Talk:Tonicization

Context
What is the context? Is this about tones in music? Andris 22:01, May 11, 2004 (UTC)


 * As the article said when you posted this, "In music". Hyacinth 23:01, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

In-line edits
Here are a few thoughts about the disputed materials:

--No, chord V OR chord vii or, in a melody in which harmony is not explicit, a leading tone to tonic movement.--

I tried to retain as much wording as possible from the original article. I agree this could be made clearer.

--I'm not happy with this: tonality is based on a central TRIAD, not a central note.--

I don't agree with either definition. Tonality is based on a collection of pitches that display certain relationships and tendencies (some of those relationships involve forming certain functional chords). One of these pitches, and the triad built on it, is assigned a place of rest or greater stability or whatever you want to call it, and we call that "tonic." However, the tonic triad doesn't define the key alone--the various pitches and chords around it do. Change the scale, and you change the tonal space. Of course, to achieve tonicization, the scale has to changed in particular systematic ways. I tried to articulate some of those ways in the article in a somewhat basic fashion. I don't actually think the idea of changing the scale is the best model to think about subtle tonicizations, but since this article is probably meant to be read by people taking a course in basic harmony, that's the simplest explanation I could come up with. And I think it's more-or-less a good way of thinking about it.

--leading tones do NOT push down--

The people at the leading tone article disagree, as do most theorists, I would think. Yes, *the* leading tone (i.e., scale degree 7) in a key may push upward, but notes that generally have a tendency to push up OR down (particularly by semitone) can be called leading tones. If you have a piece in C major, and a Bb is introduced that tends to push toward A (and starts leading toward an F tonic), what do you call that note? If you want to call it something other than a "leading tone," that's fine (although you may want to quibble with the leading tone article authors), but you have to admit that in a dominant seventh chord, the 7th generally pushes to resolve downward. That's all I mean. If you want to use a more neutral term (like "tendency tone" or something), I have no objection. I just used it here to link up with the leading tone article's definition.
 * but surely in that context the Bb has a subdominant function, not a leading note function.

--for what?--

Sufficient for tonicization -- in the appropriate context (hence "*may* be sufficient..."). Cf. the beginning of the article in the Harvard Dictionary of Music on this topic: "The momentary treatment of a pitch other than the tonic as if it were the tonic, most often by the introduction of its own leading tone or fourth scale degree or both." I didn't base my article on the Harvard Dictionary, but clearly I'm not out in left field.

--Not necessarily--

You have a point here. However, I felt this was a good simplification of what is going on. Generally speaking, I think most times you get a strong feeling of tonicization, there is at least a general sense of harmonic support. I agree that there are contexts where an incessant melodic leading tone motion (without any harmonic support) may, if repeated again and again and again, give a strong push toward another tonic, and perhaps stronger than a weak secondary dominant. But I think that's probably the exception... even if not triads, usually some sort of other harmonic components (augmented sixths, tritones) are necessary to make a strong tonicization. Lacking any of these, I think it's really quite rare for a purely melodic tonicization without harmonic support to be stronger than one supported harmonically.

--I don't agree--

This one depends on the brand of theory you're using. This statement was brought over from a previous editor, so I'm not wedded to having it in the article. The kind of harmonic theory I believe in has things like "dominant function" triads and chords, which include things like V, V7, vii0, etc. It has things like "predominant (or subdominant) function" triads and chords, which include things like IV, ii, ii6, ii6/5, etc. In such a theory, a vii0 chord has a similar broad function to a V7 chord in many ways, although of course there are nuances to this. I don't believe the chords are equivalent, but they do have a lot of functions in common. However, as I said, I don't really care about this subtlety, so if you want to throw it out, I don't think anything is lost.

Anyhow, I hope it is okay that I posted these reactions here. I just may not be editing anything on Wikipedia again for a week or more, so I wanted to give you my feedback before you made any decisions. Thanks for the comments; if you have further thoughts, I'd be interested. Jzmckay 11:36, 8 June 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm not sure if I understand the above comments (fairly old as they are), for example, "--I don't agree--" is followed by "This one depends on the brand of theory..." but I am unable to tell what you don't agree with and what it is that depends upon the theory (presumably this is one thing). Hyacinth (talk) 02:03, 24 May 2010 (UTC)

Missing text
There was extensive discussion between me and another contributor some months ago, which appears to be missing. Does anyone know what happened to it? Tony 14:34, 14 July 2006 (UTC)


 * You can click "Page history" and check the list of edits made to this page. Having done so it doesn't appear that it was on this talk page. Hyacinth (talk) 00:08, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

sub and superscript together?
Anyone know whether you can format for figured bass notation here? Tony 04:48, 17 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Superscript is the best I can find. Hyacinth (talk) 23:38, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
 * Niether are Template:Frac nor $$\tfrac{numberator}{denominator}$$ satisfactory. Hyacinth (talk) 00:02, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Aha! I knew I had it somewhere at sometime "Superscript and subscript may be combined, as in figured bass, in math markup, $$C_6^4$$ = $$C_6^4$$, see TeX markup or m:Help:Formula." Hyacinth (talk) 02:47, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

Pronunciation
Somebody who knows, please indicate whether it is pronounced "tonikization" or "tonisization." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.204.150.1 (talk) 18:20, 30 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The latter. Hyacinth (talk) 00:09, 1 July 2008 (UTC)

Big Quibble
I know many are using the term "tonicization" but it is really a poor signifier. It is a very awkward word to say and has poor declensions. I first came across it in Adwells 'Harmony and Voiceleading': I really like the book but the term is very annoying. The term I learnt from older books was 'tonification', 'tonify', etc. say them aloud and think of the root terms.Wblakesx (talk) 23:28, 27 February 2012 (UTC)wblakesx


 * (See declension) Feel free to cite those books. Hyacinth (talk) 02:25, 28 February 2012 (UTC)