-= Guitar Messenger =- | Polyphonic Writing for Keyboard (Part 1)

Polyphonic Writing for Keyboard - Part 1
by R. Toscano

Hello and welcome back to Beyond Theory. In this column I would like us to get away from THEORY altogether and look closer at texturing and things approximate to the realm of composition. Over the course of the last few years I have come to realize that most people do not truly appreciate how versatile the piano can be when writing for it. By versatility I do not mean styles of music at all, but actually how the piano can be utilized to play many different lines and textures at the same time – its polyphonic capabilities.

For the purpose of this column we will be looking at small fragments from different works out of the piano repertoire. In those examples we will see how each composer has decided to treat the given texture and in what way he has or has not attempted to expand the writing to go beyond mere melody and accompaniment. I should stress from the beginning that the purpose of this column is not to prove that mere melody and accompaniment is bad or amateurish (after all many great works have been written in that way), but simply that in this column we will be looking to expand what most people view as physically possible on the instrument from the stand point of polyphony. This will hopefully lead to more freedom when approaching composing for piano or synthesizer, and even expanding what some readers view as possible when writing for any keyboard instrument.

Melody and Accompaniment:

Everyone here has seen this sort of piano writing:

This is usually what a beginning student in composition will put together as they are trying to compose for the piano. A held over chord or left hand figure and a right hand melody, essentially 2 elements, in this case being that one is a line and the other a simple harmonic figure.

How can one expand this sort of texture to include something more? After all, a person only has 2 hands, how are they to play something more complex than this? Here is an obviously much superior example, taken from Chopin’s Nocturne in Bb minor op.9

Chopin1

You see here, Chopin is using a very simple texture as well - the left hand outlines chords via arpeggios and the right hand plays a melody. Already, however, you can see how superior his writing is to the pervious example. While it can be said that he is simply approaching the writing like the example that came before it, his control of how we hear said texture is much superior (part of the reason is Chopin’s use of compound lines in the left hand of said texture, but let us not look at that so closely right now).

As previously stated, Chopin outlines his harmonic progression via arpeggios in the left hand, and in addition to that also sets up a TONIC PEDAL in which he grounds the tonic of the piece firmly in the mind of the listener awhile outlining the very simple tonic-dominant harmony. Meanwhile, in the right hand he has the lyrical melody and some ornamental variations on it, again slightly more worked out than our first example awhile still retaining that very same idea (melody and accompaniment).

Chopin

In the example above Chopin retains the same principle, left hand outlining chords and right hand melody. However, notice he no longer has the Tonic Pedal going and instead is shifting to accommodate new harmony. The harmonic progression here is interesting, and I thought I would point it out: im – (V7) – Ger+6 (V7/N6) – N6 – V7- im. (For clarification on these chords please address questions in the GuitarMessenger Forum)

2 part, independent counterpoint

Briefly, let us now look at a 2 part texture where both lines are totally independent from each other. Awhile it is true they still interact together to form harmony one is not perceived as mere harmonic accompaniment awhile the other is heard as melody; in this case both lines are heard as totally independent. JS Bach was a master of counterpoint and the following example shows how he controls multiple lines to weave together harmonic textures from a purely linear standpoint.

Bach's Fugue No. 10 in E minor (Well-Tempered Clavier Book I)

3+ part independent counterpoint

3-part: Bach's Fugue No. 2 in C Minor (Well-Tempered Clavier Book I)

4-part: Bach's Fugue No. 18 in G# Minor (Well-Tempered Clavier Book I)

This is not the column to talk about FUGUE in detail, which is something I plan to cover later on in a future column. Nonetheless, these are great examples of counterpoint and it becomes clear how precise Bach’s control of independent lines really was. If you follow all the fugues, you can clearly see how he manipulates each one so that the listener is constantly engaged by at least two melodies or more, awhile in the case of 4-5 part fugues the other voices will usually fill out remaining harmony. Sometimes all 5 lines will be totally independent within the texture, as is the case with this example that follows: a 5 part fugue in which the subject is canonically stated in stretto (meaning that the theme will lap onto itself in all 5 lines).

5-part: Bach's Fugue No. 22 in Bb Minor (Well-Tempered Clavier Book I)