Tonality: Scales & Chords

This lesson is part of the Fundamentals of Sound & Music module.

Objectives

• Students will understand the fundamental concepts of tonality and scales, including terminology like “pentatonic” and “heptatonic.”
• Students will be familiar with concepts of dissonance and consonance in regards to harmony, and with common harmonic terminology such as tertial, quartal, triad and tetrad.

Class Activities

• Discussion and demonstration of the concepts of tonality and tonal centers
• Discussion and demonstration of scale subsets within a particular tuning system
• Discussion and demonstration of different sizes and types of chords
• Scalar analysis of different melodies

Assignments

• Analysis of a piece of music for tonic, scale
• Analysis of chords (presented aurally or in protonotation)