, and there's nothing more humbling and awe inspiring than going through the score of Rite of Spring.


I agree. I also feel the same way about Bach's counterpoint pieces - even just the two part inventions. Opposite ends of the musical spectrum, but both cases of pure genius.


----------



## Paul T McGraw (Jan 18, 2018)

Newman is both talented and insightful. And those two traits in one person are less common than one would think. I'm glad you posted this.


----------



## NoamL (Jan 18, 2018)

The mention of Jaws was interesting. John Williams uses the same tritone jumping trick in that score that Mr. Newman demonstrated here. And he uses it in a way that's like this bizarrely interesting blend of Stravinsky and Jazz.

I dug out my old college paper on Jaws.

The shark's secondary theme (not the dun-dun-dun-dun) is based on a dominant 7th







And Williams transforms this theme into vertical harmony to create the tension motif.






So the central fact of a dominant 7th from the perspective of a jazz musician is that the tritone can imply two different dominant 7ths a tritone apart (F+B = C7 or Db7).

Almost every time the camera is underwater (whether the shark is there or not) there is a motif of *Eb* Major arpeggio going to *A* major, back and forth across a tritone.



So JW is cuing our ears to the "duality" of tritones.

And he constantly plays with this back and forth like in this scene where Brody is studying the shark book.






(BTW check out how simple this scoring is!)

Then this tritone back and forth theme gets paired with the dun-dun shark theme when Brody first sees the shark. The trumpets play alternating Eb and A triads in a rising pattern...




I used to be in the "John Williams = NeoRomantic" camp, when I didn't know anything about his music haha... studying this score I went firmly into the "John Williams = Very Well Disguised Jazz" camp


----------



## Sam Reed (Jan 19, 2018)

NoamL said:


> "John Williams = Very Well Disguised Jazz" camp



Awesome post! I'm already a member of that camp in spirit -- time to make it official; where do I submit my membership form?


----------



## TGV (Jan 20, 2018)

He must have been a strict but inspiring teacher. It's nice to hear someone speak so sensible, down-to-earth about music. None of that "in 200 years people will listen to tone rows like we listen to fugues", but doesn't get all dismissive and nasty either.

He does diminish his almost adulatory description of the Rite a bit, though, by showing that energetically played random notes sound better than they should.


----------



## ed buller (Jan 21, 2018)

Very enjoyable . A bit glib in places, I rather think the note choices in the rite , even for the disonace , is very considered . And yes perhaps on the piano other choices might work but the rite really isn’t for the piano . A huge part of the effect is Stravinsky masterful channeling of his love of Ravel and Debussys colourful orchestration into his own unique style of using dissonance to cloud the folk music themes . But knowing stravinsky to be very fastidious it’s a little odd to hear this as “ pick a note ...any note !” Approach .




E


----------



## jmauz (Jan 28, 2018)

Very inspiring, thanks for posting this! Brought out my inner theory geek...


----------

