Harmony

Dualism in a Rachmaninoff Prelude

Harmonically, music of the classical period was based on tonic-dominant polarity. The subdominant served only a subsidiary role, introducing the

My Romance for Clarinet and Piano was one of my early compositions (1983, revised 2017). It abounds in lyrical melodies

My Lament for Flute and Piano was inspired by the stylistic innovations of early Baroque opera. The composers in this

The Academic Papers section of my website includes a PDF scan of a paper that I delivered at the Music

In the archetypical classical sonata-allegro movement, the exposition moves from tonic to dominant (often via the mediant). The development is

The romance genre is by nature lyrical, and the two themes in my Romance for Oboe and Piano both fit

An intriguing feature of my Romance for Oboe and Piano is the ambiguity between A-natural and A-flat. In the piece’s home

Harmonically, a typical classical work begins by defining the tonality to the listener, through the use of tonic flanked by

A significant feature of the chromatic harmony in late Romantic music is the use of nontraditional harmonies to convey subdominant

“What immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry?” — William Blake Based on the principle of octave equivalence,

My Rhapsody for Woodwinds and Piano is harmonically adventurous in places, even flirting with exoticisms such as octatonic, but the