Consecutive fifths
Encyclopedia : C : CO : CON : Consecutive fifths
In music, consecutive fifths (also known as parallel fifths) involve the occurrence of successive intervals of a perfect fifth between two voices in parallel motion; e.g., a parallel movement from C to D in one voice, and G to A in a higher voice.
Common practice period: general considerations
During the common practice period, the use of consecutive fifths was strongly discouraged. This is primarily due to the nature of the voice leading, which stresses the individual identity of voices. Partially due to the overtone series, the individuality of the two parts is weakened while they move in parallel fifths.
Consecutive octaves
This loss of individuality is also apparent in cases where parallel octaves occur. These are therefore also generally ruled out entirely, in any passages in which the parts in question are expected to be independent.
Hidden consecutives
In hidden consecutives (also known as exposed consecutives), a single perfect fifth or octave between two independent voices is approached by similar motion, with a leap or skip in the higher voice. In some contexts, hidden consecutives are avoided altogether; in other contexts, they may not involve an outer part. Other contraints may apply, and may vary by date within the common practice period, and even in the work of individual composers.
Special uses and exceptions in early music
Consecutive fifths are typically used to evoke the sound of music in medieval times or exotic places. The use of parallel fifths (or fourths) to refer to the sound of traditional Chinese or other kinds of Eastern music was once commonplace in film scores and songs. Since these passages are an obvious oversimplification and parody of the styles that they seek to evoke, this use of parallel fifths declined during the last half of the 20th century.
In Iceland, there is a traditional song style known as tvísöngur ("twin-singing"), going back to the Middle Ages and still taught in schools today, in which a melody is sung against itself, typically in parallel fifths.
The use of consecutive fifths (as well as fourths and octaves) to mimic the sound of Gregorian monks intoning plainsong in a cathedral is still common, as this practice is well-founded in historical traditions in early European music. Plainsong chant was originally sung in unison, not in fifths, but by the ninth century there is evidence that singing in parallel intervals (fifths, octaves, and fourths) was considered a common way to ornament the performance of chant, as is discussed in the anonymous early music theory treatises known as Musica enchiriadis and Scolica enchiriadis. These treatises also use Dasian music notation (a kind of music notation which predates Guido of Arezzo's familiar staff notation that has continued to be used into modern times), which is actually designed to easily notate music in parallel fifths. The practice of singing in consecutive fifths may have originated from the accidental singing of a chant a perfect fifth above (or a perfect fourth below) the proper pitch—to the untrained ear, the two notes can sound very similar, just as notes an octave or even a fourth apart can sound similar. Whatever its origin, the practice of singing in parallel fifths became commonplace in early organum and conductus styles. It was only around the year 1300 that Johannes de Grocheo became the first theorist to prohibit the practice. However, parallel fifths still occur frequently in 14th century music, and it is only with the transition to Renaissance-style counterpoint that the use of parallel perfect consonances becomes universally prohibited.
Development of the prohibition
As classical music progressed, the sound of consecutive fifths was deemed universally to be unpleasant. Composers were careful to avoid their appearance in work, either in one part (such as the left hand of a keyboard work), or in two parts moving independently (such as a tenor and a bass line). This is not to say that the interval of a fifth was not allowed - on the contrary, it forms a very strong and crucial base to many musical works. Only the consecutive use of different fifths was forbidden.
Also, the fifths did not have to be undisguised, or alone as the only two notes of a melodic line. The fifths may form part of a chord of any number of notes, and may be set well apart from the rest of the harmony, or finely interwoven in its midst. But the interval was always to be quitted by any movement provided it did not land on another fifth.
Consecutive fifths did not just apply to perfect fifths. Diminished fifths moving in parallel motion were also disapproved. Therefore a move from C and G to E and B flat was just as avoided as a move from C and G to E and B.
The religious avoidance of consecutive fifths is one of the major reasons for the doubt of the authorship of the famous Toccata and Fugue in D minor, attributed to Johann Sebastian Bach, as Bach himself was one of the most accomplished composers that ever lived at avoiding this harmonic movement, and the work abounds with them.
As music moved on into the 19th century, composers like Grieg helped to liberate the consecutive fifth in works like 'Les Cloches', until they became commonplace and completely acceptable by the 20th century. But even to this day they are studied by music students to aid their harmonic subtlety and develop their aural and theoretical awareness.
The identification and avoidance of perfect fifths is a standard part of instruction in classical counterpoint and often in the study of harmony, but consecutive fifths are quite common in popular and folk musics as in double tonics and shifts of level. The prohibition originates in the requirement for contrary motion in counterpoint and European classical music's gradual and eventually self-conscious attempt to distance itself from those musics, as explained by Sir Donald Tovey's discussion Joseph Haydn's Symphony no. 88: "The trio is one of Haydn's finest pieces of rustic dance music, with hurdy-gurdy drones which shift in disregard of the rule forbidding consecutive fifths. The disregard is justified by the fact that the essential objection to consecutive fifths is that they produce the effect of shifting hurdy-gurdy drones." (van der Merwe 1989, p.210)
External links
- Hopkins, Pandora and Thorkell Sigurbjörnsson: Iceland, Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 8 June 2006), [Grove Music - Access by subscription only]
References
- Tovey. Essays in Musical Analysis, vol. 1, p.142. Quoted in van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0193161214.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.