Why Classical Harmony Doesn't Work Anymore

Not such an authentic cadence now, is it?
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A lot of people think of music theory as, like, the "rules" of music, but is it? Well, that depends what sort of music you mean. Music is an evolving art form, with new styles developing new vocabularies, and it often takes the academics way too long to catch up, so we wind up with these ideas about how music is supposed to behave that just don't reflect how it actually does. Can we fix that? Well, maybe, but we might need some help from the field of music cognition.
The paper discussed is Musical Style Affects the Strength of Harmonic Expectancy, by Drs. Dominique Vuvan and Bryn Hughes: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full...
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Also, thanks to Jareth Arnold for proofreading the script to make sure this all makes sense hopefully!

[@12tone]

The first 1000 people to use the link will get a free trial of Skillshare Premium Membership: skl.sh/12tone10201 Some additional thoughts/corrections: 1) The paper discussed is Musical Style Affects the Strength of Harmonic Expectancy, by Drs. Dominique Vuvan and Bryn Hughes: journals.sagepub.com/doi/full... 2) Obviously, the framing of rock changing everything is overly simplistic: If nothing else, the blues and jazz helped pave the way. The reason I emphasized it here is because that's the only style used in the study: I brought this up with the authors as well, and they were interested in the idea of repeating the experiment with other sets of genre cues to see how that affected results. For now all we can conclusively say based on these specific results is that rock and classical are different, but obviously plenty of music theory work has also been done on the different harmonic vocabularies of other genres as well. 3) I should also note that, as a music theorist, I don't necessarily believe that musical observations _need_ to be verified through scientific methods in order to consider them valid. The humanities exist for a reason, and our methods are useful too. But I still think cognition research is useful and interesting, because it gives us another angle by which to probe the musical experience. It's not that all the scholarship on the harmonic vocabulary of rock was meaningless until someone came along and did A Study® to it but it's nice to corroborate your ideas through multiple methodologies, y'know? 4) Seriously I _really_ wish they'd included the plagal cadence as well, that data would've been so cool to see. Oh well. The authors were super receptive to my feedback so maybe we'll see them try it at some point. But even if not, huge thanks to Drs. Vuvan and Hughes, they were wonderful to work with and they're doing super cool stuff. 5) Oh, another thing: I'm honestly not convinced that the classical concept of cadences is actually all that applicable to rock in the first place. Rock music doesn't tend to want to create "stopping points" in the same way, so the harmonic tools you would use to do that just kinda don't fit with the ethos. I didn't address this in the video because it goes beyond the parameters of the study, but it's worth keeping in mind.

[@franklinkz2451]

Its almost impossible to conduct these kinds of experiments. Most people have heard rock music allot more in their lives then classical music and its a rarity to hear someone saying yeah I only listen to the classics and nothing else as he drops the needle on Symphony #17

[@Armakk]

I agree, "cadence" isn't really the same thing in the African-American-derived forms that define the 20th (and 21st) century. Rocky v Apollo is "Authentic" (my god what an arrogant name) vs 12 bar blues. But even then, the whole idea of isolating music like this is insane to me since all music comprehension is defined by its technological, acoustic, and cultural context. Isolating components IMO shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the phenomenon we call music. (curmudgeon alert sorry)

[@TheGerkuman]

@@Armakk I think the cadences evolved into the changes. After all, what is a 12 bar blues but a set of IV-> I and V -> I chord changes? The difference being that it also works in reverse. Every IV -> I chord change was proceeded by a I -> IV, same with the V -> I's. Edit: Of course, this may be a case of convergent evolution. It is important not to forget that.

[@0510962013]

Authentic cadence is not like that. It is flexible in modern, after jazz (i think bach already did it).

[@0510962013]

Don't see chord in vertical and one formula. We can make V with some chord. We can make I with some chord.

[@jeffreytam7684]

Music teachers: we live in a society Jazz: 20 minute solo Rock: *0-3-5*

[@f67739]

drone: one (maybe) chord 50 minutes

[@martisole6249]

@@muhammadaryawicaksono4232 go team numbers

[@actualzafra]

@@muhammadaryawicaksono4232 excuse me but there is no "b" in my fretboard

[@dynamo5326]

@@actualzafra😂

[@exerciserelax8719]

What's 035?

[@DennisTrovato]

Would the real cadence please stand up!

[@KasiaGoclowski]

I didn't check to see if someone already made this joke before I commented. Oh well. Glad someone else thought of it too.

[@YumiVanherck]

We're gonna have a problem here

[@KrisCadwell]

I enjoy it when a video actually goes into the details of how an experiment was conducted and how the results were interpreted. It might put a lot of casual viewers off but it's essential to any genuine search for truth.

[@prapanthebachelorette6803]

I’m a casual viewer with no formal background in western music but I’m here for it

[@tom_4615]

Ive never heard V-I called authentic, ive always called it a perfect cadence

[@edmontoraptor]

There are two types of authentic cadences, perfect and imperfect. A perfect authentic cadence (PAC) is when both the V and I chords are in root position and the highest note of the I chord is the also the tonic of the scale. An imperfect authentic cadence (IAC) is when at least one (or both) of the cadential chords is inverted, or a diminished vii is used in place of the V chord, or the I chords highest note is something other than the tonic of the scale.

[@tom_4615]

@@edmontoraptor thank you! Thats quite interesting... I suppose going from say Gmaj to C/G is less satisfing and has less weight than Gmaj to Cmaj

[@mixedstaples8030]

@@tom_4615 Perfect Cadence is the Commonwealth name for the Authentic Cadence too! It gets a bit confusing, but I'm Australian and the name for V-I is always taught as Perfect here, with no distinction between the American Perfect Authentic and Imperfect Authentic

[@bricelory9534]

I think it's primarily to differentiate from the "deceptive" cadence of using the VI instead of the I, which was a fairly popular way to add surprise and tension to a piece in western classical music.

[@sundarsubramanian4876]

In Canada, the Royal Conservatory used to call V-I a perfect cadence, like in other Commonwealth countries (open vs closed perfect cadence distinguished IAC and PAC). Universities always used US books, though, so students were sometimes confused. The Conservatory seems to have adopted all the US terminology since 2016 or so.

[@ians8184]

I thought this was going to be about how the power chord is made of parallel fifths, which are so taboo in classical music, but sound awesome on a guitar. I guess you touched on that a LITTLE, but I'd love to hear more about it!

[@mikesmovingimages]

Exactly. Here, the timbre is playing a huge role, the intermodulation of guitar distortion is creating some of its own tension, emphasizing the 1st and 5th notes in a chord at the expense of the third. de-emphasizing the third robs a V7-I of the tension of the tritone in between the third and lowered 7th tones in the V7 chord. But the guitar is adding a lot of other partials that may be creating different kinds of tension not accounted for in classical theory. Classical theory is expressed independent of timbre (except in the art of orchestration). Theory also always follows practice, so if a different language is needed to explain rock, it will be developed, or perhaps it becomes and extension of classical theory. This study notwithstanding, even rock music mostly starts from some tonic, wanders through some basic chords (usually IV, V and VI) and then invariably ends in I.

[@sativares]

It not taboo. It depends. If you write contapunctal music you should avoid 5th if you want to have two strong independent melodies running at the same time. If you spend writing som contrapunctualmusic, you will hear that 5th sound like shit if you for example go from 6th to 5th to 5th to 6th. But you have to use 5th in contrapuctual music but the intervals should go as following if it should sound good, for example 3th to 5th to 6th. If you use to many 5th in a wrong way the melody notes merge into one melody instead of two separate melodies. You'll understand when you write contrspuctual music. And you cannot write contrapuctual music with 5th because it doesn't become contrapuctual by nature. Brass uses 5th a lot as another example and there are other musical pieces that use 5th a lot in different context

[@sativares]

Like in rock music with distorted guitars you have to avoid 3rds in the power chord because it sound garbage if you use 1 3 5 at the same time all the time. Everything depends on the context. But if you want to break the rules you do. Nothing in theory says it isn't allowed. Composers have always broken the rules if they feel to do that - if it sounds good or intentional bad. It's part of music composition to do so. If you want to have a half broken contrapuctual composition, you'll create that. If you want to create imperfections, you'll do that. It may fit into some context somewhere.

[@mauricemusician7636]

I always looked at it as a stack of Tartini tones. The fundamental note has a 5th & 8ve in overtones, & the power chords doubles the overtones so that it sounds fatter. The UNDERTONE below the fundamental also "sounds" making it fatter.

[@albertnortononymous9020]

It’s one chord, there’s no parallel perfect fifths because there’s no parallel motion because there is no motion. Now if you meant movement between power chords, then yeah.

[@ivan_osorio]

One thing I've always struggled with in my composition classes was this notion that "the V WANTS to resolve to the I!!" ...I was always just like "Sorry, I really only hear two independent chords." Eventually I just internalized the notion that that's how "normal people" hear it and learned to apply it, but I've never actually heard this supposed gravitational pull for myself.

[@mikebliss3153]

The "rules" in classical music are derived from conventions that arose in species counterpoint and... You know what? This reply deserves its own thread.

[@aidanmays7825]

Lol you don't have evolved ears that don't hear harmonic tendency

[@levicoffman5146]

Get a harmonica and learn to play the blues. You’ll hear it. It doesn’t take long to learn how to play cross harp and all you need is a harmonica and a blues backing track.

[@colbysavary]

Gonna be honest, I KINDA don’t believe you…🤔🤔

[@aidanmays7825]

@@colbysavary see I thought the same thing, but then I came to realize we just aren't as cool as this guy. He's the main character obviously

[@Frownlandia]

I wonder how many people will appreciate the Riemann Hypothesis reference over the line, "Is there a way to prove that?"

[@lorenzodeiaco8902]

He probably is interested about higher physics and mathematics, in two other videos he put easter eggs about riemann surfaces (geometry) and a penguin diagram (quantum field theory) respectively. I have no idea whether he actually studied the subjects or is just interested in science communication, in any case the fact that he puts this stuff in music theory videos is just another level of nerdiness, and I LOVE IT!!!!

[@adrboe3027]

There is a way to prove that, but only if Re(s) > 1

[@wmchristie]

I missed that, but there also appears to be a Feynman Diagram. I’m always impressed by 12tone.

[@nicolaiveliki1409]

Another reason to love this channel

[@FaelCacilhas]

@@lorenzodeiaco8902 I think I remember him saying he graduated in Math

[@zerronyx1362]

My teacher told me my D7b5 was "wrong" He plays christian rock...

[@PaulSchwarz]

he's scared of those tritones

[@maxalaintwo3578]

The Devil!

[@peanutgallery4]

You're gonna summon a FRICKIN DEMON

[@DMSProduktions]

WTF do christians know?

[@rso823]

Thinking about it modernly wouldn’t the fifth chord be the devil chord because it sounds so tempting and abusive

[@scottblair8261]

I don't know much about the techniques of the field but from a general methods perspective I feel improvement could be made. The paper definitely could've used a control. If we know the plagal candace is common to both, they should've tested that as a positive control. Similarly they should've tried some outlandish harsh non-cadance as a negative control.

[@motomike71]

I feel like a better approach would be to look at the percentages of how often each type of resolution is used in modern popular music. It's the composers who are deciding on what type of resolution or tool to use and which one they feel is most satisfying or representing of the type of composition they are trying to create. Perception of resolution is dictated by the experience of the listener. A bV7 to I resolution would have sounded strange and modal to someone growing up listening to 18th century European harmony music, but sounds natural to a modern music listener.

[@scottblair8261]

@@motomike71 I feel like the problem that would have is deciding what music to include in your sample. You're always going to have at least an incomplete or biased sample. Using test sentences and asking participants to rate the grammaticality is something common in linguistics research, so it makes sense that they do it here.

[@frankyi8206]

Something like a bII - i cadence (often used in heavy metal) would've been interesting, because (in my trained musician experience) anecdotally I'd say it would sound so out of place in classical as to likely sound flat out wrong

[@gerrycoogan6544]

@@frankyi8206 Furthermore, the most important, and most significant music style of the twentieth century is undoubtedly jazz (from which even rock is derived.) A cadence that comes from a tritone substitution of the dominant fifth is not only perfectly satisfactory in jazz but almost invariably perceived as *more* advisable than a straight V7-I which would sound downright "square".

[@jackwilliamsopenyourmouth]

You put a lot of effort and thought into this video, but it doesn't tell us 'why classical harmony doesn't work anymore'. Thanks though, it was an interesting watch.

[@Hecatonicosachoron]

I think it still works great - and a lot of great music is still to be made by importing rarely used "classical" staples into contemporary styles.

[@onijester56]

Simply: The rules of how to write music in Classical music tell you to not do THING, and in Classical music people actively dislike THING. Yet in Rock music, people like said THING. People even seem to like said THING *specifically* because of its context in Rock music. Therefore, Rock Music lets people ignore rules that define "Classical" music...and even encourages said rules to be replaced with completely different rules.

[@krokovay.marcell]

@@onijester56 that doesn’t explain, why people don’t feel these cadences are fitting (3.5 out of 7) on an electric guitar

[@Natyelvertonmusictuition]

The 'rules' of classical music work just fine if you want to write some classical music. And the 'rules' of rock are helpful if you want to write some rock. But of course, different eras of 'classical' music have different 'rules' - so what exactly defines a style? Given enough time and analysis all definitions tend to break done rendering all statements meaningless...

[@skern49]

because it's a clickbait title that has no meaning.

[@GhabrielPeper]

I liked when you mentioned Marshall Mathers and draw an M&M

[@graffitiabcd]

They also drew the Riemann Zeta function when they were talking about "how to prove something" and as a mathemusician I find that beautiful!

[@elliotsmelliot]

I’m laughing way harder than I should be at the real slim shady joke

[@gabymoekoe]

ikr lol i expected him to cite eminem actually talking abt cadences 😂

[@blank-vw2sb]

Yupppp

[@TheV-Man]

Ikr

[@ExcaliburPaladin]

M&M

[@actualizedanimal]

Wouldn't it make more sense for the study to bake each cadence into the primer? Like, write a classical piano primer that ends with a V-I cadence as well as one that ends in a bVII-I cadence instead, and then do the same thing for the rock guitar. That would put the cadences more in the context of what an actual song in those genres would do.

[@loganstrong5426]

The issue there is that the question being asked is "which fits better with the prime?" If the cadence is literally in the prime, it would likely automatically sound as though it fits better.

[@ashtarbalynestjar8000]

@@loganstrong5426 One possibility that comes to mind is to play the same prime but ending with two different cadences in a random order and ask which one fits better with the beginning of the piece.

[@SebiStr99]

@@ashtarbalynestjar8000 That might depend on the beginning of the piece and the lead up to the cadence (I think), so it would introduce even more variables... I don't really know how to test this stuff properly tho

[@Anonymous-df8it]

@@loganstrong5426 Ok. Have two samples of classical music, both identical except for the resolution. Ask the listener how jarring the resolution was. Repeat this with rock music.

[@wiesorix]

Very interesting, I really like the analysis of the validity of the results. Too often, people think that one experiment/paper can provide conclusive evidence, so it's good to see you putting the paper into perspective. I think you ask exactly the right questions and the suggestion for follow-up research is very good.

[@yetanotherbassdude]

Something I'd love to see if it's been studied in more detail is the impact of factors outside of harmony on the listener's feelings of resolution, particularly in EDM genres where harmony is far more secondary to the rhythmic and timbral aspects than in western classical genres. The fact is that in western classical music, while timbre is still important, you can nearly always re-orchestrate any piece of music to different instruments and most listeners will still hear it as the "same" piece, because in the western classical tradition it's the abstract harmony and melody that define a piece of music. In EDM, changing the instrumentation and/or timbre, particularly when it comes to transitions like the drop that can confer feelings of resolution and transition to a new section of the music, will fundamentally alter that music and can easily make it into something most listeners will hear as completely new. I'd love to know if there's been any of this kind of cognition research into these aspects of EDM genres and how they affect listeners' feelings of resolution in the same way that different harmonic cadences can on western classical music. If there are studies that can prove that modern listeners can have feelings of resolution that are entirely independent of the harmony, that kind of torpedoes the whole idea from western classical music theory that harmony is the strongest driver of the listener's feelings in the first place.

[@marioCazares]

I second this

[@JohnathanWhitehorn]

this must be why i’m jobless

[@peterjuff]

Pretty much all music theory books specify that the theory is derived from the ‘common practice period’ of western classical music from 1750 to the early 1900s.

[@esthersmith3056]

Yes, that it was slowly developed to analyze music within a specific tradition is generally understood and not really debated. The fact that this limits its usefulness discussing music outside that tradition - that the common practice period does not embody all there is to music - is generally much less well understood. The idea that rock music is best described in more modern frameworks is surprisingly controversial.

[@jacksonfrease9792]

@@esthersmith3056 idk bout that but ok

[@albertnortononymous9020]

Gradus ad Parnassum was published in 1725 by Austrian composer/theorist Johann Joseph Fux as an attempt to explain how the music of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina worked. From Bach (who endorsed the book) onward, if you wanted to get anywhere in classical music, you had to learn and use the rules Fux set down in that book. Because all music composed with these rules will sound similar, music written according to these rules is known as “common practice” music because the “common practice” was the application of Fux’s rules.

[@SavageGreywolf]

it's also worth remembering that classical composers of the 18th and 19th centuries were the rock stars of their day. Complete with obscene spending and gossip-rag scandals. hell, Liszt invented smashing his instrument on stage.

[@fionagmarshall6931]

Really appreciate the clarity of these videos. Particularly the explanation of the relationship between intermodulation and distortion.

[@BlonVonMurpy]

Can’t express how thankful I am for your videos. Incredibly insightful and helpful

[@illusion5739]

Hey 12tone, I recently found your channel and it helps me understand some things and learn new things as a self taught amateur musician. Nothing really much to say but thank you!

[@qiuz51]

I came to traditional music pedagogy later in life after being a rock person for a bunch of years and I had VERY difficult time getting the V-I in my ears. I truly think that at the time I wasn't experiencing the same degree of "tension and release" that the Schenkerian bros ship so aggressively and had to consciously develop it with ear training. It's clear as day now of course, but I don't think we should consider any music paradigms to be innate or self-evident. Harmony is socially constructed, yo.

[@yuvalne]

I really like your study breakdown videos. Keep up with the good work!

[@StupidMusicalExperiments]

Is 'authentic cadence' the American name? I've always used 'perfect cadence', is this just a British thing?

[@kuhaneko]

+1 can relate

[@DragonWinter36]

As an American, I use & have heard both, but I hear and use “perfect cadence” more.

[@WhiteTreeRightful]

I've actually heard it called a perfect authentic cadence when it's in root position and the soprano voice ends on the first scale degree, but it'd an imperfect authentic cadence with the soprano ends on the 3 or the 5. Idk it always seemed like an unnecessary amount of detail to memorize, I wish we had spent that time learning about other things.

[@sammysabbah6118]

Well, an authentic cadence simply means chord 5 resolving to chord 1..however, an authentic cadence can be further divided into "perfect authentic cadence" and "imperfect authentic cadence"

[@sammysabbah6118]

@@WhiteTreeRightful i definitely feel you! Another one that bothered me was wasting time learn about parallel 5ths and octaves lol. Music is full of parallel 5ths now. Why do I need to know about that. Lol

[@rcjd7834]

The classical vocabulary is definitely different from the common rock/metal vocabulary. This is why neoclassical metal is a defined genre, because it is fundamentally different from a theoretical standpoint. Would love to see you and Adam Neely do a collab, you seem like you would have a lot of synergy in your presentation and research styles.

[@jlbqk6]

I think it's pretty cool they made an effort to analyze the effect of timbre. I've got no education in music but I've always though the insistence that C3 on a piano is exactly the same as C3 on any guitar is oversimplifying. For that matter I don't think C played on different octaves sounds the same and therefore shouldn't be treated identically. Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I feel like the broad-strokes equivalence assumptions can mask some of the complexity that flavors the final piece.

[@albertnortononymous9020]

Well first, the guitar transposes up an octave (so it can be written in treble clef), so C3 on the guitar will sound an octave lower than C3 on the piano. Second, the broad-stroke equivalence assumptions are the very reason common practice music sounds the way that it does-the material that matters most and is worth analyzing isn’t in the sound of the instruments, but in the individual melodies they play (as taught by composer Milton Babbitt to Stephen Sondheim). The timbres were purely aesthetic and rarely factored into analysis unless the composer was definitely trying to imitate an actual sound with an instrument (birds = woodwinds, cow fart = contrabassoon, etc.). Finally, octaves are important in common practice theory-the lowest note is what determines which inversion of a chord is being played. But when common practice theory was dropped in favor of anything different (eventually 12-tone technique), they made even octaves unnecessarily equivalent by reducing all the notes to 12 “pitch classes” so that an F# had the same function no matter which octave it was played at, so that now octaves were purely aesthetic (high notes = light, low notes = gravity, etc.). The problems inherent in classical music are arbitrary and self-imposed is what I’m trying to say.

[@claytonr.young-music912]

@@albertnortononymous9020 Wow! Some musical theorists are incredibly stupid. How could someone disregard instrumentation; it makes a big difference, and dynamics and articulation make a big difference too.

[@eljanrimsa5843]

The piano is an instrument that has been invented and ingeniously developed to give you clean notes. Every other instrument has its own opinion on what it wants to give you.

[@cyanhallows7809]

@@eljanrimsa5843 cap

[@brodaclop]

If plagal cadence is so common in both styles, wouldn't it make sense to rely on it in the priming?

[@smergthedargon8974]

Yeah, that stuck out to me too.

[@Alberto-ny7kf]

you should do an analysis on The Pixies's Where is My Mind!

[@jonathankrieger9121]

He looked at the song before

[@jester6289]

The day is my enemy please

[@ThOutRider2]

Why? I love the song, but I'm curious what makes you interested in it

[@Alberto-ny7kf]

@@ThOutRider2 the guitar sounds sooo sad i wanna know the theory behind it. i don't even like the song that much tbh i just wanna know whats so melancholic about the notes.

[@ThOutRider2]

@@Alberto-ny7kf ahhh OK. Thanks for the reply. Yeah that is interesting

[@JamesCamienMcGuiggan]

Really good vid. Particular props for the Picasso cameo. One of my favourite works of his!

[@crisdekker8223]

1:34 Ah yes, the authentic slender shady.

[@batya7]

Having just watched a video on sociolinguistics, I was amused by the concept of musical code-switching.

[@uberchops]

Maybe my experience isn't the most common, but I was taught that while the authentic cadence was the "strongest", strongest doesn't always mean "best" or "most appropriate". Like in a rock song which uses the lowered 7th and no leading tone, a V - I cadence would sound horribly out of place. If you want a strong finish, a IV - I is almost certainly stronger than a v - I and bVII - I is still at least modally consistent.

[@tonygairomusic911]

Great video! Incredibly interesting topic, especially on the heels of Adam Neely's "18th Century Musicians" piece. Love this subject matter and look forward to more thought-provoking insight in regard. I tell my advancing students that there are really cool and original means to cadence using voice-leading which can create some non-traditional bass movement. Not really a classical vs rock thing, per se but...Anyway, thanks for this.

[@midge_gender_solek3314]

For me the authentic cadence with piano sounded like an ending of a piece, while with electric guitar is sounded more like an intro. That is cool.

[@patricion.lealmartir9440]

Usually I speed up videos so I watch the same information in less time. In this case I have to slow down the video because if I don't do it I don't get the information

[@danielcisternas3017]

Another way to interpret the results is not that V-I is less important today, but is that harmony is less important today (it is to be expected that variations of something that is less important tend to be scored lower). It is amazing how many #1 songs that are made of 2-3 chords. Trying to learn more myself, I found thousands of video hours/books that music theorists have created about harmony and very few about rules that dictate how a good leading melody is made.

[@franklinkz2451]

Uhhh Mr Mathers didnt exactly say it that way but i mean im sure that is what he meant

[@cholten99]

I really enjoy these videos but the icing on the cake is always one or more little stand-out doodles. A quick throw-away Feynman Diagram in this one was excellent.

[@josephminder7366]

I’m glad to see you’re doing something with your music degree

[@photonicpizza1466]

6:58 Is that a Black Lotus? Nice.

[@brananherndon6947]

That’s what it looks like

[@JuliaAllenHesse]

don't tell WOTC though! they dont' like proxies

[@akmadsen]

It definitely is. Great choice by Mx. Tone here. :)

[@exohead1]

@@akmadsen You know they use they/them pronouns, right?

[@akmadsen]

@@exohead1 I had no idea. My apologies. What is the equivalent of "Mr/Ms" with they/them?

[@jdavis6650]

I'm glad you have a forum to express your opinion and earn a living.You tend to use a form of logic that works for you and many of your subs, but I have my own doubts. While I don't have a label for it, I would describe it as the "I might be wrong" doctrine. It seems to be working for most. Either way, best of luck.

[@samcmusic3031]

I’ve always thought that on electric guitar using power chords, a IV to I sounds a lot more satisfy

[@wmchristie]

The yinyang elephants are great! I’m obsessing on the symbols today.

[@stella717]

We actually watch your videos in band class, the teacher says he's a patreon of yours. Pretty cool videos 📹 😎 👌 👍

[@tejs1234]

5:00 The backdoor IS a plagal cadance if i may. It derives from the mol dur scale and is basicly IV-6 resolving to I.

[@AleFabbriProjects]

In fact in Italy, at the conservatory, our jazz harmony teacher called it "plagal substitution" ; it comes from the movement of the voices in classical music. In many jazz standards (for instance "Stella by Starlight") the cadence is : IV - bVII - I

[@jeremiahsaxton8967]

I've been watching this channel for a few years now, and I just realized that you're left handed

[@petebenes948]

And draws right to left. As a fellow southpaw, can confirm that written media like to smear under the left hand.

[@buxeessingh2571]

I LOVED the Riemann Zeta Function as the graphic for, "is there a way to prove that?"

[@siulumlion]

Also Feynman diagram at 3:26!

[@nugboy420]

Love the Feynman diagrams you throw into these videos sometimes

[@JuliaAllenHesse]

Another aspect of this might be .. does rock music really need "cadences"? Does it need to "resolve"? In bands I've been in, we've never written songs with "resolution" in mind. We jam until we stumble across something that sounds good, and tweak it until it's a song. This riff four times, this other riff four times, and end on a big E chord (really E5 or maybeeeee Em).

[@TwoScoopsOfTubert]

I'm coming from the same boat, but maybe we *are* doing that.. just without knowing it. I think not knowing the ins and outs of the theory doesn't necessarily mean you're not trying to achieve the same thing as someone who is very deliberately writing material. They just probably know how to get there more efficiently.

[@joetowers4804]

i'm almost positive that the previous chord to that big E5 chord is a good ol' B chord.

[@akmadsen]

@@TwoScoopsOfTubert That's exactly it. The theory exists to try to explain why we think these things sound great and what rules we subconsciously follow when writing music. I studied linguistics, and this is very similar to grammar. For instance, a 3-year-old most likely doesn't know about word classes but they still have a very good grasp of how to use verbs as verbs, nouns as nouns and so on. They usually don't try to pluralize a verb, and they don't try to put an adjective in past tense. Yet, if you asked them about it, they probably wouldn't be able to explain why. I'm delighted to see music theory moving away from "one theory to explain them all" and towards theories for different genres. It makes a lot more sense, IMO.

[@agnidas5816]

@@TwoScoopsOfTubert but we are not trying to go to a technical space - we are getting feelings across first and foremost. Watch Tous les Matins du Monde (1991) to get a better idea of music. I think it is a wonderful eye opener that one ...

[@alankc1937]

you described the different between outstanding bands and well... the others good ones...

[@Poparad]

3:12 Ah, the good old Kontakt electric guitar. I'd know that sound anywhere!

[@ShaharHarshuv]

I like how you put in the skillshare ad seemlessly.

[@jotougas2211]

One thing that I think is really important is that most classical music is through composed (it goes from one phrase to another without really repeating anything verbatim) wheras most rock is in some sort of ABAB/rondo form. So things that work in classical, like the very definitive PAC might not work as well in rock, where you have to loop the form over and over. Not only that, but (most) classical doesn't use chord loops, so the PAC makes more sense when ending a large phrase. This is just my perception, but the plagal cadence sounds a lot more soft than the PAC, making it more useful to loop because it is less strictly defined. Idk though, that's just how I see it, which definitely isn't universally true or correct.

[@simongelsdorf3556]

Very interesting video, however here in the Netherlands, we teach the backdoor cadence as a plagal cadence as well. The chord derives from mixolydian b13 scale of the main key, lets say A major like in the video. It is the same scale where the IV degree minor, in this case Dm6 or Dmmaj7 comes from, so it is just another version of a plagal chord, even though it has not the D in the base. G7 also has a Bdim triad in its upper structure, which would be another variation of the minor plagal cadence.

[@samaelherself4286]

I've kind of always had a bit of an issue with cadences while studying music and it relates to this. We are taught that some resolve better than others, but that doesn't always apply, as seen here, and that changes a lot depending on our backgrounds. I personally prefer the sound of the backdoor resolution (especially in minor), the bII (or bii) to i and IV to i. I've talked to other people that are a bit skeptic of classical ideas and what we think is that it may be due to the music i've listened to the most, both growing up and currently.

[@smergthedargon8974]

bII to i? A fellow Phrygian appreciator, I see!

[@production2353]

I've been talking about this for years. The paper completely misses what's actually happening today as they are looking in the wrong place. Perfect cadence has been not only largely abandoned but completely subverted by much of modern pop, where standard Western Harmony often has little to no functionality at all in the classical sense.

[@georgeantonioandrei8570]

Well you have some functional harmony in jazz, pop and rock. But they all have theyr own vocabulary and the schools refuse to teach those.

[@skern49]

perfect cadences are literally EVERYWHERE in pop music. not sure what you're talking about

[@aksela6912]

I'm sure the music theory bit here is sound, but that sloth is definitely upside down.

[@TheGerkuman]

Thank you for the Eminiem (M&M) doodle.

[@hotdogskid]

One day were gonna see 12tone explaining the poincare conjecture and 3b1b analyzing mf doom lyrics and i cant wait

[@colwilson8167]

Surely the resolution used depends somewhat on the emotion or feeling that is being attempted to portray with the music

[@gonce9846]

Buen análisis! Gracias

[@MarkRhodesSongs]

Fascinating. Thank you.

[@Pakanahymni]

Having listened to rock and metal all my life and when I started learning music theory at first the V7-I cadence sounded absolutely awful to my ears, there was something goofy and off-putting about the sound that I didn't like at all.

[@BrunoNeureiter]

Interesting

[@j.c.m.2181]

Same here. If anything, V7-I feels unfinished to me, I seem to prefer deceptive cadences to mediants and circling back from there. Wasted a lot of time trying to 'fix' my resolutions.

[@joshistyping]

Yeah, V(7)-I in rock sounds more incomplete, like something that goes in the middle of a verse.

[@leongilbertomedellinsekarg2720]

Classical Harmony is not only Tonal music, tonal harmony it is still working when it comes to tonal music, when it becomes modal, it is a different topic. We all still really unprepared for modal music since we are taught to focus on tonal understanding of music.

[@odysseuscrocodilydae4391]

What a fabulous essay!

[@dibyenduroy7799]

Man busting out the reinmann zeta function when we least expect it

[@jstrandquist]

This confirmed something that I've been noodling on for a while, that rock and classical use a fundamentally different vocabulary. I noticed this because I learned most of my music theory via this channel's intro videos and song analyses, which worked perfectly well for someone whose primary musicological interest is rock. But anytime I attempted to read works on music theory or musical philosophy, I found that they exclusively dealt with classical music and/or high-art challenges to classical music like 12-tone serialism, treating rock and other popular music as debased and musically vacuous. I obviously disagree, and I started to wonder if perhaps the issue was that the framework by which these theorists were evaluating rock music was simply unsuited to it.

[@marciamakesmusic]

Wow so observant lol

[@mattheasboelter5217]

That's a really great way to put it. I guess in the end, it's really just that theory tends to lag behind actual practice. You can even see this happening in the common practice period (although not as much and not as fast). The example I actually know (I'm sure there are more) is the debate over Monteverdi's Cruda Amarilli, where he was criticized for breaking counterpoint rules for "no reason". What was his main reason? It helped enhance the relationship between the text and the music. 100 years later, those types of violations became a common part of theory. I can't speak with as much authority on later music, but I think it's pretty safe to say that things like that were happening constantly. I guess in the end, I think it's really important to always remember that 1: theory only exists inside it's context, and 2: that context shifts rapidly. I think people often like to treat theory as an unmovable standard, but that's as far from the truth as you can be.

[@Timliu92]

"To paraphrase renowned music expert, Marshall Mathers......" Gee, never knew Eminem was so darn good in music theory. 😋😋

[@buxeessingh2571]

In "My Band", the structure of the two solos, "...drop the beat..." and "...tears my ass apart..." are standard for short song-form cadenzas.

[@keinname1896]

Just a little sidenote that could potnetially be interesting: There is a niche for the bVII -> i and that is Power and Melodic Death Metal. This cadence is ALL OVER THE PLACE, if you make an corpus analysis of Amon Marth songs (that absolutely nobody, especially the poster of that comment would ever do) you would find that like 75% of all the songs would use either a i, bvii pendulum or another loop that uses v, vi or iv while relaying on the bvii to get back to the tonal centre. It's also very common in other styles of modern rock an metal. The sentiment that the plagal cadance sounds very 60 is kinda true and it has been somewhat overshadowed by the i -> bVII in the later years. So that music theory study was kinda smart about it's material which is something quite unusual nowadays. :D Still an amazing video!

[@josephreynolds2401]

I've tried delving classical. THIS video was made for me.

[@ProffessorMusic]

I'd love to see you conduct a study on this - I'm sure many of your viewers would be happy to participate! (myself included)

[@gigno1485]

As a professional statistician, I'm interested in seeing the data they collected. I wonder what other sorry of experiments you could run to examine these preferences. I bet you could set up a regression with dummy variables for differing aspects of the music. Might be cool to try at least.

[@danielkerr5583]

Any two chords can be a cadence with the right context and preparation. Different styles of music are different contexts, I'm not surprised that the quality of "resolution" evoked by a particular cadence depends on the context. Honestly, in isolation, the authentic cadence doesn't sound like a resolution to my ears, or even really anything at all. It could just as easily be a I - IV intro to some new idea, bIII - bVII in the middle of a minor key progression, or could even be a minor scale borrowed chord setup for a backdoor cadence bIII - bVII - I.

[@rddsknk89]

I don't know what kind of musical background you have, but it is puzzling to me the a V-I doesn't sound like anything to you. For me personally, anytime I hear even just a dominant 7th chord, my brain can't help but hear the implied resolution from V-I. That sound is just so ingrained into me.

[@danielkerr5583]

@@rddsknk89 My background is classical actually, so the V-I should be really strong for me, even in the absence of any other cues. I don't have a good explanation why it isn't. Possibly, it's because my exposure to classical music wasn't thrust on me, I sought it out myself. As a child, my parents rarely listened to classical music and instead listened to classic rock, motown, folk, and other pop music of the 50s and 60s.

[@kylezo]

@@rddsknk89 I think this is the case of someone really liking the sound of their own voice. Claims of "V-I doesn't sound like anything to me" when tension & release is the core of all harmonic relationships is really quite silly. As if there's no 5-1 in "classic rock, motown, folk, and other pop music of the 50s and 60s" lmfao

[@danielkerr5583]

@@kylezo I didn't say a V-I doesn't sound like anything to me, I said in isolation it doesn't. I don't claim to have a rational explanation for it, it's just my experience. As you say, V-I doesn't appear only in classical music, though the styles I listed V-I isn't as emphasized as it is in most classical music. I provided context for my experience, I don't really think what I've stated is contrarian enough to warrant your attack. However, if maintaining your view on this matter requires you to dismiss my experience, so be it, I don't really have any control over that.

[@leomiller2291]

In the flat 7 resolving to 1 in this video, what are the notes that make up the flat 7 chord and the 1 chord? Thanks!

[@apocryphite_2]

3:05 my immediate thought after hearing both examples was that they mean drastically different things (what specifically, I don't know. I'm a novice). It's interesting that the timbre alone can change the meaning of the same notes.

[@enricopersia4290]

Thinking about many of my favorite songs, the cadence 7th minor/tonic or 2nd Minor/tonic are actually more pleasant to my ears than the 5/1, maybe it's just a matter of habits?

[@ShadowD2C]

Wonderful video

[@stochasticstoic4810]

What would you say to an analysis of the IV-iv-I cadence? Such a staple of English rock...

[@mikemorrisonmusic]

I’d love for you to do an analysis on Anesthetize by Porcupine Tree.

[@asloii_1749]

YES

[@lorenzodeiaco8902]

I am wondering if you ever studied physics or mathematics? I just love the fact that you keep putting little diagrams, graphs and functions in these videos. I love both music and maths , but I am going to try to persue science and live music as a passion, it seems like you took the opposite decision. Btw your content is always fricking great so congratulations!

[@Erkilmarl]

The backdoor cadence may have come from British Folk music, too, (What Shall We Do with a Drunken Sailor, just I and b7)and from the use of Dorian mode. When I started listening to Rock during the early 70's it seemed that this cadence was everywhere. Just think how in songs like Paranoid and Locomotive Breath phrases end with D - Em. I so grew with this avoidance of the perfect cadence, that I usually and instinctively cassify songs that make excess use traditional perfect cadences as uninteresting.

[@TheSalamander5678]

The Rock primer was somewhere between CCR and Taking Care of Business to me

[@SebiStr99]

My theory(that i just started to develop on my piano), as to why 5-1 works better in "classical" (or on an instrument that doesn't distort and has the ability to clearly voice every note), is as follows: when you can hear every note of a chord, in a 5-1 you change the 3rd up by a half-step and the 5th up by a whole step, but you can keep the root as the new 5th. this makes for a satisfying, yet not overwhelming amount of change. while on an instrument (or setting) where you can't really pick out details beyond a certain point (eg distorted electric guitar; maybe with distortion even weakening certain notes and their harmony with others), you have might have a harder time making the change 3rd+1semi = new root stand out enough to be satisfying, so you have to introduce the root of the 1 chord a different way. that is by making it the 5th of the previous chord, thereby making it a 4-1 cadence. This is just a thought I had whilst playing around during this video. I know it isn't very scientific, nor is it backed up by facts, but I wanted to write it down somewhere, so why not here. Also, play around with "power chords" on piano. resolutions will sound very different. (4-1 > 5-1 in powerchords imo, whilst I would prefer 5-1 in full chords)

[@vikkilikki8627]

I have recently watched a bunch of your videos and didn't realize before this very minute that you are actually drawing the opposite direction you would write (in english that is). For some reason it wasn't really an issue, I believe it might be since you arent using latin letters (the only letters I know how to read) you have made your own language that compliments your voiceover and I actually don't know how to finish this sentence, but that was very interesting! :D Hey! 20 min older me here, I realized it is probably because you are left handed, and as a left hended person I know the struggle of smudging and others not being able to see what you're writing.

[@chrisjamesr77]

2:55 Haha, I was totally thinking that sounded like the Stones, then he draws the Stones logo, nice!

[@marceloleal1957]

Well, though this video is interesting, all kinds of chord changes have been used in classic rock, so I was hoping that you would talk a little bit about the most important difference, which, for me, comes from the blues concept of making the tonic a dominant. And for me it opens up all kind of possibilities in "popular perception of good" sounding chord changes, even if this didn't come itself firstly with the blues, but rather contemporary music itself (and maybe even medieval music without the theory behind it, or even before and/or elsewhere). And even if you can see a I7-IV as a plagal cadance rather than a V7-I, authentic. Also, not related, but you have surely noticed that the ii-V has a simlar effect than the IV-V, and the vi-V (or even just the ii, the viiº, or V) in the major tonality, and in minor tonality the iiº-V, the iv-V, and the VI-V? Whatever, I don't know why I'm commenting. Have a good day!

[@shipsahoy1793]

Every musical genre has its own vocabulary, structure, articulation, meters, etc. The point here is that depending on what you’re trying to build, you will use different tools, different materials, and do different operations. So nothing new under the sun, just different.

[@martinepstein9826]

It's unfortunate that so many rock/metal guitarists deal with intermodulation by only playing the simplest chords. There are tons of interesting chords that sound great on distorted guitar.

[@johnmcminn9455]

let's not forget Girshwin studied classical. this writing spend a lot of time talking about V I when what you study at a jazz school day 1 is tri tone subs on ii V and the fact V7 is every chord in a 12 bar I IV V. it is notable to look at really simple pop music and find the major Lydian sound and how the 4 chord can be subbed with the 4 of Melodic Minor and the diminished ladder associated with MM the title of a video could be Functional harmony vs modal harmony and why the 2 need each other 😃♥️

[@NoThumb]

Ready for some early morning music theory >:)

[@matthewhammans4365]

I love how when he said is there a way to prove that he drew the riemann zeta function. Clever humor

[@phillipmaciejewski9872]

That Feynman Diagram Easter egg at 3:27 is brilliant

[@lawrencetaylor4101]

Awesome study.

[@sdlion7287]

I guess if Spotify and its users would open up their playlist and preference recognition, it would advance this kind of research a lot. Lots of people like rock AND classical music... but on the big scale, which composers with what style preferences do they like more? Rock and CM are just so diverse within themselves.

[@ZekeNigma]

I can only speak for myself, but even before I got into rock/metal, I'd often gravitate towards composers that often made more intense and darker sounding pieces, such as Beethoven, Bach, Tchaikovsky, and so on. It was actually easier for me to get into rock/metal because of classical music, because to me, it sounded like stuff those composers would make but with distortion. The song that kind of made me realize that to begin with was "Blood and Thunder" by Mastodon, which I thought sounded too harsh and abrasive at first back then, but suddenly when I heard that guitar solo hit, that's when it all clicked for me and started to get into it more as a kid.

[@bdellovibrioo5242]

It would be interesting if the experiment were performed with the classical primer using a plagal cadence.

[@fucktheweekend152]

theres one frame at 10:14 that shows a piece of paper with a lot of noise on it. is that your test sheet? or just something under the paper so it doesnt bleed through to the table?

[@ambiention]

I wonder if the way chords progressions are voiced on the piano versus the guitar had an effect. Rock guitar chord shapes don't usually give much consideration to voice leading, more existing as independent 'blocks' of notes.

[@johnathanrhoades7751]

Loved the Black Lotus card for "Proxy" 😄

[@PROgamingspot]

Interesting! I’ve always intuitively disagreed when people say that the perfect cadence is the ultimate resolution, as I’ve always perceived the IV-I plagal cadence as a significantly stronger resolution than the V-I perfect cadence.

[@bagghius]

I like how you sneak in physics into your sketches

[@emilyblack7342]

I don’t have the time to delve into the literature surrounding academic questions like this (or to learn how to do so in a field like music theory) so I’m glad we’ve got 12tone here to do it for us. Specifically emailing the authors in universally Hell on ice. I don’t want to spend 15 minutes agonising over “best regards” vs “all the best”