Acoustic scale
The acoustic scale is a sequence of seven notes that resembles a major scale with raised fourth and lowered seventh degrees. The sequence is also called the overtone, lydian dominant, lydian ♭7, or mixolydian ♯4 scale.[1][2][3][4] The acoustic scale is the fourth mode of the ascending melodic minor scale.[5]: 283
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History
[edit]Ernő Lendvai coined the term in his analysis of Béla Bartók's music.[6] He called it an acoustic scale because it derives from the overtone series.[7][8]: 67 Lendvai found Bartók favored two organizational schemes, one ruled by asymmetric golden ratios and the other by symmetrical structures organized around the acoustic scale.[6] Lendvai's speculatory work is often ignored in current scholarship.[9] The scale is an example of heptatonia secunda.[10]
The acoustic scale features prominently in the finale to Bartók's Concerto for Orchestra (1943).[7] It appears sporadically in nineteenth-century music, notably in the works of Franz Liszt (Mephisto Walz No. 3) and Claude Debussy (L'isle joyeuse).[5]: 245, 273 The acoustic scale is also common in the music of Nordeste, the northeastern region of Brazil.[11]
Construction
[edit]The acoustic scale generates a chord that resembles C major with an added minor minor seventh (B♭) and raised fourth (F♯).[8]: 67 The acoustic scale begins in the lydian mode and ends in the mixolydian.[10] The major lower tetrachord contrasts with its minor upper tetrachord. This polymodality was a constant feature of Bartók's music, where major intervals were positioned closely alongside their minor counterparts.[12]: 213f
The acoustic scale is familiar as the ascending melodic minor scale from the fourth degree.[5]: 283 In jazz theory, the lydian dominant scale maps cleanly on to chords with a ♯11.[13] It is an effective substitution for the mixolydian mode over the dominant chord.[4]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ↑ Persichetti, Vincent. Twentieth-Century Harmony. W. W. Norton & Company, 1961. 44.
- ↑ Berle, Arnie. Encyclopedia of Scales, Modes and Melodic Patterns. Mel Bay Publications, Incorporated, 2010. 55.
- ↑ Berle, Arnie. Theory & Harmony for the Contemporary Musician. Amsco Publications, 1996. 82.
- 1 2 Fewell, Garrison. "Lydian-Dominant Strategies", Guitar Player, vol. 32, no. 2. February 1998. 154f.
- 1 2 3 Tymoczko, Dmitri. "Scale Networks and Debussy", Journal of Music Theory, vol. 48, no. 2, 2004. 219–94.
- 1 2 Wilson, Paul. The Music of Béla Bartók. Yale University Press, 1992. 7.
- 1 2 Cooper, David. Bartók, Concerto for Orchestra. Cambridge University Press, 1996. 9f.
- 1 2 Lendvai, Ernő. Béla Bartók: An Analysis of his Music. Introduction by Alan Bush. London: Kahn & Averill, 1971.
- ↑ Waldbauer, Ivan. "Analytical Responses to Bartók’s Music: Pitch Organization", The Cambridge Companion to Bartók. Edited by Amanda Bayley. Cambridge University Press, 2001. 217.
- 1 2 Kárpáti, János. Bartók's String Quartets. Corvina Press, 1975. 127.
- ↑ Adolfo, Antonio. Composição, Uma discussão sobre o processo criativo brasileiro. Rio de Janeiro: Lumiar Editora, 1997. 23. ISBN 978-85-7407-369-9.
- ↑ Kárpáti, János. Bartók's chamber music. Stuyvesant: Pendragon Press, 1994.
- ↑ Gann, Kyle. The Arithmetic of Listening: Tuning Theory and History for the Impractical Musician. University of Illinois Press, 2019. 139.