Elements of Music: Harmony

Harmony is the resulting mixture of tones played simultaneously. If melody gives you the idea of the song, then harmony deepens the feel of the song. It breathes life into a song. It colors the song.

Now we are going to approach this a little differently. Based on the observations we made last page and the page before that, we can pretty much bank on the harmonic effect will be comparable to the melodic effect.

There may be a few deviations but for the most part, we can trust the things we found out back there when dealing with the feeling of our song.

What we don’t know, though, is how these intervals and harmonies interact with each other. For example play this...

harmony

In the first we have a melodic perfect 5th following by a resolving harmonized major 3rd. Very clean, very tidy, right?

In the second one we have a melodic major 7th followed by a resolving harmonized major 3rd. There’s quite a difference in the way that major third resolves the Perfect 5th and the way it resolves the Major 7th.

This is the point. I want you to find out how these reactions differ or are alike.

On the next page I’ll give you a list of interval combinations to play and you can write what you find out about each one to the side. Just like what we did for the melodic intervals.

This is an opportunity, if you haven’t already, to explore your sound, figure out which intervals and combinations best suit you. What kind of resolutions you tend to prefer, all of these kinds of things.

Make sure you write all your thoughts on these.

Free Guitar eBook

Elements of Music: Harmony