- Hi, I'm Gareth Green,
and welcome to another video in our series
where we delve inside the mind of Bach.
And this time, we're looking at the first two phrases
of one of his Chorales, Ich dank.
And this is in a collection called Riemenschneider,
if you have that collection or know about it, at number 341,
but you don't need that because the score is here
right in front of you.
And in particular, we're going to be thinking about
the use of common notes.
If you don't know about those, don't worry,
all will be explained.
But first of all, let's hear the music
of these first two phrases.
Okay, a quick whiz through the harmony,
because there are one or two interesting things
going on here.
Like actually, which key are we in?
Are we in A major or are we in F-sharp minor?
Because when we see the first chord,
it looks like a chord of F-sharp minor.
So that suggests that that might be the key,
but then we don't really see any E-sharps
that we might be expecting to see.
And immediately after the first chord,
we start seeing chords that look as if
they belong to A major.
And then we have a first phrase
that looks as if it's modulating to E major, which it does,
but there's a funny G-Natural in the melody
just before we get there.
So it's a slightly bumpy ride in terms of the key.
And then the second phrase is much more solidly going,
well, starting in E major and staying there
in the dominant key.
So have a little think about this for a moment.
So if we're in A major, we're starting on chord VI,
little bit of a surprise,
if this is really the tonic A major,
when we're starting on chord VI, slight surprise,
but there we are, Bach is full of surprises.
But it's not really F-sharp minor,
which is what that first chord suggests.
So this is Bach just teasing us a little bit, isn't it.
And there's something else that maybe justifies
the use of this chord that I'll come back to.
So we've got this chord VI,
there's a passing note in the alto.
Then we're going onto chord I in first inversion,
and then chord I in root position,
then chord IV in root position, passing note in the tenor,
so all this is fairly straightforward,
Then we're on the move because this chord
with a D-sharp in the bass
is suggesting that we're probably going to E major,
but here's the little surprise because the next note
in the melody, G-natural.
So you see this G-natural, we're not really expecting that
to be there if we're going to E major,
but what Bach is doing is he's kind of going
V in first inversion to I in E minor.
And then he goes V7 to I in E major.
That's a pretty unusual move for the time.
So starting on the F-sharp minor chord,
when we're really in the key of A major,
and then having this V-I in E minor
followed immediately by V-I in E major,
is a little bit of a colourful start.
So hear that first phrase.
And then in the second phrase, as I say,
it's much more firmly in the dominant key of E major.
So we're going I, IV, back to I.
This is all fairly straightforward.
Then VI.
Now there's a bit of stuff going on here
isn't there, could be a passing note in the alto,
and passing note in the tenor,
but this is really a chord VIIb
by the time we get to this point,
all of that is really a VIIb in E major.
Then it's a VII in first inversion,
and then back to I in first inversion.
And then even though you could say
these are now at the end of this bar, inessential notes,
you could say that's a lower auxiliary note,
you could say that's an upper auxiliary note,
and you could say that it's a passing note,
or you could say that the whole of this is a new chord.
So we've gone from E major first inversion
to a chord II7 in first inversion,
and then a fairly standard cadence where we've got
I in second inversion, V7,
and then I to finish.
So it's a really interesting blend of
fairly conventional treatment and one or two surprises,
and more than one way of looking at certain corners,
which is what Bach does.
But really what we're focusing on here is this use
of common notes.
You might know this as common tones,
if you've been brought up in a more U.S focused system,
they're the same thing.
And it's this notion that when we progress
from one chord to the next,
that there might be one or more notes in common
between this chord and the next chord.
And it's often offered as a piece of advice
for people learning to write harmony,
that if you've got a note that belongs to this chord,
and the same note also occurs in the next chord,
it's a very good idea to have that note repeating
in the same part, rather than having it
leaping around the place.
It gives us a little bit of stability.
So we're in the key of A major,
let's have a think about this.
If we take the note A, which is the first note
of the melody, well, A is at the bottom of a chord I,
at A major chord.
A is also in the middle of chord VI,
an F-sharp minor chord,
A is also a top of a chord IV, a D major chord.
So in other words,
if you are going to have a move between I, VI and IV,
you've got A in common.
So if that A can resound in the same part,
that's going to help the stability of the harmony.
So I'm hoping that now you can see why some moments
in this printed text that you can see
are highlighted in yellow, because I'm trying to highlight
these common notes, these common tones.
So you notice that this melody, that Bach is working with,
presents him with an immediate challenge, doesn't it?
Because the first thing we have in the melody is this.
Now if somebody gave you that melody and said,
"I'd like you to write an inspiring harmonisation
"of that melody."
You'd probably be thinking, oh, crikey,
this is not going to be terribly easy.
I've just got four repeated notes.
What am I going to do?
I, I, I, I.
Well, you can't really do that, can you?
But you can think,
maybe I can use I in different inversions.
So I've got I, but I could put it in first inversion.
I'm probably not going to put it in second inversion
because if I put it in second inversion,
then it's going to pull down to a resolution
that may or may not present itself.
So root position, first inversion,
but I could also think,
well, what about chord IV in root position
or first inversion?
What about chord VI in root position or first inversion?
And you can see, this is the kind of stuff
that Bach is up to.
And I think it's one thing that explains
why he started on this unusual chord VI,
because that first A in the given soprano part,
the treble part, is part of chord VI.
Then when he repeats it,
he moves to a different chord, and he moves to chord I
in first inversion.
Then he's got to repeat A again,
but this time he keeps the same chord, chord I,
that goes into root position.
Then he's got to repeat A again.
So he goes for one of those other options, chord IV.
So can you see, Bach has used each of those three options
that we talked about, A being at the bottom of I,
the middle of VI, the top of IV.
So in order to avoid being stuck thinking,
I'm just repeating the same note,
do I just keep repeating same chord?
He's said, no, we can use I, we can use IV, we can use VI.
I is perhaps the most important of those chords.
So he uses I twice, first inversion and root position.
So for those common notes,
we have VI, I in first inversion, I in root position, IV.
So he's been given the melody,
he's got to work with the melody,
whether he wants to or not,
whether he wants to have all those repeated notes,
but it's a very satisfactory response
because you don't get the feeling of being stuck
with these repeated A's because the harmony is on the move.
But notice when Bach is writing his own harmony,
where he has the choice of which notes to use,
he's also interested in common notes.
So from the first chord to the second chord,
you notice the tenor repeats the A as well.
So that gives us stability, doesn't it.
We've got two parts repeating A,
that's not consecutive octaves by the way,
because they're not moving.
If it was going two A's to two B's, that would be octaves,
but because it's repeating the same note,
that's not considered to be consecutive parallels,
however you know them, but it's giving us stability,
two parts repeating that note.
And then you notice when we go into the first complete bar,
we've got the alto here, repeating those two E's.
Well, obviously if we're going from chord I
in first inversion to chord I in root position,
well, the notes are the same.
So the A's are repeating at the top,
but now E is repeating in the alto,
and you notice how he can dodge between parts.
We had repeated notes at the beginning, soprano and tenor.
Now we've got these repeated notes, soprano and alto.
And then he does it again
at the end of that first complete bar,
when we come to this bit,
we've got these two F-sharps repeating in the alto.
So you can see F-sharp is the middle of that chord IV,
and F-sharp is also the fifth of this chord V
that's in the key of what turns out to be E minor,
it gives us stability.
So you notice how that repetition of the common note
or the common tone just keeps stability going there,
especially when something else is moving,
like we're changing key.
Also worth noting, when he can't repeat these common notes,
the other parts often move to the nearest available space.
I find often when people are writing harmony,
they've got their middle parts
especially jumping up and down big intervals
all over the place.
It throws up other difficulties.
It's not great for the sense of line
we get crossing of parts frequently,
but if you can move to something that's nearby,
so you see we've got a move next door in the melody
with that A to the B going on there,
we've got this common note situation going on in the alto.
The tenor is all kind of moving by step downwards,
and the bass moves by step upward.
So we're using a common note when we can,
but then we're just using the nearest available notes,
if we can't do that.
Then notice, we've got the tenor using common notes
or common tones here,
because that B belongs to the chord V
in first inversion of E minor,
and B as also in the tonic chord of E minor,
so common notes there.
Then he moves on to the next chord.
Well, he could have used a common note,
he could have used the B, but he wants to make it a VI.
So the tenor has moved off that possibility
just to make the chord richer.
And that seems a good move because V7 into the cadence
makes a lot of sense.
But then you see the bass using a common note
or a common tone here,
well in fact, the chord is just a repetition, isn't it.
We're using this E major chord root position,
and then we're repeating the chord,
but we've just got new spacing for the upper three parts.
But because the upper three parts are leaping
in a way that we've not seen quite so much elsewhere,
he's making a point of using that common note,
that common tone in the bass
to give us a bit of stability there.
We move into bar four.
And now we've got common notes in the tenor here,
because the E is the fifth of that A major chord,
and it's the root of this E major chord.
So common tone, common note being used in the tenor,
but you notice the soprano and alto parts
are moving by step,
so they're not jumping around the landscape,
they're going to the next available note,
and the only leap we've got there is in the bassline.
So if you've got one part repeating,
two parts moving by step,
well, you can afford to have one part leaping
if you want to.
Then all this stuff, there's a fair bit of movement
going on in this corner, isn't there.
So we're moving to neighbouring notes, lots of activity,
but nearly all the movement is going by step, isn't it.
So, where you can't have these common notes,
you're trying to create as much stability as you can.
Then we've got this situation
where we've got in the alto there, that sustained E,
well, that's not too difficult to see why that's being used
as a common note.
E major in first inversion,
we talked about what might be happening
right at the end of bar four with inessential notes.
But we also said that can be regarded harmonically
as a chord II7 in its first inversion.
So the E is a common note
being used all the way through there.
So you see how that works.
And then in the last bar,
this is an easy one to miss actually,
this bass one here,
where you might think, oh, is that really a common note?
Well, it's two B's, it's just that
Bach has displaced octave.
He often has these cadences that go, hot, cross, buns.
So dominant, dominant, tonic.
So that's a very common formula for it,
but actually it is the use of a common note, isn't it,
or a common tone with those two B's there.
So, it's another insight into
the wonders of Bach harmonizations of his chorales,
particularly that first phrase,
throwing up a few surprises there,
but just an interesting exercise
in how he creates stability
by using these common notes or common tones,
and how, when he can't use common notes or common tones,
he's looking for nearest available notes, much of the time.
So we get parts that are often moving by step,
and it limits the number of big leaps.
And if we have a leap in one part,
we tend to be more stable in the other parts,
and the place where we have the greatest number of leaps
in the greatest number of parts
is between the last chord of the first phrase,
and the first chord of the second phrase.
So when we get to this point,
you notice that we've got more leaps,
but that's because it's the connection between one phrase
and the next.
So let's put all our thinking together now,
as we listen to that whole pair of phrases again.
Well, I hope you've enjoyed that little study
on this Bach Chorale.
If this is something that interests you,
we've got other videos on Bach Chorales on the channel.
We've also got a course on how to harmonise Chorales
in the style of Bach.
And you can find that at www.mmcourses.co.uk,
along with our many other online courses
that might be of interest to you.
You can also click on the link
when you're on the home page there
to find out all about Maestros,
which is our wonderful international community of musicians,
where we meet once a month for a live stream,
there's live chat, people asking questions,
great to connect with each other.
We study something very specific together every month.
So we try to learn something interesting.
And there's also an opportunity for composers
and people doing harmony, and performers
to submit their own work,
where I can give you personal feedback, how about that?
And we can share that within the group,
and learn from each other, many other perks as well,
involved in being a Maestro.
So, take a look at that while you're there.