parallels (was RE: anti-looper bigots)

["Tony K" <bigtonyk@gmail.com>]

> Popular songs such as "Iron Man" and "Smoke on the Water" derive their  
>sound from parallel fifths.

I know I'm being picky here... but.  Smoke on the Water is parallel 4ths.  
I saw an interview with Ritchie where he discussed how often that riff is 
played wrong (in 5ths) and that 4ths give it an 'evil' sound.

I remember those rules from music theory classes.  My teacher's attitude 
was that it's a flexible rule (because of course someone found some 
parallels in a Bach piece,) and one that musicians uses when composing to 
create that style of music.  

I now return you to this fascinating discussion already in progress.

Tony

-----Original Message-----
From: kkissinger@kevinkissinger.com [mailto:kkissinger@kevinkissinger.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, August 05, 2009 10:57 PM
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: Re: anti-looper bigots

Quoting Brian Good <bsgood@gmail.com>:
>
> Per Boysen wrote:
>
>> Very interesting historical two cents. Wonder what those early Baroque
>> era people would think about the multi glissandi THX jingle! :-)
>
> They'd be hiding under the theater seats, I imagine. :-)
>
Actually, in the pre-Renaissance era, they chanted in parallel fifths  
in a style known as "organum".  (A popular example are the monks in  
Monty Python -- they are chanting in organum -- stopping only to beat  
their own heads with boards. I don't think the boards were authentic  
-- however the organum is.)

The reason that parallel fifths and octaves are avoided in  
contrapuntal music is that this motion destroys the independence of  
the voices.

So, to baroque ears, parallel fifths would likely have sounded "old  
fashioned".  And, yes -- in choral singing (other than organum) a  
careless (or random) parallel octave or fifth causes tuning problems  
for the singers. (usually, when a choir runs across a "problem  
passage" the culprit is usually a parallel fifth, parallel octave, or  
some kind of poor voice-leading.)

For any  Moondog fans -- he was really into classical counterpoint and  
on my Moondog CD liner notes Moondog is quoted as saying that  
voice-leading was very important to him.

The power chord is a perfect example of parallel motion -- it is  
parallel motion that blends into a mass sound.  That is, you don't  
hear independent notes so much as one big, powerful sound.

Popular songs such as "Iron Man" and "Smoke on the Water" derive their  
sound from parallel fifths.

Interestingly, in the twentieth century, parallelism returned as a  
style.  What goes around, comes around.

Hindemith, as I recall, wished to avoid parallel octaves and fifths  
because it was "old fashioned" and has an ancient sound.

Forgive me for rambling on -- I really enjoy counterpoint and, in  
fact, the countrapuntal possibilities of live-looping inspires me when  
I work with loops.

-- Kevin