Tension and Melody

Cranky

What is the relationship between tension and melody?  Or rather, what are the different ways that this relationship can be?  

Is melody part of the tension?  Implied by the tension?  Is melody always chord tones while tension is the notes that are oh-so-close but not quite chord tones?

Roland

We like melodies to resolve. Normally to the root or octave of the scale we’re playing in, sometimes to the 5th, and occasionally to the 3rd note of the scale. 

Tension is often created by holding off from resolution. (It can be done in other ways, such as rhythmic repeats). Greater tension can be created by using other notes, where it’s more difficult to anticipate how resolution can be achieved. Typically this is done by using other notes from the scale. Sometimes it’s done by using notes which aren’t in the scale, such as the 6th or the sharpened 4th. Blues players tend to use notes which aren’t in any Western Tempered scale. For example a half flattened 3rd, which sits between the minor and major 3rd.

Musical_Mystery_Tour

As far as tension and melody goes, essentially it goes up for the 'question' bit, and down for the 'answer', as most improv blues playing tends to do. But...

You can create musical tension with any element of the music - volume, complexity, rhythm, melody, harmonics, or just by simply doing something completely unexpected - so long as what you do makes the listener harbour the expectation of a resolution as the tune drives forward and it makes them think, 'where is this going?'. If people think that as they listen, then it is job done as far as creating tension goes. 

Probably the most famous example of this, is Ravel's Bolero. Ravel himself played the main melody of what ended up being Bolero to one of his composer friends and said: 'This theme has an insistent quality. I'm going to try and repeat it lots of times without any development, gradually increasing the orchestra as best I can.'

Technically that is an example of dynamic tension - i.e just slowly cranking up the volume as the piece progresses, and as Ravel said, starting off quietly and basically getting louder and louder as each additional instrument comes in and joins with the preceding instrument in weaving the repeating melody around the snare drum which keeps going for the whole thing.

Having said that, the way the melody weaves in and out of the snare drum in a kind of hypnotic way does tend to drive it forward. All this leaves you thinking 'where the f*ck is this going?' as you listen to it for the best part of fifteen minutes. Then as a kind of musical 'f*ck you' joke at the expense of the listener, Ravel simply ends the piece with not much in the way of a resolution other than a big loud 'ta-da!'.

He should have called it 'How do you like them apples!'

Tannin

^ Re Bolero, I reckon that ending is what makes it work.

Imagine replacing it with something entirely conventional - the unimaginative anti-climax would echo backwards all the way through the piece. You'd listen to it once and write the whole thing off as a very poor effort with no worthwhile ideas. (This wouldn't be entirely fair to it, but we humans are like that - once we write part of something off we stop looking for good aspects and just say "it's complete carp" without much qualification.)

But as-is, next time we hear Bolero, somewhere in our heads we are waiting, waiting, waiting for that discordant finale which smashes the hypnotic pattern. That is the brilliance of the work, really - for 15 minutes Ravel creates strong, slow-build tension by not creating tension! 

Musical_Mystery_Tour

Tannin said:

I reckon that ending is what makes it work.

Oh I agree, it is what makes it cool. As I said, it's kind of 'ta-da!'

Cranky

Musical_Mystery_Tour said:

Tannin said:

I reckon that ending is what makes it work.

Oh I agree, it is what makes it cool. As I said, it's kind of 'ta-da!'

I think a better ending would be for every instrument to drop off except for the snare drum, but then also just a guy whistling the motif over the snare for a few measures as it fades out.

digitalkettle

Cranky said:

Musical_Mystery_Tour said:

Tannin said:

I reckon that ending is what makes it work.

Oh I agree, it is what makes it cool. As I said, it's kind of 'ta-da!'

I think a better ending would be for every instrument to drop off except for the snare drum, but then also just a guy whistling the motif over the snare for a few measures as it fades out.

You mean you think it should un-Ravel?

HAL9000

For tension and resolution here’s EC playing Crosscut Saw. My limited theory knowledge suggests the C# played over the E (V chord) then over the D (VI chord) shouldn’t really work, but then it resolves to the A over the A chord and it absolutely does work…

https://youtu.be/kEdH5dU7ZKk?feature=shared

viz

digitalkettle said:

Cranky said:

Musical_Mystery_Tour said:

Tannin said:

I reckon that ending is what makes it work.

Oh I agree, it is what makes it cool. As I said, it's kind of 'ta-da!'

I think a better ending would be for every instrument to drop off except for the snare drum, but then also just a guy whistling the motif over the snare for a few measures as it fades out.

You mean you think it should un-Ravel?

Can't see another post beating that for January's post-of-the-month prize!

Roland

viz said: Can't see another post beating that for January's post-of-the-month prize!

And there was me waiting for you to join thread and make an astounding musical contribution.

viz

Ha.

The only thing I can think of saying is that in Hal's Eric Clapton thingy, at 00:16, over the E7 and D chords (the D is a IV not a VI btw), I'm not sure that's a C# - the note is bent up to a D; OK it's a bit flat and is probably somewhere between a C# and a D, but anyhoo the reason that works is because blooz doesn't mind being a bit flat on those squeezed notes.

HAL9000

viz said:

Ha.

The only thing I can think of saying is that in Hal's Eric Clapton thingy, at 00:16, over the E7 and D chords (the D is a IV not a VI btw), I'm not sure that's a C# - the note is bent up to a D; OK it's a bit flat and is probably somewhere between a C# and a D, but anyhoo the reason that works is because blooz doesn't mind being a bit flat on those squeezed notes.

Shows how we hear things differently. I hear it more as a C# - you hear it as D ‘a bit flat’; I definitely don’t hear it being pushed all the way to a D. Anyway, as you point out, it works in the context of the blooz. It’s a lick that would never have crossed my mind, but I have shamelessly nicked it since hearing it!!

(As you correctly point out the D is indeed the [edit] IV chord - senior moment there - will try harder next time!)

viz

HAL9000 said:

(As you correctly point out the D is indeed the VI chord - senior moment there - will try harder next time!)

I think you should try harder this time too

HAL9000

viz said:

HAL9000 said:

(As you correctly point out the D is indeed the VI chord - senior moment there - will try harder next time!)

I think you should try harder this time too

Buggeration!!

Cranky

I’ll try asking the question in a different, more specific way.  

(fwiw, it seems like Bolero is a good example of tension having basically nothing to do with melody)

In a Beato video about playing bass, he specifically recommended that bass players avoid melody tones.  That was an almost overwhelming statement to me because I usually think in chords and chord tones and I don’t know what “melody theory” is.  Is the melody always a chord tone?  Never a chord tone?  How does a bass player know which chord tones to avoid if the melody is in the chord?

When I was forced to sing in choirs as a lad, I remember being in the bass section and we rarely sang a melody tone.  It was always harmony.  But was it a chord tone?

I need to start memorizing bass lines.

Tannin

Re harmony: yes, it was (almost) always a chord tone. (When it wasn't, that was the tension bit.) 

And from that advice, Beato obviously isn't a bass player. Playing bass, you generally resolve to a chord tone, very often to the root of the chord, and you do that in a structured way - typically the chord tone comes on a strong beat (but in some styles of music you tend to do the reverse). Either way, you do it deliberately and systematically. 

Now if we were talking about the bass line in something like a string quartet, then we in a sense aren't "playing bass", we are simply playing the lowest voice on a four voice harmony. The "melody" gets shared around between all four instruments and at any one moment you often can't really say who "has the melody".

Brad

I think the relationship between tension and melody is whatever the composer/improviser wants it to be. What they might deem sensible, how far they want to push it and thus, how much the listener can tolerate (depending on their listening habits)

As others have said, there’s a whole host of musical factors that can affect the tension of a melody, not just notes (rhythm!). But seeing as you’re mentioning chord tones a fair bit…

There is a hierarchy of consonance and dissonance with melodic tones over and within harmonic context. If you were to compose a short melody over a simple C major triad, the safest notes choice would indeed be the chord tones. There’s a sense of gravitational pull towards the 1 3 or 5. Out of the remaining scale tones, 2 6 and 7 have more ‘colour’ with the 7th beginning to pull the ear with a slight sense of tension to go to the root. Finally, 4 is the scale tone with the most tension, as it clashes with the 3 in the chord. The 4th is often referred to as an “avoid note”. I don’t like this term, I like all options. I think “a handle with care note” is more appropriate. And it’s funny because the most dissonant scale tones over a C triad (in said key) the 4th (F) and 7th (B) serve a particular function…

From there, the remaining non-scale tones will heighten the dissonance/tension. Play a #5 over a C major triad and it really bends the ear until you resolve it to 5. Play a #5 over a C Aug triad and that tension isn’t there (providing your ear is used to an Augmented triad of course). 

This is an improvised take, so may not be strictly applicable it check out how inside then outside Bill gets with his note choice. 

https://youtu.be/Nv2GgV34qIg?si=8GDRK-t8zy9awLuY

This obliterated me when I first heard it. The relationships between melody, harmony and tension (amongst everything else) is something to chew on…

https://youtu.be/t4pxrqVLGE0?si=v9DHypmP2wW_zn8Q

Cranky

So here’s kind of a big matzoball.  Stella by Starlight.  

Mind, I’d never heard or heard of this song until a couple years ago, and my jazz ears are still comparatively virgin.  Yeah, virgin.  So what?

Anyway, is this perhaps by far without a doubt the least standard standard?  Normally I can detect the melody from chord structures and progressions, but with this one I get nothing.  The melody seems totally detached from what’s going on everywhere else. 

¡Tensión!

The fact that there are so many versions of the song doesn’t help, even though it usually does with other songs (I like to make playlists of a standard and listen to it).

viz

Hm. I find it the melody fits perfectly to the harmony; but maybe what I do hear, that might be supporting what you say, is that the harmony itself is so flowing and endless, with all its promise of resolution stored up to the end. A bit like Misty. 

The Sinatra version is a good one because it has very little embellishment form James’s original, but the addition of words helps the flow, as well as his tremendous phrasing that helps get rid of any aimlessness in the tune. 

https://youtu.be/RSwcCTRB6-g?feature=shared

Brad

Cranky said:

So here’s kind of a big matzoball.  Stella by Starlight.  

Mind, I’d never heard or heard of this song until a couple years ago, and my jazz ears are still comparatively virgin.  Yeah, virgin.  So what?

Anyway, is this perhaps by far without a doubt the least standard standard?  Normally I can detect the melody from chord structures and progressions, but with this one I get nothing.  The melody seems totally detached from what’s going on everywhere else. 

¡Tensión!

The fact that there are so many versions of the song doesn’t help, even though it usually does with other songs (I like to make playlists of a standard and listen to it).

It could very well be that your ears aren't yet accustomed to what is going on. That being said, there are some 'interesting' things harmonically and the rate at which these things change could be what is bending your ear?

I'd recommend analysing the harmony and then the melody against the harmony. You may very well get insights by doing so that you otherwise might not pick up on. 

Cranky

Brad said:

Cranky said:

So here’s kind of a big matzoball.  Stella by Starlight.  

Mind, I’d never heard or heard of this song until a couple years ago, and my jazz ears are still comparatively virgin.  Yeah, virgin.  So what?

Anyway, is this perhaps by far without a doubt the least standard standard?  Normally I can detect the melody from chord structures and progressions, but with this one I get nothing.  The melody seems totally detached from what’s going on everywhere else. 

¡Tensión!

The fact that there are so many versions of the song doesn’t help, even though it usually does with other songs (I like to make playlists of a standard and listen to it).

It could very well be that your ears aren't yet accustomed to what is going on. That being said, there are some 'interesting' things harmonically and the rate at which these things change could be what is bending your ear?

I'd recommend analysing the harmony and then the melody against the harmony. You may very well get insights by doing so that you otherwise might not pick up on. 

Yeah, I have a short jazz standards “course” I’m working on, Stella is the last song on the list but I think I’ll skip to it shortly.