The Dominant Seventh Chord

An episode of the Gresham College Lectures podcast, hosted by Gresham College, titled "The Dominant Seventh Chord" was published on December 7, 2022 and runs 134 minutes.

December 7, 2022 ·134m · Gresham College Lectures

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Summary

The name might sound forbiddingly technical, but the chord is immediately recognisable and it has played a hugely important role in tonal music. This is a chord of action and motion: it sounds unstable and incomplete, leading the listener to expect the particular triad that is its normal target. Without this chord, what we call Viennese classicism (Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven) would have been impossible. We will also look at how composers play with the expectations generated by the chord. ...

Episode Description

The name might sound forbiddingly technical, but the chord is immediately recognisable and it has played a hugely important role in tonal music. This is a chord of action and motion: it sounds unstable and incomplete, leading the listener to expect the particular triad that is its normal target. Without this chord, what we call Viennese classicism (Haydn-Mozart-Beethoven) would have been impossible.

We will also look at how composers play with the expectations generated by the chord.

A lecture by Marina Frolova-Walker

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/dominant-seventh

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