By Reed Gratz – This is an article published in George Russell’s seminal work: The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization.
His book can be ordered at: http://www.lydianchromaticconcept.com
The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization. George Russell’s book, The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization, first published in, was. Instead, George Russell came up with his own theory which he called the Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organisation. Now, there’s something interesting. Download the Brochure in PDF Format. The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization. George Russell's book, The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization, first published in 1953, was the first theoretical contribution to come from jazz, and was responsible for introducing modal improvisation which resulted in the seminal recording of Miles Davis' 'Kind of Blue.' The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization was expanded several times over the years, and has grown greatly since its first appearance in For searchers like Miles and Coltrane and Bill Evans, and many in the generations that followed them, Russell’s theory provided a harmonic background and a path for further exploration.
Share & Embed 'george-russell-the-lydian-chromatic-concept-of-tonal-organization.pdf' Please copy and paste this embed script to where you want to embed. The full Concept is too complex, convoluted and large to cover here in detail. But the Lydian Chromatic Concept is just a different way of allocating ‘correct’ scales to a particular chord. Essentially, George Russell came up with seven ‘Vertical Principle Scale‘ based on a ‘Lydian Chromatic Order of Tonal Gravity’: Lydian; Lydian.
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
As stated in Robert Cogan and Pozzi Escot’s enlightening book, Sonic Design: “The European tonal system . . . has been regarded by its theorists, from Rameau to Hindemith, as a natural order. Certain of them proclaimed the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as the ‘common-practice’ period, an astonishing conception when one compares its two centuries of common ideals, with the proceeding thousand years of the European modal system, not to mention the several millennia of the Indian raga systems. Since it ignored these, as well as the music of other cultures, and cannot apply to the twentieth-century music of the entire world, how common can it be?”
Constructing a seven-note scale by using a series of successive intervals of a fifth, is common in the history of music. It has been the basis for scaler structure from before Pythagorean times (c. 550 B.C.E.) to the present (The Lydian Chromatic Concept). Examples of this can be found in the music of Eastern civilizations. Slabs of stones, used as instruments tuned in sets, are still found in China, Korea, and Samoa. The Chinese sets were originally tuned by a Pythagorean-like system several hundred years before the “Pythagorean school” developed in Greece.
Chinese musical treatises from the eleventh through the sixteenth centuries were consistent in describing the use of a cycle of fifths for scale construction. The eleventh-century Chinese (Sonq Dynasty) treatise, Twujih, by Roan Yih and Hwa Yuan, explains in detailed terms the use of a fundamental tone, over which a scale of twelve semitones is produced by a cycle of fifths. It was this same process that was used by Prince Ju Tzay Yeh (1596) in an early form of the equal-tempered scale.
Two hundred years after Twujih, Chern Yuanjing included a circular diagram in his Shyhlin Goangjih, (c.1270), assembling the twelve semitones of a chromatic scale by means of a succession of fifths. He explained that by doing so, the basic scale, “gong-diaw” (C,D,E,F#,G,A,B) was obtained. According to the Shyhlin Goangjih, any note of the scale could serve as the “tonic” of a melody, and a mode was defined by this tonic pitch on which the scale was constructed. Because there were twelve pitches in that chromatic scale and seven notes in each basic scale, eighty-four modes were theoretically possible.
Both the traditional music of Japan and Hindusthani music are based on scales derived from a series of fifths. The two basic scales in Japanese music are the Ryo (D,E,F#,G#,A,B,C#) and the Ritsu (D,E,F,G,A,B,C). They coincide with a D Lydian scale and its “parallel” Lydian minor scale (on the sixth degree of F). In the book Hindusthani Music, An Outline of Its Physics and Aesthetics, author, G.H. Ranade states that, “. . . ever since the days of the sage Bharata (prior to 300 B.C.) it was a well established practice to obtain the various notes of the scale by a chain of successive fifths.”
The question arises then; if these ancient and advanced cultures derived scales from successions of fifths to arrive at what we refer to as Lydian scales, why did Western musicians move so predominantly toward the major-minor scale system?
Leonard Meyer, in his book Music, The Arts, And Ideas, discusses the idea of teleology in music. Teleological music, in this sense, refers to “goal-oriented” music (comparable in part, to Russell’s idea of Horizontal Tonal Gravity) that represents the large majority of Western music (referring to European and European-influenced music). By reflecting the basic philosophy of goal-orientation, the major-minor scale system (a resolving or Horizontal idea) is manifested. It seems logical then, that Zen and other Eastern philosophies, which refer more often to a vertical, a blending, non, or at least less, goal-oriented idea, should originate in cultures reflecting this thought in musical scale choice.
The choice of the major-minor scale system is completely consistent with the teleology, and technologically-oriented Western mind. It is a mind set of the Written Tradition. The phenomenon of tension and release, goal-oriented organized Western religion and philosophies, climbing the social ladder, getting ahead, planning for tomorrow; all fit easily with Western European music, the music of the common practice era. Would music based upon the idea of modality structured on the scale derived from a series of successive perfect fifths, assuming the lowest of that series as tonal or modal center, the fundamental, have a different sound? Would a music coming from a more vertically-oriented philosophy and culture lead to a different musical philosophy?
William Thomson, in his in-depth article Emergent ‘Dissonance’ and the Resolution of a Paradox, discusses and questions numerous ideas regarding the perfect fourth as it has been perceived through music history, from consonance to dissonance. He points to the Grove’s Dictionary definition of Dissonance. A discord, or any sound which, in the context of the prevailing harmonic system, is unstable, and must therefore be resolved to a consonance. Perhaps those changes are in direct relationship to the contrast of fundamental approach to scaler construction; the use of the subdominant, and, the continuing perfect fifths above a fundamental.
Examples of Western musical thought regarding the construction of the Pythagorean scale, resulting in the major scale, are discussed below. In both instances, the resultant (major scale) appears to have been reached by manipulated means. The methods used in each example (varied from that used in the previous examples) seem to have been guided toward the desired end the major scale.
John Backus explains the construction of the Pythagorean scale in his widely used (and certainly authoritative) book, The Acoustical Foundation of Music. Beginning on the pitch C, Mr. Backus progresses to a perfect fourth above (to F), moves back to C, then proceeds by fifths: G,D,A,E, and B to “…avoid black notes…”
Black notes only come into play, of course, with keyboards. The idea of subdominant is acceptable and with great purpose in Western music. It certainly proceeds the use of black and white notes on a keyboard.
A second example is from the Harvard Dictionary of Music, edited by Willi Apel in which the Pythagorean scale is described as a “diatonic” scale with one fifth below the fundamental (C to F), followed by five fifths above (C down to F, then C,G,D,A,E,B). This group of pitches is combined to form a scale within one octave; the resultant scale being a major scale on C (C,D,E,F,G,A,B).
By examining these two examples, one might ask the question; if a real construction of a series of successive fifths has occurred, is the pitch F not the true fundamental and the F Lydian Scale (F,G,A,B,C D,E,) the resultant as supported by the Eastern treatises? The two differing interpretations offer the possibilities of Horizontal (major and minor tonal system) and Vertical (Lydian and modal system).
Historically, there is evidence describing sources of influence which led Western musicians in the direction of the resolving major scale. Along with the idea of teleology was the powerful influence of the Christian Church. The Church influenced much of the music from well before the eleventh century to the eighteenth, when that influence began to diminish. By the tenth century, after many centuries of development, the Church recognized eight modes:
AUTHENTIC MODES PLAGAL MODES and relative pitches
Dorian Hypodorian
d, e, f, g, a, b, c a, b, c, d, e, f, g
Phrygian Hypophrygian
George Russell Lydian Concept Pdf Music
e, f, g, a, b, c, d b, c, d, e, f, g, a
George Russell Lydian Chromatic Pdf
Lydian Hypolydian
f, g, a, b, c, d, e c, d, e, f, g, a, b
Mixolydian Hypomixolydian
g, a, b, c, d, e, f d, e, f, g, a, b, c
George Russell Lydian Chromatic Concept Of Tonal Organization Pdf Download
The final (similar to tonic) note for each of the Plagal modes was that of the corresponding Authentic mode (example both the Phrygian and Hypophrygian had finals of E. The Plagal mode was constructed on the pitch a perfect fourth below the final note of the Authentic mode and considered to be grouped in a pair with the corresponding Authentic mode. Modes built upon notes equivalent to A, B, and C, while appearing in practice for centuries, were not recognized by theoretical treatise until the middle of the sixteenth century (1547) when systems of twelve modes containing the Ionian, Hypoionian, Aeolian, (later the natural minor scale), and Hypoaeolian were described by Glareau. Previously, modes of this nature were used often and constructed when notes were altered at cadences and to avoid the tritone by means of “musica ficta” (accidentals added by performers). As the practice of avoiding the tritone (occasionally referred to as the Devil’s interval) particularly in choral music, was common and offered association with the declaration of “impurity,” the use of modes containing the perfect fourth were given an added emphasis. Of course, this also was connected to the growing popularity of using the perfect fourth above the final/tonic in a decorative, passing way with the perfect fifth above, and later, to the Dominant 7th chord.
Lydian Chromatic Concept Pdf
This time period (1547) coincided with the formation of the Council of Trent. This body of high-ranking clergy within the Roman Catholic Church, met on an irregular basis between 1545 and 1563, and was responsible for the establishment of a reformed Mass. The Council was formed out of a need for “purifying” and desecularizing the sacred service, as dissension was rising from England, Germany, The Netherlands, and other European areas within the realm of the Roman Catholic Church.
In exploring the foundation upon which certain scales are founded,we discover, as Mr. Russell points out, that the Lydian Scale is based on a series of successive fifths and to a degree, on the overtone series. It is the product of a physically natural acoustical phenomenon. The naturalness of the Lydian Scale is confirmed too, by the symmetry of its construction. By including the sharped fourth, the exact center-point of the octave interval is present (C to F# is an interval of three whole steps; from F# to C is also three whole steps).
George Russell Lydian Chromatic Concept Pdf
This may be seen more vividly by examining the frequency ratios (the number of cycles completed by a sound wave in one second) and interval ratios for each of the twelve intervals of the chromatic scale. The Harvard Dictionary of Music defines equal temperament as, “… dividing the octave into twelve equal parts (semitones). The frequency ratio of the octave is 2.0 (C1 = 2 and C,one octave below, = 1), the frequency ratio, S, of this semitone is given by the equation S to the 12th power = 2; S=12√2, S =1.05946. The successive powers of this figure (between C and the other chromatic scale tones) give the frequency ratio for the tones of the chromatic scale.”
George Russell Lydian Chromatic
The Table showing the Chromatic Scale Tones, their Frequency Ratio and their Pythagorean Interval Ratio is omitted here but can be seen in George Russell’s Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization in Appendix I.
Perhaps the logic of using the major and minor tonal system as so exclusive a foundation of our theoretical and compositional approach to music, is questionable. Evidence of the fact that advanced cultures took the circle of fifths as the basis for scaler structure, deriving differing and beautifully valid scale results, is numerous and strong. By inclusively attuning ourselves to other cultures and musics; their origins and philosophies, we become aware of the some of the associations between the Lydian Scale and natural symmetry and order.
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