Romantic period - Harmony and tonality
General characteristics of harmony and tonality in the Romantic period
- Chromatic harmony was used more frequently than in earlier periods.
- Composers added more notes to their chords to form extended chords.
- Composers used Discordant music, where notes in a chord do not agree. to make their music more expressive.
- Music was modulated to more distant keys than those used by composers in the Classical period.
- Some music became tonally ambiguous. This was developed further in the 20th century.
Chromatic harmonies
Composers added chromatic notes to their chords and melodies to make their music more expressive. In the slow movement of Sergei Rachmaninov鈥檚 Piano Concerto No. 2, the opening flute melody contains chromatic notes as well as accompanying chords. These dissonances usually resolve to consonant chords - or diatonic chords - which creates a feeling of tension and release.
Extended chords in Impressionism
A chord extended by adding on thirds beyond a 7th, i.e. adding a 7th, 9th, 11th, 13th etc are chords which have extra notes 鈥 through adding thirds on top of the seventh, ninth, eleventh, thirteenth etc. Extended chords were frequently used by Claude Debussy.
The effect of extended chords is a blurred sense of harmonic direction, which suited Impressionist music.