Composition tools - Harmonic spaces |
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Basic principle [Professional] [Composition Light] [Composition Pro]
An harmonic space is a set of chord progressions that may be
sequenced and that give a specific atmosphere or style to a
music. It can be very simple or may contain several chords
sequences and types. Its basic purpose is to orient the composer
in an intuitive way, by being able to select a final chord
progression to use in a music composition. It is used in
association with a score group - an object that you can find
inside the main area of the conductor view. By using an harmonic
space inside a score group, you may select the chords and hear
the effects they have with the real time arranger of Pizzicato.
The scores placed inside the group will take the sound colour of
chords you select in real time. This is an easy and powerful way
to create a chord progression, because you hear it and choose it
just from you feeling, without any needed knowledge of chord
theory. It is an intuitive approach to design a chord
progression.
We will first see how we can use an harmonic space with the
real time arranger.
Using the real time arranger [Professional] [Composition Light] [Composition Pro]
You will find some simple harmonic spaces in configuration 3
of the document manager, in Libraries / Instruments and
templates / Harmonic spaces. We will use for instance the
first, C Major - 3 notes chords + dominant 7th.
- Start Pizzicato on a new document and go to
connfiguration 3 of the document manager and drag the
node C Major - 3 notes chords + dominant 7th and
drop it in the main area of the conductor view. You can
then observe the following group that has been
automatically created:

- You could also have reached the same result by creating a
group of scores (contextual menu inside the conductor
view) and by dragging the C Major - 3 notes chords +
dominant 7th node into it. Resize the group by
clicking and dragging its bottom right corner, so as to
display:

You can observe the various chord progressions "C - D
min", "C - E min",... with their assigned
colours. The rule of such an harmonic space is that after a
C, you can have the chords as displayed here above. After a D
min, you may have such and such chords, ... This is a simple
example, as other harmonic spaces may have other rules.
- As we have not yet selected the chord with which we want
to start, Pizzicato shows you all the possible starting
sequences. On each chord, you will see a little OK
button. It is used to validate the chord to use. Click on
the first C chord OK button and the
group becomes:

The first chord is now fixed as C and Pizzicato
suggests 7 chords that can be sequences after the C chord
- Click on the OK button of the F chord
and the group becomes:

- Click on the next G chord, then on the C
chord. The group becomes:

Notice that the group is automatically resized when you
add chords to the progression. On each chord of the
progression, there are now 4 icons that you can use to:
- "?" : click on this icon to change the
chord, by calling the chord selection dialog box.
- "+" : click on this icon to add a new chord
after the current chord, with the help of the chord
selection dialog box.
- "x" : click on this icon to delete the
current chord from the progression. The following
chords are shifted to the left accordingly.
- "<=" : click on this icon to remove all
chords from the progression, starting with the
current chord. The next suggestion of Pizzicato is
then displayed on that location so you can re-orient
the chord progression from this point on.
You will notice that each chord is now assigned to a
duration of one 4/4 measure. You may move the border between
two chords by dragging the mouse over the border and click it
to move it to the left (shorter duration for that chord) or
to the right (longer duration).
Up to now, this is only visual, but here comes the
interesting point.
- In configuration 4 of the document manager, third area,
locate the following node, by expanding the nodes as
necessary:

- Drag and drop the above Rhythm (selected in
blue) inside the score group and position it as follows:

- Its content is one 4/4 measure of a country style rhythm,
written in C Major. Expand the length of it as explained
in the conductor view lesson : drag its bottom right
corner to the right so as to have:

- Now listen to the group by using the yellow triangle of
the conductor toolbar. You will hear the four measures
change with the chords present in the group. This is the
real time arranger that plays the score and arrange it to
fit the chords you have selected.
We will now see how you can intuitively design a chord
progression.
- First, click on the "<=" icon of the first
chord, so as to delete the chord progression. Click on
the OK button of the first C chord and
resize the group and the rhythm so as to have the
following presentation:

- Right-click on the blue background and select the Play
in loop menu item. Start the playing and the score
will now play in loop the same rhythm again and again.
Here is how you can select your chord progression in real
time.
- Double-click in the middle of the yellow C chord. A
little coloured circle appears:

It is the fixed point for the real time arranger. When
this circle is not present, the score is played with the
chord present in the corresponding measure. But when you set
this fixed point, Pizzicato continues playing the score with
the chord being located at the fixed point (here C). You may
now click in any of the chords suggested by Pizzicato and you
will hear the change of tone in the rhythm. Try and click on
each one of them. When you find one transition you like, just
click on the OK button of that chord and the chord
is added to the progression, as explained above. Pizzicato
shows you then the next suggestions for possible chords in
that harmonic space. This space represents here the 3 notes
chords of the C major scale, as well as the dominant 7th
chord, quite common in use.
When you click inside the circle, it disappears and the
real time arranger continue to play the score with the
existing chord progression. You may also disable the real
time arranger by clicking inside the little yellow square
present at the top of the group.
Warning - do not forget to delete this fixed point
after you have used it, because otherwise Pizzicato will play
all your score with that fixed point, even from other
documents and they may sound strange to you because Pizzicato
arranges them all in the fixed point chord.
Once you have found the chord
progression you like, you may do two things with that group:
- You can drag the little green
square on top of the group and drop it outside the group.
Pizzicato will create a full score of the group,
including the arranged notes with the chords.
- You can similarly drag and drop the
little blue square and the score will only contain the
chord progression. You can drag that chord progression in
a document inside your My library folder to use
it on other occasions. It is then part of your library.
You will find in the Pizzicato libraries
numerous harmonic spaces. They are located in the Music
libraries, Harmonic spaces folder and they are classified
according to the types of chords (thirds, sevenths and others),
by common notes and degrees to sequence. You can find them in the
first area of configuration 4 of the document manager.
Since version 3.6.1, a check box entitled Do not
arrange" is present in the play options dialog box. You
can reach it with a right click on the score in the group and
then select Play options... If you check it, the score
will not be arranged with the current harmonic space of the
group.
Editing an harmonic space [Professional] [Composition Pro]
Here is how to create a custom harmonic space or edit an
existing harmonic space.
- Open a new document and open the conductor view. In the
document manager, configuration 1, right-click the
document icon and select the New harmonic space
menu item. The following dialog appears:

- You can change the name of this harmonic space in the
text box in the right upper corner.
- The first list is a list that will contain the possible
chord sequences. Click on the Add button. A new
line appears in the list. Then click on the Add a
chord... button. The chord selection dialog box
appears:

- Click on OK to select the default C major chord.
The second list shows the C chord. Add a new chord in
that list and select the F chord. This "C +
F" sequence is a possible chord sequence in this
harmonic space.
- Click again the above Add button and add the
sequence of "D min + F". Notice that a colour
is automatically associated with the root note of the
chord. The colour may be changed if you want to test
another colour/chord convention. They will appear in the
groups of scores with these selected colours.
- Using the same principle, create the two following chord
sequences : "F + G" and "G + C". The
left list should now appear as follows:

The number "=0" is in fact a value that you can
assign to that specific sequence. It can be assigned by
selecting the line in the list and then changing the value
with the upper slider in the right part of the dialog. It is
presently not used by Pizzicato but this number, if assigned,
should represent the relative quality or importance of that
specific chord progression in the harmonic space you design.
- The upper Delete button is used to delete one of
the selected sequence of chords. The Up and Down
buttons at the top of the dialog are used to change the
order of the selected chord sequence so you can sort the
list as you want.
- The Modify chord... lets you change the chord
selected in the second list. The Delete chord
removes the selected chord of the second list and the Up
and Down buttons may be used to sort the list of
chords of the selected chord progression. By clicking on
the colour square, you may select the colour associated
to that chord.
- If you check the Play the selected chord box,
you will hear the selected chord with a string sound and
you can adjust the sound volume with the slider just
below it.
- The Transpose... button lets you
transpose all chords defined in the harmonic space.
- The Structure... button is
used to construct an harmonic space automatically,
following a set of specifications that you decide. The
following dialog appears:

Here are the specifications that you
can give and that will determine the possible chords
sequences that the harmonic space will contain:
- To the left, a
double list is used to specify which chords can be
used. You can select a chord and move it from one
list to the other with the four middle buttons.
- The central table
determines in which scales the chords can be used. It
defines the harmonic context of the chords. The
twelve notes can be used, in combination with the
major scale and the three minor scales.
- In the upper part
of the third frame, you can select how many common
notes can be accepted between two sequenced chords.
- Just below, a
menu is used to display the possible sequences of
degrees inside the same scale or between two
different scales. In each case, a table of 7 times 7
checkboxes is used to specify which degree sequences
are possible.
- If you click on Create,
Pizzicato removes any existing chords sequences in
the harmonic space and then build all possible chords
sequences that satisfy the given specifications. So
as to conntinue with the above example, click now on Cancel.