Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarity?

TwilightOdyssey

TwilightOdyssey

Darkness on the edge of Tone
So, Negative Harmony is the current hotness in music theory nerd/compositional nerd circles right now. Personally, I am experimenting with it in a melodic context on a new song; it definitely takes a minute to wrap your head around it and has led to much scratching out of notes as I try and chart it out. :)

Has anyone else here had a go with it? Though you can apply it to any type of orchestration, it seems particularly well suited for random modular synthesis and generative composition. With something like Nodal you could easily and quickly set up two clusters of nodes, one for your positive key and one for the negative and have Nodal randomly switch between them.
 
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Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Negative harmony? Is that the divorce lawyer you go to when your EHarmony relationship doesn't work out?
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Are there any examples of this from a popular music context? I am familiar with it through the writings of George Perle and Albert Jakobik, and through the music of Bartok, Schreker and the Second Viennese School, but I would think that the transference value to any rhythmic music beyond jazz would be limited. It would be fun to be proven wrong, though!
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

I suspect a lot of people will have no idea what we are talking about. I haven't seen this video yet, but Rick Beato had great content, so I am willing to bet that this is a great introduction:

 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Sounds like theory corksniffery.

01d825caaa464d319b06e92eeaac35f6.jpg
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Gtrjunior said:
Sounds like theory corksniffery.

01d825caaa464d319b06e92eeaac35f6.jpg
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Oh, in late tonal and post-tonal music it has shown itself to be too strong an organizing force to be dismissed quite that lightly. (In many ways I would call it the very opposite of corksniffery, as it has proven itself again and again as an organizing force for more than a hundred years now.) But I AM surprised to see it discussed on a guitar forum, since the music discussed here is overwhelmingly tonal (or some variant thereof), and for music that is organized with asymmetrical patterns such as our scales, musical palindromes are much harder to apply. I am therefore genuinely interested in seeing how the OP uses it, as I know it only in theory; I have never tried to use it in practice.
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

If somebody wants to hear how it sounds in practice, this is probably one of the most famous and easy-to-read examples:


(I would definitely advice people to get a full score, though)
 
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Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Sirion said:
Oh, in late tonal and post-tonal music it has shown itself to be too strong an organizing force to be dismissed quite that lightly. (In many ways I would call it the very opposite of corksniffery, as it has proven itself again and again as an organizing force for more than a hundred years now.) But I AM surprised to see it discussed on a guitar forum, since the music discussed here is overwhelmingly tonal (or some variant thereof), and for music that is organized with asymmetrical patterns such as our scales, musical palindromes are much harder to apply. I am therefore genuinely interested in seeing how the OP uses it, as I know it only in theory; I have never tried to use it in practice.
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I was just making a joke with the pic but until now I had never heard of it.
I googled it and saw a basic definition and have a very loose understanding of the thought process behind it.
At this point, at least for my purposes I don’t see the relevance of reorganizing the harmony structure of standard triads.
Like I said....for MY purposes. It’s is a very interesting theory concept though. I also would like to see how this is used in action....maybe there is a lot more relevance than I realize.
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Sirion said:
Are there any examples of this from a popular music context? I am familiar with it through the writings of George Perle and Albert Jakobik, and through the music of Bartok, Schreker and the Second Viennese School, but I would think that the transference value to any rhythmic music beyond jazz would be limited. It would be fun to be proven wrong, though!
Click to expand...
Well, I don’t think the nomenclature Negative Harmony was a thing until Jacob Collier coined the phrase, but I think it’s been in use for some time.

Modern pop music is all about melody, particularly the vocal melody, so harmonization rarely comes into play.

I also think this is just starting to sink down out of the Intelligensia now, thanks to streaming culture and social media, so it may not appear in popular music for some time. For myself I am using it to reharmonize mono sequencer lines. The piece I am working on is in Em, which would have it’s mirror in Eb Lydian depending on how you transpose it. The way I am using it is not as a modulation or a key change, but mirroring melody lines from G Major to D Negative Major.

When I have a working demo I will post it here.
 
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Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Gtrjunior said:
I was just making a joke with the pic but until now I had never heard of it.
I googled it and saw a basic definition and have a very loose understanding of the thought process behind it.
At this point, at least for my purposes I don’t see the relevance of reorganizing the harmony structure of standard triads.
Like I said....for MY purposes. It’s is a very interesting theory concept though. I also would like to see how this is used in action....maybe there is a lot more relevance than I realize.
Click to expand...
It’s about musical gravity and how certain notes naturally pull towards resolution in Western music. Negative Harmony opens up a way to retain the same gravity of resolution but through a less-traveled series of notes while still getting to the same ending point.
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

The interesting thing about novel musical concept is, you've probably incorporated in your playing regularly; you just don't know what it is exactly.

I recently studied modal jazz which seemed intimidating with names like Miles Davis, Bill Evans and Herbie Hancock thrown in with the explanation.

When I finally figured it out, I thought WTF?! Guitar players play 'modal jazz' all the time...you know, playing E blues throuughout the entire song regardless of the chords under it, cause you are too stupid to understand tension and resolution, besides the limited knowledge on theory...LOL!
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Obsessive Compulsive said:
The interesting thing about novel musical concept is, you've probably incorporated in your playing regularly; you just don't know what it is exactly.

I recently studied modal jazz which seemed intimidating with names like Miles Davis, Bill Evans and Herbie Hancock thrown in with the explanation.

When I finally figured it out, I thought WTF?! Guitar players play 'modal jazz' all the time...you know, playing E blues throuughout the entire song regardless of the chords under it, cause you are too stupid to understand tension and resolution, besides the limited knowledge on theory...LOL!
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This is a compositional reharmonization technique, not something you are likely to blindly stumble across. Playing a single scale regardless of the changes below it and then saying 'aha' is not the same thing.

Negative Harmony applies the same resolutional gravity to whatever key you are in by stacking inverted triads, you are not playing a different mode on top of the same chords, nor is this a tritone substitution or altered chord substitution.

It would be helpful to the discussion if you actually knew about the subject, or asked about it honestly, it instead of feigning knowledge you don't have.
 
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Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

TwilightOdyssey said:
This is a compositional reharmonization technique, not something you are likely to blindly stumble across. Playing a single scale regardless of the changes below it and then saying 'aha' is not the same thing.

Negative Harmony applies the same resolutional gravity to whatever key you are in by stacking inverted triads, you are not playing a different mode on top of the same chords, or is this a tritone substitution or altered chord substitution.

It would be helpful to the discussion if you actually knew about the subject, or asked about it honestly, it instead of feigning knowledge you don't have.
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What? Lol...did I say 'playing different mode' with regard to your 'negative harmony'? You completely miss my point.

Yeah I know you don't like me but read my post again; this time without personal issue clouding your judgement.
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

I'm a fan of theory and I've never heard of negative harmony before. Keep us posted how your composition turns out and maybe some more explanation of what it is. To me what can be done with tonal harmony is too vast to master in a lifetime so that's what I stick with. The stuff I have on my plate is: shedding scales to use with 16th note based solos such as the modes, harmonic minor modes, blues scale modes, diminished arpeggios and scale, whole tone scale. Also working on chord melody for jazz standards, being able to grab the chords quickly, and soloing on the form. Also wondering about creating inner voice movements in tunes and how one goes about making those and non root bass movement within the context of a good chord progression. On the back burner is contrapuntal Chet Atkins style fingerstlye with the thumb playing bass and the fingers playing chords and melody. It's a lot of stuff to work on. I'm an advocate that almost anything can be accomplished within the form of tonal harmony. So yeah.
 
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Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

TwilightOdyssey said:
Well, I don’t think the nomenclature Negative Harmony was a thing until Jacob Collier coined the phrase, but I think it’s been in use for some time.

Modern pop music is all about melody, particularly the vocal melody, so harmonization rarely comes into play.

I also think this is just starting to sink down out of the Intelligensia now, thanks to streaming culture and social media, so it may not appear in popular music for some time. For myself I am using it to reharmonize mono sequencer lines. The piece I am working on is in Em, which would have it’s mirror in Eb Lydian depending on how you transpose it. The way I am using it is not as a modulation or a key change, but mirroring melody lines from G Major to D Negative Major.

When I have a working demo I will post it here.
Click to expand...

Yes, negative harmony was not the term I learned. I'm not sure I learned a particular name for it, as I was taught about it as an aspect of symmetrical tonal organisation in general. Musical palindromes were certainly spoken of, but there are many other ways to form musical palindromes than negative harmony, so I think we used the term in a broader way. As far as the term goes, it seems to be slightly older than Collier, though: the term was used in Ernst Levy's Theory of Harmony, which was pushumously published in 1985; that is, nine years before Collier was born.

The roots of the concept go way back, though. The first possible predecessor I am aware of is the French composer Jean-Philippe Rameau (1683–1764), who coined the term "subdominant": If one visualizes the dominant as being five steps above the tonic, the subdominant is likewise five steps below. In classical music, applications of the principle can be found in practice from ca 1900, so as an idea, it isn't exactly novel, but it is right that it hasn't really been used much, if at all, in popular music. The use of chromatically inverted melodies, which really seems to be at the root of what you are suggesting, is a significant part of Schoenberg's serialism, and finding examples at least in the inter-war period should be easy. I will go out on a limb and guess that there must be examples even in Debussy.

I look forward to hearing your experiment, though, because I don't think I am aware of the concept being used in a popular idiom.
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Point, counterpoint. But three (or more) dimensionally.

Sent from my Alcatel_5044C using Tapatalk
 
Re: Anyone want to discuss NEGATIVE HARMONY/musical palindromes/compositional polarit

Gtrjunior said:
I was just making a joke with the pic but until now I had never heard of it.
I googled it and saw a basic definition and have a very loose understanding of the thought process behind it.
At this point, at least for my purposes I don’t see the relevance of reorganizing the harmony structure of standard triads.
Like I said....for MY purposes. It’s is a very interesting theory concept though. I also would like to see how this is used in action....maybe there is a lot more relevance than I realize.
Click to expand...

No problem, and no offence taken. :)
 
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