A musicological question for music geeks/experts.

[fainéant]

I gave myself a crash course. I still can't wrap my mind around it. When one intereprets an Opeth song, for instance, what are you thinking of? The common thing to do is cut up the music in terms of its riffs and meter. But what about its 'tonality'?

That's the thing I don't understand. Take the song April Ethereal. It's (I think) set in the key of E minor. How does one go about thinking of this music in terms of tonality, scales, modulations, modes - Ionian, Aeolian, etc- and where and when does the language of riffs come in? And what about Chord Progressions? How does this mesh in with riffs and keys, modes, and scales?? Aren't chords- or riffs- or themes- scales in themselves, or do they invariably belong to a parent modality, a minor or major key? -- Or, is all of this an arbitrary, not so clean cut way of organizing the music, an organization that doesn't always work? If so, why?

Can someone please break down the science? Needless to say I'm confused.

btw, I have a good idea of what "modal music" is. Miles Davis' album "Kind of Blue" is a good example. But what's it mean for music to be "pseudo modal"?

 

[Nick Inch Nails]

I know exactly what you are talking about.

 

[StorTroll]

Hmm, I think it´s impossible to give you an unambiguous answer.
As for Opeth, thinking scales, modes ect. just won´t do...For instance the song April Ethereal is actually in no particular key.
Am-Bm-F#m, then to Em...then whatever! But that´s one the most appealing sides Opeth music. You cannot expain it theorywise. At least it´s quite "hard"...Keys modes are mixed together...

 

[fainéant]

Originally posted by StorTroll
Hmm, I think it´s impossible to give you an unambiguous answer.
As for Opeth, thinking scales, modes ect. just won´t do...For instance the song April Ethereal is actually in no particular key.
Am-Bm-F#m, then to Em...then whatever! But that´s one the most appealing sides Opeth music. You cannot expain it theorywise. At least it´s quite "hard"...Keys modes are mixed together...

That's what I'm interested in. Can you - OR ANYONE - expand upon that, confirm or disconfirm that?

I'll try to come up with more focused questions some other time.

 

[Misanthrope]

Originally posted by fainéant
I gave myself a crash course. I still can't wrap my mind around it. When one intereprets an Opeth song, for instance, what are you thinking of? The common thing to do is cut up the music in terms of its riffs and meter. But what about its 'tonality'?

That's the thing I don't understand. Take the song April Ethereal. It's (I think) set in the key of E minor. How does one go about thinking of this music in terms of tonality, scales, modulations, modes - Ionian, Aeolian, etc- and where and when does the language of riffs come in? And what about Chord Progressions? How does this mesh in with riffs and keys, modes, and scales?? Aren't chords- or riffs- or themes- scales in themselves, or do they invariably belong to a parent modality, a minor or major key? -- Or, is all of this an arbitrary, not so clean cut way of organizing the music, an organization that doesn't always work? If so, why?

Can someone please break down the science? Needless to say I'm confused.

btw, I have a good idea of what "modal music" is. Miles Davis' album "Kind of Blue" is a good example. But what's it mean for music to be "pseudo modal"?

You need to stop trying so hard. You dont think such things as you go along, when i improvise i prepare myself by knowing what scales work and what scales dont work as i want them to work, but when im on a solo i dont think " o well i just modulated it from c mixolydian/bebop minor to a d harmonic minor now i might as well find my way up to a A natural minor and bring it on up until a c myxolidian again.

When im playing an improvised solo...is hard to explain but i just take any path i want to. I set my ideal roads of scales and my ideal sounds, but when im playing i just get a good feeling of the chord progression im playing on ( without obsessing about its harmonic properties ) and start playing notes and taking the directions i think that will sound good. Eventually you start playing something like 60% of the notes in a way that sounds good and you use little things like speed, bends, slides, arpeggious etc to fix some of the rest of the notes that dont sound as good.

Thats how i approach modal playing, is not sofisticated and all but you cant focus on theory while improvising, you need to focus on sounds and moods and just worry about theory when you dont like how a certain note sounded to get to a better sounding place quickly.

 

[fainéant]

I should have made the distinction clear. I'm not a musician asking for theoretical background useful for sound soloing. I imagine many musicians simply go by what "sounds right" when they solo, and go by trial, error, and experience. Instead, I'm interested, as a scientist of sorts, in knowing how things like "riffs" and "chord progressions" relate to each other.

For instance:

Would it be legitimate or illegitimate to say there is a chord progression going on in opeth riff at min 4:34 in song When? Or, indeed, are riffs chord progessions? And what are chord progressions in relation to modes and keys?

Do riffs have a modal character about them. Maybe riff 3 in song C is Locrian, and riff 7 in song D is pure Aeolian. Would this be valid language? Or maybe it's all bullshit? If so, why so?

 

[ControlledChaos]

opeth does not modulate. They play a lot of nonrelated chords and have very elementary tonal chord progressions like:

i III iv i

In any event, real modulation is not found in a lot of music other than classical, which is the epitomy of musical skill and genius in most cases. Mozart and Beethoven and Rachmaninoff and Saint-Saens modulate. It is harder than it sounds.

 

[Punisher]

 

[fainéant]

controlledchaos,

you're saying that in most cases, if not all cases, there's no change of key in an Opeth song? I find that hard to believe. There's modulation in christmas songs.

April Ethereal, for instance, as StorTroll notes, goes all over the place. It really is difficult to pin down the key of the song. A song by Novembre, on the other hand, seems to hover within the same scale all throughout, if i'm not mistaken.

Maybe you're confusing 'modulation' with 'artistry', the talent of transitioning from key to key meaningfully, no?

 

[Morningrise]

I can say one thing... Lots of metal music never follows one key for a very long time.

 

[DisTortorous]

Misanthrope,
You see, that is the beauty. When Opeth can take some scales and keys that typically do NOT work together, then they make it sound as if it were nothing, that is the charisma of this music.

As for the setter of this thread, who said progressions needed to be part of the music? And what's more, who cares about the riffs, there are better components to the music than to worry about some small riff.

 

[SADUDE]

Almost anything that is meaningful in music does not stay in one key for too long. As my experience suggests. Of course there are a few exceptions.

 

[fainéant]

Originally posted by DisTortorous

As for the setter of this thread, who said progressions needed to be part of the music? And what's more, who cares about the riffs, there are better components to the music than to worry about some small riff.

non sequitur and uninformative.

 

[fainéant]

Need input!

 

[ControlledChaos]

Originally posted by fainéant
controlledchaos,

you're saying that in most cases, if not all cases, there's no change of key in an Opeth song? I find that hard to believe. There's modulation in christmas songs.

April Ethereal, for instance, as StorTroll notes, goes all over the place. It really is difficult to pin down the key of the song. A song by Novembre, on the other hand, seems to hover within the same scale all throughout, if i'm not mistaken.

Maybe you're confusing 'modulation' with 'artistry', the talent of transitioning from key to key meaningfully, no?

I am misunderstood. There are plenty of changes in key in opeth. But that is what they are, passing chords or transition chords. There is no real modulation. They may start up in E minor and follow with chords like B minor, F# minor, D# minor etc...(harvest) but there is no modulating. They just suddenly shift to, lets say, B minor from E minor with either a few nonrelated chords or none at all.

A modulation from E minor to B minor could look something like this if written out theory wise

i iv V I vi V7/V i V i

opeth does

i i
(e minor), (b minor)

I hope I make some sense. Keep in mind I'm not disrespecting opeth in any way. If you label every key change as modulation, there is modulation out the kazoo...perhaps it is I who is confusing modulation with artistry, as you said.

In any case, modulations or not, Opeth is incredible.

 

[ControlledChaos]

In reply to the Novembre comment, they do not "modulate" (if I may continue to use that word in that context) any more times than Opeth does, but they are closer to true modulation. They use contrapuntal composition techniques frequently, such as motives, sequences, and sentences.

 

[ControlledChaos]

But yes, they stay in the same key more than opeth does. Man, how many consecutive posts will i make in this thread?

 

[DisTortorous]

Retarded fainéant. I'm not interested in any of your bullshit. At least you could have answered some of my questions.

Progressions aren't always in music. And what the hell do you mean by - Chords, progressions, riffs, themes in themselves or are they...-in themselves? Like, did they eat themselves and then pop out of their asses?

They might not all pertain to the same key, major or minor, I mean this should be obvious. This is what musicians call a key-change.

 

[fainéant]

Originally posted by ControlledChaos
I am misunderstood. There are plenty of changes in key in opeth. But that is what they are, passing chords or transition chords. There is no real modulation. They may start up in E minor and follow with chords like B minor, F# minor, D# minor etc...(harvest) but there is no modulating. They just suddenly shift to, lets say, B minor from E minor with either a few nonrelated chords or none at all.

I'm getting more confused. On the one hand, it does seem like you're confusing modulation (changing keys) with the idea of changing keys meaningfully, where "meaningful" implies intelligent artistic behavior. On the other hand, it's like you might be right about Opeth. You mentioned Harvest, but isn't there a parent key to the song? Aren't chord progressions like Cminor to Abminor to gminor to gmaj a part of a key, in the case of Harvest the key of Cminor? And wouldn't the chorus ("into the orchard we walk..") be considered a modulation to a different key? Whatever the case is, this is all a part of my confusion. There are chord progressions then there particular keys. Then there are riffs. Then there are modes. I'm asking about how these terms all mesh together in the perception of music.

A modulation from E minor to B minor could look something like this if written out theory wise

i iv V I vi V7/V i V i

opeth does

i i
(e minor), (b minor)

I understand this part, sort of. You might be right about there being no modulations in Opeth music, but then I have this instinct that you're not seeing the fact that chord progressions can be considered a part of a key. (as harvest's is) But that's what I'm trying to clear up.

cheers

your other post:

In reply to the Novembre comment, they do not "modulate" (if I may continue to use that word in that context) any more times than Opeth does, but they are closer to true modulation. They use contrapuntal composition techniques frequently, such as motives, sequences, and sentences.

interesting. It'd be great if the trained musicians on this board would discuss this, perhaps debate it.

 

[fainéant]

Originally posted by DisTortorous
Retarded fainéant. I'm not interested in any of your bullshit. At least you could have answered some of my questions.

Progressions aren't always in music. And what the hell do you mean by - Chords, progressions, riffs, themes in themselves or are they...-in themselves? Like, did they eat themselves and then pop out of their asses?

They might not all pertain to the same key, major or minor, I mean this should be obvious. This is what musicians call a key-change.

non sequitur and uninformative. try again.