Playing the Guitar

                             

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

     

Triad Inversions Explained

Musical Sanity

 

An Indian yogi once told me regarding knowledge, “If you’re thirsty, drink!”  Over the years, as a teacher of music and the guitar, I have had the opportunity to study first-hand the question of thirst with my students.

I have observed that all my students seem to come to music and their guitar out of a thirst for something, and that each of them characterizes that thirst in very different terms—everything from a way to be popular with their friends, to a desire to create beauty and meaning in their lives and in the world. Very different, but I have wondered if there might be a common thread that ties all these diverse ‘thirsts’ together?

And after decades of teaching hundreds of students, I have concluded that there is a common thread, and to borrow the word from the old yogi, it is a thirst for sanity in and through music, but what is this connection between sanity and music, or more broadly, between sanity and the arts? Let’s first consider sanity, and what it represents.

First, consider the opposite, insanity. Its qualities are disturbed, chaotic, painful, delusion, unhappiness, speedup, etc. Sanity, on the other hand, is represented by qualities of lucidity, peace, knowledge, happiness, understanding, clarity, etc.

When I was a child, the only thing that made sense to me was music, not the idea of music, but music itself. Music was the only thing that calmed me down; it spoke to me without words; it had the ring of truth; it was mysterious and mystical. Was I conscious of all this at the time? Could I express it in the way I am expressing it right now? Probably not, but the sense of it all was there—right from the beginning. How many times have I observed students arriving for their lessons in states that could objectively be called insane—minds sped up, dwelling on past, obsessing about the future—and yet they somehow made the effort to come for their lesson. Why? How? I must conclude that it is sanity that they are reaching out for—like a person drowning at sea and reaching out for anything floating that can save them.

I consistently do a yearly review with each of my students. We look back over their accomplishments and disappointments and set some goals and aims for the following year. After the first year of covid, the year almost everything was locked down worldwide and people were unsure of almost everything, all my lessons were conducted online. At the end of the year, I did my usual reviews, and to my surprise, I noticed that all my students had had very successful musical years, but even more surprising was that in all the reviews, not one student even mentioned Covid! Covid had not even touched their music, i.e., their music had been a real refuge for them in those difficult times.

Music can be a nearly perfect refuge; it is inherently sane, lucid, self-sustaining, and independent, but it is affected by external life and the internal baggage that we bring to it. In and of itself, musical satisfaction is very achievable given the right student, the right teacher, and the right occasion. The process itself, though difficult at times, is not all that complicated, confusing, or unreachable, and all the feelings and perceptions to the contrary are the result of the personal baggage we bring to the process.

So, what is this baggage, and can it be eliminated or at least neutralized to some extent? Simply put, some of the most common baggage one brings to their music are feelings of unworthiness, insecurity, lack of self-confidence, unproductive learning habits, and impatience, etc. Dealing with this baggage, not the music itself, is the real work of most students and the right teacher can help.

I cannot even count the number of times I’ve had this same conversation with a student—students from beginners to more advanced.

Student: “This should not be taking so long, I’m really frustrated; I’m really slow.”

Me: “What makes you say that, on what are you basing your conclusion?”

S.: “I just know…”

M: “Look, I’ve taught hundreds of students. I have a much better perspective from which to evaluate a student’s progress and I tell you; you are doing just fine; you are exactly where you need to be. Try to worry less, stay in the moment, and just stay with the work the stands right in front of you.”

 

In my book, From Silence to Sound – Richard Kyle’s Journey to Musical Competency,[1] three students are talking about their work with their teacher:

“I really enjoyed listening to you tonight,” I said to Jobe, “both your wonderful guitar and your incredible story.”

“Thank you, and I yours as well. Perhaps next time Sara will share her story too?”

“My story?” she replied, as we began moving to door. “All I can think to tell you is my relationship with Mr. Kubadi has given me the permission to do my work.”

“The permission to do your work!” Jobe and I repeated in unison as we pushed open the heavy wooden door and stepped out into the cold night air.”

 

An amazing statement when you think about it. You see, as soon as a student begins to think that they should be somewhere where they’re not, they lose the ability to be where they are—where they need to be and sometimes a teacher needs to remind them that they are where they need to be and that its okay, okay to not worry and to relax into the moment of the work, hence, the permission to do one’s work.

Of course, giving oneself permission to do the work is just a starting point. There is still the question of productive practice, i.e., knowing what to work on and how to work on it, and the ability to ask and answer the appropriate questions. Questions are important, they have all the energy, answers kill questions. But questions need to be appropriate, the better the questions, the better the thinking, and the better the thinking, the better the practice, and hence the results. But the ability to ask the right questions at the right time will be impaired by what I called the baggage one brings to the process. On all levels and in all spheres, baggage veils the truth.

This baggage consists of all the various expressions of self-doubt, feelings of unworthiness, selfishness, even guilt, and all the various shoulds and coulds, etc. that surface in one’s thoughts and feelings mechanically, like recordings that go on and on and can’t be stopped.

 In fact, these thoughts and feelings can become so painful and unpleasant as to cause a student to give up the pursuit of his or her music and the musical sanity that attracted her or him to the music in the first place. In other words, to, as is said, to throw the baby out with the bath water. I have observed this with some students. It is sad.

The seat of all thoughts and feelings is the mind. The mind is vast, powerful beyond belief, and nearly endless, and for the average person to try to control it directly is, as Gurdjieff once put it, like trying to jump over one’s own knees. But the situation is not hopeless.

Over the years I have learned a couple of things. Thoughts can’t be stopped for very long, but one can, with intention, create counter-thoughts. For example, if you tell yourself to not think about blue elephants you will automatically begin to think about blue elephants, but if you try very hard to think instead about red elephants, to the degree of your efforts, you will stop thinking about blue elephants.

The second thing I have learned is that it is possible to train oneself to not identify oneself with one’s mind and its projections. I have observed various things that suggest that I am not my mind and not everything my mind thinks and feels is necessarily true. It seems that my mind has its own agenda, and that agenda is all about power and control. Therefore, I can remind myself that I do not have to act on everything my mind tells me.

In the chapter on tuning in my book, From Silence to Sound – Richard Kyles’ Journey to Musical Competency,[2] Richard, is having a hard time getting his instrument in tune. He admits to his teacher that his mind is sped up and that he feels slightly sick. His teacher, Mr. Kubadi, responds in this way:

“I like your honesty, Richard, real music demands it and the courage to trust; for when we really look, we will sometimes see things we don’t want to see. Without trust we will turn away and miss the place where our work begins. When we underestimate the starting point, we waste time; when we overestimate the starting point, the work loses traction and goes nowhere. Tell me Richard, where does your work begin?”

Where does my work begin? This is a question we need to ask with every practice and within every practice. If we think, for example, that we are further along in a piece or an exercise then we are, our work becomes ineffective and unproductive. It evokes the feeling of a bad dream in which one is running away from something as hard as one ca and yet, is going nowhere.

Some students make the mistake of engaging their work at an earlier stage in the process. They go over things they don’t need to, out of habit and insecurity. It’s like they’re trapped in the past. As Mr. Kubadi says, this wastes time and energy.

Dig deeper into these mistakes and one will see the cause can be found in all the shoulds, coulds, desires, etc. one brings to the work, i.e., in the baggage one brings to the work. This baggage keeps one from being impartial, and impartiality is an aspect of musical sanity.

In his book, God Speaks, Meher Baba states that all that is written by way of an explanation of God is to appease the convulsions of the mind. In other words, explanations should not be mistaken for experience—and experience is the goal. Still, a mind free of convulsions is a great thing. A mind free of convulsions is inherently sane and with this sanity comes a real inner peace and happiness.

Of course, this all applies to one’s music. The freer from our baggage our music becomes, the saner it becomes, and the more joyful, fulfilling, and beautiful becomes its expression—for ourselves and others.

But musical sanity is not achieved easily. It’s much like love, maybe it is love? You can’t demand love, buy love, or intimidate love—not real love. But you can create conditions in your life that attracts and nourishes it. As in love, so in music and the pursuit of musical sanity, there are no rules, formulae, set do’s and don’ts. Nothing is set in stone. Everyone must find their own way—their own path. When music is thus won through love, it transcends technique, knowledge, and expectations.

I’ve had the opportunity in my life to attend many classical guitar concerts. I’ve heard guitar played at the highest level of the domain and I’ve noticed an interesting thing. After most concerts, as the audience is filing out of the auditorium, I’ve heard conversations regarding the ability of the performer, the interpretation, the greatness of the music, etc. But without exception, after the concerts of the great Andre Segovia, I mainly heard silence and observed smiles on the faces of the audience.

It’s a very different thing when mastery of the music is achieved by serving it. Others feel the difference—feel the silence, which is the source of all sound, the silence which is the source of lasting peace and lasting happiness, the silence which is the source of real sanity. Is it worth the effort? Does one have the choice? Perhaps for some, there is no choice.

“Please tune your instrument, Richard,” he said as he walked across the room to join me. I tried, but because of my state I was not very successful and observed myself becoming more and more agitated and confused. For ten minutes I loosened and tightened strings, but my guitar still sounded awful. It was useless! Twice I looked to my teacher for help, but he just shrugged as if he didn’t know either. I was becoming miserable and considered leaving, but in the depths of my being I knew that there was nowhere for me to go.”[3]

 

                                                                                                                                  ©copyright Michael Kovitz 2023

 

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[1] Available through me at, From Silence to Sound142@gmail.com

[2] From Silence to Sound – Richard Kyles Journey to Musical Competency, is available through me at, fromsilencetosound142@gmail.com

[3] Ibid.

Thinking and Reading Music

 

Last Thursday evening, two students on two consecutive lessons, brought up the questions; what is music, what should one be thinking about when they are sightreading music, and what is the difference between playing a piece of music from memory and sightreading a piece of music? I found this interesting because, for me, these topics are all connected.

In the first lesson, the student, a very talented natural musician, asked me, “What should I be thinking about when I’m sightreading a piece of music?” I answered by saying that the answer would be different depended on the level of the musician’s sightreading, the difficulty of the piece, and whether the musician was reading it for the first time or after working on it for a while.

When one learns a language, they begin by learning the alphabet—the letters. At this level attention is focused on the letters. When the letters are learned, they are combined to form words. Now the attention is on the words. Words are then combined to form sentences and sentences express ideas, thoughts, feelings, and images. At this level, attention is now focused on the story—the message—the teaching—and is not at all focused the reading experience. The actual reading experience has gone from opaque to transparent.

It is the same with reading music. First one learns to identify the notes. A note, an abbreviation for notation, indicate a sound, its pitch, and its duration. At this level the attention is focused on the notes. Once the notes are learned, they are combined to form motives, phrases, and melodies. At this level, the attention is focused on the music and is not at all focused on the reading experience.

The purpose of reading music is to access music. For many forms of music, it is the most expedient, though not the only, way to access pieces of music, technical exercises, and musical studies. Reading music takes the burden off the need to memorize. But what does it mean to access music? Here too, there is no one answer, because what one can access from music notation is dependent on one’s musical knowledge, understanding, and experience.

It's like the fortune teller and her crystal ball. There is nothing in the ball at all, but what she “sees” in the ball is a projection of her own thoughts, feelings, intuitions, etc. Focusing on the ball allows her to bring out that which is already within her. The ball can reveal to her nothing that she does not already know.

The notation of a piece of music is much the same. It contains both explicit and implicit information, but this information can only be accessed to the degree of musical understanding of the person reading the music.

Think of an architectural “blueprint.” The blueprint is not a representation of the finished product, instead, it is a set of codified instructions regarding how to build the finished product. But this blueprint, in the hands of someone who cannot read it or understand, would be useless. Regarding music, a beginner might only see notes (indicating pitches) and duration (indicating how long the notes are to be held).

But a more advanced musician will “see” and “hear” so much more, like key, phrases, cadences, harmonic progressions, etc.

And what does a more advanced musician think about when they are reading a piece of music? Again, that will depend on the reason the musician is reading the music. In a performance, a musician is not really thinking about the music as much as she is hearing the music emerging from her in real time. She is like the conductor of an orchestra guiding the musicians through her vision of the piece. She is not thinking about the mechanics of the process, she is trusting the musicians to be able to manifest her vision; she is not thinking about what the chord is, or the type of cadence; she is guiding and hearing the music in real time—in the present.

It is much the same with a musician performing a piece of music. Her mind is the conductor, her body and her instrument are her orchestra, and she, as conductor, guides her orchestra through her vision of the piece. Whether she has the score in front of her or not, at this level it matters not, she could read or not read at her pleasure. The goal of reading is to bring the music that is outside, inside.

And finally, regarding the question, “What is music?” I think, in the final analysis, though my answer may not be satisfying to everyone, music is whatever you think it is…

©copyright Michael Kovitz, 2023

                                                                                       

The Modes

 

Renaissance music (16^th century), by lutenist composers like John Dowland, Luis de Milan, Francis Cutting, and Hans Neusidler is some of the earliest music found in the modern classical guitar repertoire. This music is beautiful and its place in the history of the guitar and the history of music is very significant.

Since this music is modal and utilizes compositional practices quite different than the music of the Diatonic Common Practice Period (1750 – 1900), I believe that for lovers of early music, and especially the musicians who play this music, it is important to know something about the modes and compositional practices of those earlier times. A working knowledge of the modes and their evolution is also of great importance to lovers of jazz and classical music of the 20^th Century.

First some background: Beginning around 1600, the modal compositional practices of the Renaissance began a transition towards what we now call Diatonic Common Practice Music. By 1750, this trend reached fruition in the music of the High Baroque Period, (as represented by the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel, Domenico Scarlatti, and Antonio Vivaldi).

But from the time of Bach, the state of the music did not remain static as composers like Mozart, Beethoven, and Wagner, pushed the boundaries of diatonic music further and further. Mozart pushed Bach; Beethoven pushed Mozart, Wagner pushed Beethoven, until by the end of the 19^th Century, the compositional practices of diatonic music system had been pushed and stretched to such an extreme that the two pillars that supported it—the use of clearly defined major and minor tonalities and the hierarchy of tonic/dominant thinking—began to crumble under the weight of more and more extensive chromaticism.

We can hear and feel this in much of Wagner’s music when it begins to soar, as it were, into a space beyond major and minor tonalities, beyond keys, and beyond the tyranny of the tonic/dominant relationship, into the abyss of freedom—the space that lay beyond diatonic common practice techniques, its sensibilities, and all that it represented. The music soars over the abyss, but like a kite whose string is held by the hand of a man who is safely standing on the rim of the abyss, we hear that time and time again it is reeled in from the abyss to the familiar footing of Diatonic Common Practice Music.

Claude Debussy’s music, however, is a different story, for Debussy not only gazed into the abyss of freedom, but leapt right into it. In the abyss of freedom there are no rules or procedures, except for those that the composer imposes on himself. Debussy, like many composers of the 20th century who joined him and followed him, had to invent the rules and procedures as he went along, often changing these same rules and procedures when they did not fit a given musical situation, or context, or evolution in the composer’s musical thinking.

The music of the early 20^th Centuries was a time of experimentation, upheaval, and novelty. The question of what lay beyond diatonic common practice music had been asked and numerous answers were advanced—some of which took root and some of which had a more passing influence on the ongoing stream of musical thinking and practice. But one thing that was fairly consistent among these early 20^th century composers and the jazz musicians who emerged near the middle of the 20^th Century was their strong reaction against the rules and techniques of diatonic common practice music leading to new, self-imposed, practices that had less to do with how music should be written and more to do with how music should not be written.

Claude Debussy used pentatonic, whole-tone scales, and exotic oriental modes to create music that broke from the tradition of clearly defined major and minor tonalities. Arnold Schoenberg devised tone rows constructed from the twelve tones of the chromatic scale and created music that explored the realm of atonality. Béla Bartók used the ancient modes as well as Eastern European folk melodies that led to melodies and harmonies beyond the reach of diatonic major and minor tonalities and the tyranny of the tonic/dominant relationship.

Modal Jazz emerged in the mid- 20^th Century with the music of Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, and others. In this music, the modes were used to create non-functional harmonies free from diatonic associations and enabled the musicians to create melodies that were free from the restrictions of particular chords and the chord progressions of functional harmony.

In the latter half of the 20^th Century and now, in the early part of the 21^st Century, the use of modal terminology is popularly used to codify tonal regions within diatonic tonalities in order to create new possibilities in the realm of melodic improvisation in jazz, popular, and even country music.   
Modal music has been around for a long, long time—counting from the Greeks, at least two thousand years! During that time, modal music has gone through many transformations and many systems, yet at its core have always been the modes themselves with all of their various codifications and practices.

Western music traces its origins to ancient Greece and the time of Pythagoras, approximately 650 B.C., but the history of Greece and the rise and fall of its various societies stretch back thousands of years before then, into the second main division of ancient history named the Bronze Age by the modern historian C.J.Thomsen.

In Europe, the Bronze Age began around 2300 BC.  Entwined with this history are the even more remote histories and influences of the cultures of the ancient Near East and Middle East (approximately 3700 BC). Of significance is the fact that the arts, sciences, and philosophies, of these cultures were based upon sophisticated mathematical systems and calculations that later inspired and informed the arts, sciences, and philosophies of the Greek civilization during the time of Pythagoras.

Pythagoras based his system on the mathematical ratio of 3:2 (the interval of a perfect fifth). These modes were constructed from various combinations of tetrachords. A tetrachord is a series of notes that descend an interval of a fourth by stepwise motion, e.g., (E, d, c, B,) or (E,

d flat, c, B,) etc.
By combining the notes of two tetrachords, the original Greek modes were created. In the following examples, the notes that begin and end each tetrachord are shown in uppercase letters:

 

                       Dorian:                          E, d, c, B, A, g, f, E

                                    Phrygian:                       F#, e, d, C#, B, a, g, F#
                                    Lydian:                          G#, f#, e, D#, C#, b, a, G#
                                    Mixolydian                    A, G, f, E, D, c, b-flat, A
                                    Hypodorian                   B, a, g, F#, E, d, c, B
                                    Hypophrygian               C#, b, a, G#, F#, e, d, C#
                                    Hypolydian                    D#, c#, b, A#, G#, f#, e, D#

In practice, all of these modes would be transposed between E & E, for example, the Phrygian mode would become e, d, C#, B, a, g, f#, e, the Lydian would become e, D#, C#, b, a, G#, f#, etc.

Greek civilization gave way to the power of Rome that brought with new musical influences, codifications, and systems. Hebrew and Byzantine melodies (approximately 330 AD – 1400 AD) were derived from melodic types based upon melodic motives that were salvaged from the Greeks and earlier Middle and Near Eastern musical fragments. By the 12^th & 13^th Centuries (Medieval Music), research into these earlier forms and practices was codified into a system of modes and practices called Plainsong or Gregorian Chant.

300 or so years later, Ptolemy again re-codified the modes. Notice that all of the modes in Ptolemy’s codification follow the same pattern of descending steps beginning on a different tone, (half, whole, whole, whole , half, whole, whole) and that the starting notes follow the pattern of a modern-day major scale—in this case an E major scale.

These modes transposed to the same tone become:
  
   Dorian:                         E, d, c, B, A, g, f, e, (our modern Phrygian mode)
   Phrygian:                     e, d, C#, B, a, g, F#, e, (Dorian)
   Lydian:                        e, D#, C#, b, a, G#, f#, e, (Ionian)
   Mixolydian:                  E, D, c, b-flat, A, g, f, e, (Locrian)
   Hypodorian:                 E, d, c, B, a, g, F#, e, (Aeolian)
   Hypophrygian:             e, d, C#, b, a, G#, F#, e, (Mixolydian)
   Hypolydian:                 e, D#, c#, b, A#, G#, f#, e, (Lydian)

Almost 900 years later, the modes were again codified with credit given to Pope Gregory the Great and this codification reached a final form by about the 11^th century. Notice that this codification bears a closer resemblance to the modes as taught in the later 20^th & 21^st centuries.

In the following examples, modes I, III, V, & VII are classified as Authentic Modes and modes II, IV, VI, and VII are classified as Plagal Modes. Bold-face upper-case letters are used to designate the final. (The final is similar to the tonic in Diatonic Common Practice Music, though it is important to keep in mind that a final and a tonic or a dominant and a co-final do not have exactly the same significance with regard to resolution and all that it implies to the modern musician). Upper-case letters in regular type face are used to designate the co-final. Notice, that in both the authentic and its corresponding plagal form the final is always the same, but the co-final in the authentic mode is a fifth up from the tonal while the co-final in the plagal mode is always a third down from the co-final of the authentic mode. Additionally, the common practice of the time would be to move any final or a co-final that was a half-step below the following degree of the mode to that following note. For example, in the Phrygian mode, the co-final is placed on C rather than B.    
 (Finals are designated by bold uppercase letters, co-final by light uppercase letters).

I.                                 Dorian:                                     D, e, f, g, A, b, c, d
II.                                Hypodorian:                              a, b, c, D, e F, g, a                  
III.                               Phrygian:                                  E, f, g, a, b, C, d, e,
IV.                               Hypophrygian:                          b, c, d, E, f, g, A, b
V.                                Lydian:                                    F, g, a, b, C, d, e, f
VI.                               Hypolydian:                             c, d, e, F, g, A, b, c
VII.                              Mixolydian:                              G, a, b, c, D, e, f, g
VIII.                             Hypomixolydian:                       d, e, f, G, a, b, C, d




In 1547 Glareanus added four new modes to the system—two additional authentic modes corresponding to our modern major and natural minor scales and their two plagal variations. These were called Ionian, Aeolian, Hypoionian, and Hypoaeolian, respectively.



IX.                                Aeolian:                                   A, b, c, d, E, f, g, a
X.                                 Hypoaeolian:                           e, f, g, A, b, C, d, e
XI.                                Ionian:                                    C, d, e, f, G, a, b
XII.                               Hypoionian:                             g, a, b, C, d, E, f


The most modern classification of the modes based on the key of C Major is as follows:            

I.                                                         Ionian:                                     C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C

 

II.                                                       Dorian:                                     D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D

 

III.                                                     Phrygian:                                 E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E

 

IV.                                                     Lydian:                                     F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F

 

V.                                                       Mixolydian:                             g, a, b, c, d, e, f, g

 

VI.                                                    Aeolian:                                   a, b, c, d, e, f, g, a

 

VII.                                                  Locrian:                                   b, c, d, e, f, g, a, b 

Of practical importance is the need to identify and construct the modes from various starting points—keys—finals. Towards that end the following techniques are offered.

  

1.      The first to the last note of any major scale creates the Ionian mode in that key or on that final; beginning with the second note of any major scale creates the Dorian mode in that key or on that final; beginning with the third note of any major scale creates the Phrygian mode in that key or on that final, and so forth with all the remaining modes. This is particularly useful because of our present usage of ‘key signatures’ in the notation of modal music. For example, a key signature of F#, would not indicate G major or E minor, but the possibility of the music being in any of the modes derived from the Ionian mode, i.e. G Ionian, A Dorian, B Phrygian, etc. To find which mode it is, one only needs to determine the final—which is usually the last (the final) note or harmony of the piece.

 

2.       Because of the contemporary musician's familiarity with major and minor scales, modes can be identified as essentially ‘major’ or ‘minor’.

 

Ionian is the same as a major scale.

Lydian is the same as a major scale with raised 4^th.

Mixolydian is the same as a major scale with a lowered 7^th.

Aeolian is the same as a natural minor scale.

Dorian is the same as a natural minor scale with a raised 6^th.

Phrygian is the same as a natural minor scale with a lowered 2^nd.

Locrian is the same as a natural minor scale with lowered 2^nd and 5^th.

 

3.    Modes in any key will have all the notes of a major scale in that key. For example, the

B Dorian mode, built upon the second note of the A major scale, has sharps on C, F, and G, as does the C# Phrygian, the D Lydian, etc.

Identifying the modes in Renaissance music can be more difficult because pieces of music often contain notes that are not in the mode, like accidentals in diatonic common practice music. Therefore, the following observations are offered with the hope that they may lead the thoughtful musician not so much to answers, but to deeper questions regarding the nature of the music they are playing:

Since the time of Pythagoras, composers have regularly raised the 7^th note of any mode by a ½ step to create an interval of a ½ step between the 7^th note and the final or key tone of that mode.
Additionally, important cadences are also altered to allow for a ½ step movement to any cadential note.
Instances are easily found in which the 6^th note of a mode is raised as well.

Mostly, these allowances are found in the upper voice, while the lower voice is often more consistent with the notes of the underlying mode of the piece, therefore, when trying to discern the mode of a particular piece of music, conflicts should be resolved by giving more evidentiary weight to the notes of the lower voice.

And finally, simply put, within any domain of possibilities vast differences occur between theory and practice and, as it has been observed; rules of composition enable the less gifted composer to write competent music, while the greatest of composers have shown the ability to transcend existing rules and create new possibilities within their musical domains.

                                                                     © Copyright, Michael Kovitz, 2017