They are in fact dominant chords and function however enharmonically misspelled for the sake of voice leading. Basically V7/V tritone subs misspelled. If not based on your 5th degree than V7/x...in the case of your tonic C example the Db7 (B note is a misspelled Cb) is tritone sub of G7. It is the misspelled leading tone that allows this to work in all cases. The major 3rd of a Dominant7 chord, in other words, is your tertiary root to build your Aug6 chord on. If target harmony is D, then C# is your aug6 root...Eb bass, G, Bb or A depending on type. It is A7 tritone sub...Eb7. As the guy said below...Bach used root position in B minor mass. The rule to use m2 above target as bass note is clueing in what’s going on. That IS the root of the chord...it is a phrygian cadence.
Exactly. It is so much easier to explain how and why these (potentially incomplete) chords and neapolitan work the way they do, instead of inventing a whole new concept
I used this as the most succinct useful presentation of Augmented Sixth Chords for my private piano students. Thank you for the effort and for the terrifically clear explanation!
Another wonderful video filled with very useful information. I watched several RU-vidrs explain the principles behind the Aug 6th chords, each of them giving the formular for scale degree 5 as you did, but your is the ONLY video that goes further to encompass the possibility of building this chord on other scale degrees. Thanks once again, you have given me much food for thought that will keep me busy for the next week. Thanks, Dr B.
I have a funny story. I gave this lecture using the "traditional" textbook method that is all based on resolving to scale degree 5, but as I was doing it I realized it wasn't as clear as it could be. I deleted the entire video, rewrote my lecture notes, did it again the next class and this is the video now posted that you watched. I am particularly proud of recognizing there were needed improvements. I want to do the same with my lesson on transposition as I think it could be improved as well.
@@ChristopherBrellochs It's definitely one of the best explanations I've seen. There's a lot of other ways you can use them, like an It+6 on bii working as a substitute for V7 at a cadence (Schubert did that once), but people get really stuck on them being formed on bvi. It's nice to see people thinking of the other ways they can be used.
@@nicholassinnett2958 Thank you so much for noticing. I actually gave this entire lecture two days before the one above and half way through realized I was just focused on building augmented 6th chords on the b6 scale degree. I rewrote my lecture and gave it again since I realized my explanation should be broader and include exactly what you describe Schubert doing! Best wishes, Dr. B
13:44 I love how you went from asking dumb questions in a mocking way from the perspective of an imaginary student at the beginning of the series to calling us music theoriticians at the end. Thank you for considering me worthy, Dr B!
I really like your traditional method of teaching with a concise summary already on the whiteboard, then explaining each topic thoroughly. This avoids me going forward or background in the clip to find key concepts. By the way, I searched for this topic on RU-vid and you were the only one to explain well... I just had to slow the playback speed to 0.75 to understand every word you said.
All of your videos are helps me a lot with my music theory course in these pandemic days. Although we are learning this course through modular lessons; I can say that you save me on every topic, and you explain it very well. Thank you so much, Dr. B. 🙂
I love these well explained music theory lessons. But one thing, to me it makes sense to look at aug6 and neapolitan chords as (possibly incompletely voiced) tritone substitutions of V7, but sadly there are no lectures here about these
I actually started a video on Augmented 6th chords and realized there was a better way to explain them and restarted. I put some serious thought into this topic which can easily be more confusing than necessary. Thanks for the comment.
I support the teaching of augmented sixth chords, because the use of augmented sixth chords is an important historical fact. But to hear the augmented sixth correctly one must tend to hear with one's eyes more than with one's ears. These chords are a great example of late pre-20th Century thinking among Europeans. They're somewhat analogous of how graphic rhymes began to be treated when poetry came to be consumed mostly in silence; music, similarly, somewhat came to be conceptualized as an expression of a score, rather than scores being conceptualized as mere performance instructions. The problem that listeners are expected to abandon natural auditory pattern recognition in favor of culture-dependent reference to graphic pattern recognition can be somewhat mitigated by good voice leading in preparing the chord, such that the graphic alteration matches the established direction of the line. To use divergent chromatic movement at least respects basic Gestalt principles.
If I pick up scale degree 2 or 3, Does it resolve to 2 or 3 respectively? And how is the chord progression ? Ex if - 1 2 4 5 1 is chord progression can I insert augmented chord between 1 and 2 chord
Dear Dr. B., I also know that inversions of the +6 chords also exist. How are they marked? (e.g. "German o3" - Bach: Mass in B minor, Crucificus, ending) Almost all of the inversions are used (with a possible exception of the It+6). There are other types of +6 chords which do not seem to have an English name. It they have, please tell it: Type 1, major key: b6-2-#4 "Übermäßiger Quartsextakkord" Type 2, major key: b6-7-#2-4# "Doppelt übermäßiger Sekundakkord" Type 3, major key: 4-b6-7-2# "Eulenspiegel-Akkord", resolves to I6 Type 4, major key: b6-1-3-4# "Doppelt übermäßiger Quintsextakkord" Type 5, major key: b6-1-2#-4# "Doppelt übermäßiger Terzquartakkord" - English: Swiss 6th??? Ger6+ _may_ resolve directly to V, the parallel 5ths are called "Mozart 5ths" in Hungarian terminology and considered as a legal exception. This is allegedly legal because the parallel movement does not happen between the root and 5th of the chord but between the 3rd and 7th. In the other case, Ger6+/^3 resolves plagally to I, questioning whether it's still a Ger6+ or not (it's actually a ii56 with augmented 6th). In German and Hungarian terminology, "parallel" seems to be used differently, the "parallel" of C major being A minor in German. For C minor, "common-rooted minor key" is used.
I'm assuming that the double thirds written at the same spot on the treble clef is just to express the idea, but that they would ultimately not be place in the same spot but this is a way to squeeze all that sonority information into 1 tight spot?
I'm not sure of the exact timing in the video you are referring to, but what you describe is actually fairly common and is the way it is normally notated when writing two parts on one staff. Keep in mind the alto and soprano parts move in parallel, contrary and oblique motion and sometimes come together for a moment on the same pitch - historically, music printing was very expensive so any way to "squeeze" in more information with less cutting of a woodblock or other method was desirable. Hope that helps, Best wishes, Dr. B www.patreon.com/DrBMusicTheory
You're grasp of Augmented Sixth chord spelling is perfect! Keep watching though, as I explain how they can be used to resolve to scale degrees other than 5.
