Suspended Chords = Accepted Dissonance?

[GlynB]

A little theoretical knowledge is not dangerous, but can be thoroughly misleading!

And so best avoided...

[Daniel Davis]

Strictly speaking the intervals and chords which are counted as dissonant vary with which species of counterpoint you are using and with which period of music. Dissonance and it's treatment is just one of the conventions used within specific historical and technical constraints. E.g. If you wish to write a pastiche of Bach, then you will have to conform to the same rules of harmony and Moreover, as with any technical persuit, consistency is key. Establish your musical language with its own vocabulary and rules and stick to it within a composition. Feel free to use other rules in a different composition.

[TheReson8or]

Suspended chords are not dissonant!...there...I said it! Dave

[oggyb]

Suspended chords are not dissonant!...there...I said it! Dave

[Daniel Davis]

Suspended chords are not dissonant!...there...I said it! Dave

Suspended chords are dissonant, which is not the same as saying they are bad. Dissonance is an essential part of classical harmony. Lack of dissonance is characteristic of a lot of pop music and differentiates it from the richer harmonic palettes of classical and jazz musics. More dissonance please: spice it up!

[agent funk]

Just to be clear here, where is the dissonance in a suspended chord? To me a tension is not always dissonant, it may need to resolve but does that imply dissonace? If I hear a sus chord I don't think "dissonance". Maybe the chord sequence is un-resolved, but is a sus chord dissonant? Where? Which interval?

I have no classical training but to me dissonance and cononance are not the same as tension and resolution?

[Random Guitarist]

Just to be clear here, where is the dissonance in a suspended chord? To me a tension is not always dissonant, it may need to resolve but does that imply dissonace? If I hear a sus chord I don't think "dissonance". Maybe the chord sequence is un-resolved, but is a sus chord dissonant? Where? Which interval?

I have no classical training but to me dissonance and cononance are not the same as tension and resolution?

I think in terms of a lot of music theory they are. Consonance is a chord which is 'at rest' and doesn't feel like any note of it needs to move. Dissonance is any chord which sounds like it's going to resolve to a diferent one. So Dsus4 has dissonance because you can cleraly hear/feel the need to drop the 4th to make a D.

I think the waters get muddied because dissonance is often used for some really quite unpleasant combinations of notes, and so becomes shorthand for any kind of modernistic earache, but the term does apply to pleasant chords as well.

At least that's my understanding, happy to be corrected.

Thanks,

Grant.

[Exalted Wombat]

I have no classical training but to me dissonance and cononance are not the same as tension and resolution?

That is, however, how the words are often used.

[agent funk]

Ok I understand. Thx

I think the confusion for me is (right or wrong) I have heard the terms cono/dissonance mainly applied to specific intervals rather than chords. Whilst the terms tension/resolution to chord progressions or melodies.

[oggyb]

Ok I understand. Thx

I think the confusion for me is (right or wrong) I have heard the terms cono/dissonance mainly applied to specific intervals rather than chords. Whilst the terms tension/resolution to chord progressions or melodies.

The terms consonance and dissonance are applied to intervals. Sometimes those intervals are within chords! When we use the term, we're generally talking about intervals which according to early practitioners are felt to not be at rest (as mentioned above).

So in a sus4/triad chord (aka a 4/3 suspension) the dissonant interval is the 4th created between the root and the suspended 4th. It wants to resolve down to a consonant interval. FYI, in the 13th/14th century when all this was being developed, it was more widely accepted that a suspended 4th would resolve UP to the much more consonant 5th.

Dissonance is a kind of tension. Consonance is the effect of releasing that tension.

[damoore]

Anyway, getting back to the original question (at the risk of being intensely boring).

Maybe your melody is in the Phrygian mode. Not to be confused with the the Friesian mode. In other words, it "rests" on E instead of C and classical harmony is not entirely relevant.

Without more context, of course, we couldn't tell. And in any case even in Harmony texts you will find examples where the author will basically draw a line through the chord in the analysis to say that it doesn't really fit standard "rules". Often in examples from Wagner, for example.

[Daniel Davis]

Maybe your melody is in the Phrygian mode. Not to be confused with the the Friesian mode. In other words, it "rests" on E instead of C and classical harmony is not entirely relevant.

When did modes cease to be a part of classical harmony? In fact when species counterpoint and all that entails, including intervalic consonance and dissonance, modes were the norm.

Now the Friesian mode on the udder hand...

[petev3.1]

I don't see avoidance of parallel fifths as a law, but as way of avoiding creating imbalances in the counterpoint where suddenly two parts cease to be independent. Parallel perfect fifths and octaves stick out like sore thumbs, distract the ear and disturb the flow. Not so much a law as a wise musical decision, and there to be broken for other styles.

It seems to me TFHT that what was said earlier is correct, and your D add9 Sus 4 chord may be Em7. Technically speaking this contains a dissonant interval. It hardly seems like one these days, but even so in your sequence you naturally resolve the 7th to the root of the next chord in the usual way.

[Pabs]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... wmRQ0PBtXU

[shufflebeat]

Now the Friesian mode on the udder hand...

Grooaann! - I've never herd such wit. Kindly leave the dairy.

[Exalted Wombat]

I don't see avoidance of parallel fifths as a law, but as way of avoiding creating imbalances in the counterpoint where suddenly two parts cease to be independent.

Indeed. If you're writing a 4-part texture, don't slip into 2 or 3 parts BY MISTAKE. Do it all you like if that's the sound you want. But it's silly setting out to write rich-sounding 4-part harmony then excusing your sloppy technique with "I don't need no stinking rules!"

[TheReson8or]

Right , I don't care what the text books say cos I have written songs for years and KNOW what sus chords do...they lurk within the place between nice and nasty,, they are neither dissonant or consonance...they are suspended...in between! Dave

[shufflebeat]

Agreed - 100%. In your songs that's what they do, whereas other folks use them to create discomfort by exploiting their inherent dissonance.

[TheReson8or]

Agreed - 100%. In your songs that's what they do, whereas other folks use them to create discomfort by exploiting their inherent dissonance.

Well they are all full of sugary coated nonsense then!

[TheReson8or]

sus chord nonsense circa 1995 8 track cassette recording!

[Exalted Wombat]

I don't hear sus chords, rather a series of add2 clusters. Sus is as sus does, and these aren't functioning as suspensions.

[TheReson8or]

add2 clusters...you create words! the verse is full of sus...so sussed! Dave

[Exalted Wombat]

Yeah, I know! Just labels.

But is it useful to call it a sus when it isn't acting as a suspension calling for a resolution (even if one doesn't happen)? Floyd Cramer played sus2 chords. The inevitable final chord of a musical theatre ballad is an add2 (or add9). Is there a point in having two names? Can you name it ignoring what it DOES?

[TheReson8or]

So do you not think it is resolved when I go to the first chord of the chorus?

[oggyb]

So do you not think it is resolved when I go to the first chord of the chorus?

TECHNICALLY SPEAKING, no. The tension is resolved, certainly, but not any suspensions. I liked the song Very cheese. Much 90s.