Yes! I haven’t dabbled in that area myself, but Vornska (a friend/professor that helps with these videos) has made set charts for things like 19 TET! He likes to compare properties of sets between different types of equal temperament. It’s a big world of harmony out there!
Set theory has plenty of applications in Scriabin's music insofar as it's a practical way of reanalyzing his extensions on common practice harmony, understanding the relative consonance of sets and the compatibility of transposition. Unfortunately, set theory has failings more critical than those of lead sheet notation. In the example you gave, the second chord is _not_ rooted on F# but is simply a fifth inversion of the first chord (yes, that exists). The reason for this is because Scriabin wouldn't have spelled the third of a chord as a diminished fourth, and--though he was inconsistent in his proto-mystic era, Opp. 47 to 61 or about--he wouldn't have spelled the #11 as a diminished fifth either. We know little about Scriabin's thoughts on his own tonal system apart from the fact that he strongly valued spelling and at least must have been aware of the relevant tuning theory. He knew there were more than twelve notes, similar as they might be in 12 TET, and this accounts for Scriabin's sometimes eccentric and difficult-to-read note spelling, which in terms of set theory would have to be considered nonsense. As much as I'd rather not file myself under the same category as WIM123, Scriabin's reliance on harmonic direction (largely uses transposition of regular intervals in a pseudo-functional way), spelling, and concept of consonance and dissonance _must_ negate accusations of atonality. And as far as Forte's definition of atonality goes (which I think, frankly, is even more a deliberate misnomer than the common definition of "atonality") Scriabin's harmony might sometimes be complex and dissonant, but at no point in his career did he entirely dismiss triadic and functional harmony, only using them more infrequently. There are plenty of instances into his later years of plain major triads, minor triads, at least one obvious V-I, and still probably even more suggestions of functional direction. In my mind, these don't constitute novel pitch combinations or unfamiliar environments (not that that means anything), and from there Scriabin's more dissonant harmonies are really just extensions of normal triadic chords which aren't necessarily beyond the capacity of conventional tonal music, even if Scriabin may or may not have been the first to use them in quite the way he did. This is to say nothing of the fact that many of his pieces begin and end in the same transposition of sets and that he was even known to declare that certain pieces were in certain keys. So still I find lead sheet notation to be a more convincing representation of Scriabin's intent, even though it could use some abbreviation for convenience.
I appreciate hearing this perspective! I disagree about a few things. I don’t think it’s it’s accurate that Scriabin used plain major/minor triads in his late era (after op. 57), or V to I cadences. The one exception would be the last chord of Prometheus; other than that, I would love to see examples triads or V to I cadences in Scriabin’s late era if they exist. I think it’s strange to insist something is build off a certain pitch other than the bass. In my view, the bass necessarily affects the way we hear the chord and determines the mode. Scriabin does seem sorta picky about spelling, and perhaps that can give us some insight into his intentions, yet as theorists I think it’s most important to analyze how the music actually sounds rather than focus on the way it’s written. You’re right that he starts and ends pieces on certain bass notes, and there can be plenty of consonance in his late era, but the harmony certainly doesn’t resemble the major scale like tonal music does.
@@jaybeardmusic8074 the bass does not have as much effect on the music as people believe. It is important, and is *most frequently* the root or inversion of a chord. But it can be neither. And it often is neither in scriabin's music.
@@jaybeardmusic8074 There are a few of them. Scriabin jumps through hoops to ensure that he doesn't affirm any tonality too strongly, though, so he never lingers on them for very long. - ua-cam.com/video/-OamDGhQwJs/v-deo.html (Sonata 9 m. 39) E major, root position. - ua-cam.com/video/zbpDYKlZ5-A/v-deo.html (Sonata 10 m. 219) B major, second inversion. In particular, Scriabin really likes second inversion chords, and this Sonata is riddled with them, usually with some polite diatonic extensions (7th, 9th). - ua-cam.com/video/VV_BLGSbN4U/v-deo.html (Vers la Flamme m. 19) B minor, root position. Minor harmonies are an oddity in Scriabin's late music, but they exist. - ua-cam.com/video/x8ix0ilZ14Y/v-deo.html (Op. 74 No. 2, first chord) F# minor, root position. There might be more examples. Sonata 7 is one of the highlights of Scriabin's playful harmonic misdirection, with many instances of apparently consonant (but misspelled, which is important) harmony wrapped in his more usual chords with entirely different roots, almost as if suggesting polytonality. I agree with you that the bass note is important for analyzing harmonies, and also that factoring in listening experience is important for analysis (that's why I'm not totally dismissing set theory as a practical tool). Indeed, Scriabin *very often* uses root position chords. But coming in with romantic ears, as I did, and Scriabin himself did, I don't really find these chords difficult to decipher when they're inverted due to their transparently just being extended dominant chords. See ua-cam.com/video/1CtmdgxtMHs/v-deo.html (Op. 73 No. 1 ***). Sure, he plays with the bass notes very heavily here, and the later measures also employ various false relations which was a feature of his final style, but these chords sound to me to obviously be centred in A, regardless of the E's or D#'s (not Eb's!!!!) in the bass. This also gives evidence for my companion theory that Scriabin's extreme stylistic change wasn't abrupt at all, but was just a natural succession of his increased reliance on dominants, 13th chords, and inversions designed to make chord function less assertive. As far back as his 4th Sonata (first movement), and with every other chord in his 5th, he used inversion over the fourth and fifth scale degrees to lessen the "functional implications" of seventh chords. This is to say nothing of the fact that inversions were used very often in common practice harmony, and yet I think you'd be hard-pressed to find people who justify these inversions as chords with separate roots after the baroque era. As for the V-I "cadence", because of the ambiguous chord function, I'm going to revise my statement and say I don't know for sure that the ultimate chord of the "cadence" is the tonic. ua-cam.com/video/-OamDGhQwJs/v-deo.html (Sonata 9, m. 50-51) This is at least an indisputable movement counterclockwise the circle of fifths, between F13#11 (mystic) and Bb7b9#11b13 (octatonic with a b13? Part of some other overarching set?). This theme in the Sonata starts in E, so this might be a very brief tonicization of Bb--which is what I'm inclined to hear--or it could just be part of a longer movement towards the tonic E at m. 53. Neither of these explanations are particularly satisfying, probably by design, but this suggests that Scriabin never intended to dispense with function entirely. P.S. Thank you for using an edition with bar numbers in your score videos. You've made my life much easier. ********* EDIT: You mentioned that Scriabin often starts and ends on the same bass note. At the end of this piece, I realized it happens to be that Scriabin ends with an octatonic chord on A with a dropped 11th, and in the second bar of the piece, he uses this exact A octatonic chord, spelling and all, the only difference being that it's in fifth inversion. I can't ignore that the functions of these chords sound identical to me while having a different bass note.
@@zionfortuna See below: infamous troll and put-down artist Whatismusic123. *But* I share the opinion with him that Scriabin's music is (definitely) not atonal and (probably) not composed with set theory in mind.
Something I'd say needs to change in about set theory education is that it desperately needs more practical lessons. Usually, when people are introduced to it, they are introduced to its basic concepts like sets, vectors and inversions, plus some analysis here and there, but when it comes to how to apply set theory to their composing processes, they get nothing.
Yes, I agree! I show how Scriabin’s late era music can be analyzed with set theory on this channel. Perhaps I could make a video on how to compose with set theory!
is set theory useful for analyzing xenharmonic music like 71-tet and the music of Harry Partch?
Yes! I haven’t dabbled in that area myself, but Vornska (a friend/professor that helps with these videos) has made set charts for things like 19 TET! He likes to compare properties of sets between different types of equal temperament.
It’s a big world of harmony out there!
Set theory has plenty of applications in Scriabin's music insofar as it's a practical way of reanalyzing his extensions on common practice harmony, understanding the relative consonance of sets and the compatibility of transposition. Unfortunately, set theory has failings more critical than those of lead sheet notation. In the example you gave, the second chord is _not_ rooted on F# but is simply a fifth inversion of the first chord (yes, that exists). The reason for this is because Scriabin wouldn't have spelled the third of a chord as a diminished fourth, and--though he was inconsistent in his proto-mystic era, Opp. 47 to 61 or about--he wouldn't have spelled the #11 as a diminished fifth either. We know little about Scriabin's thoughts on his own tonal system apart from the fact that he strongly valued spelling and at least must have been aware of the relevant tuning theory. He knew there were more than twelve notes, similar as they might be in 12 TET, and this accounts for Scriabin's sometimes eccentric and difficult-to-read note spelling, which in terms of set theory would have to be considered nonsense.
As much as I'd rather not file myself under the same category as WIM123, Scriabin's reliance on harmonic direction (largely uses transposition of regular intervals in a pseudo-functional way), spelling, and concept of consonance and dissonance _must_ negate accusations of atonality. And as far as Forte's definition of atonality goes (which I think, frankly, is even more a deliberate misnomer than the common definition of "atonality") Scriabin's harmony might sometimes be complex and dissonant, but at no point in his career did he entirely dismiss triadic and functional harmony, only using them more infrequently. There are plenty of instances into his later years of plain major triads, minor triads, at least one obvious V-I, and still probably even more suggestions of functional direction. In my mind, these don't constitute novel pitch combinations or unfamiliar environments (not that that means anything), and from there Scriabin's more dissonant harmonies are really just extensions of normal triadic chords which aren't necessarily beyond the capacity of conventional tonal music, even if Scriabin may or may not have been the first to use them in quite the way he did. This is to say nothing of the fact that many of his pieces begin and end in the same transposition of sets and that he was even known to declare that certain pieces were in certain keys. So still I find lead sheet notation to be a more convincing representation of Scriabin's intent, even though it could use some abbreviation for convenience.
I appreciate hearing this perspective! I disagree about a few things.
I don’t think it’s it’s accurate that Scriabin used plain major/minor triads in his late era (after op. 57), or V to I cadences. The one exception would be the last chord of Prometheus; other than that, I would love to see examples triads or V to I cadences in Scriabin’s late era if they exist.
I think it’s strange to insist something is build off a certain pitch other than the bass. In my view, the bass necessarily affects the way we hear the chord and determines the mode. Scriabin does seem sorta picky about spelling, and perhaps that can give us some insight into his intentions, yet as theorists I think it’s most important to analyze how the music actually sounds rather than focus on the way it’s written.
You’re right that he starts and ends pieces on certain bass notes, and there can be plenty of consonance in his late era, but the harmony certainly doesn’t resemble the major scale like tonal music does.
Out of curiosity - at the beginning of the 2nd paragraph you mentioned "WIM123", what exactly is that?
@@jaybeardmusic8074 the bass does not have as much effect on the music as people believe. It is important, and is *most frequently* the root or inversion of a chord. But it can be neither. And it often is neither in scriabin's music.
@@jaybeardmusic8074 There are a few of them. Scriabin jumps through hoops to ensure that he doesn't affirm any tonality too strongly, though, so he never lingers on them for very long.
- ua-cam.com/video/-OamDGhQwJs/v-deo.html (Sonata 9 m. 39) E major, root position.
- ua-cam.com/video/zbpDYKlZ5-A/v-deo.html (Sonata 10 m. 219) B major, second inversion. In particular, Scriabin really likes second inversion chords, and this Sonata is riddled with them, usually with some polite diatonic extensions (7th, 9th).
- ua-cam.com/video/VV_BLGSbN4U/v-deo.html (Vers la Flamme m. 19) B minor, root position. Minor harmonies are an oddity in Scriabin's late music, but they exist.
- ua-cam.com/video/x8ix0ilZ14Y/v-deo.html (Op. 74 No. 2, first chord) F# minor, root position.
There might be more examples. Sonata 7 is one of the highlights of Scriabin's playful harmonic misdirection, with many instances of apparently consonant (but misspelled, which is important) harmony wrapped in his more usual chords with entirely different roots, almost as if suggesting polytonality. I agree with you that the bass note is important for analyzing harmonies, and also that factoring in listening experience is important for analysis (that's why I'm not totally dismissing set theory as a practical tool). Indeed, Scriabin *very often* uses root position chords. But coming in with romantic ears, as I did, and Scriabin himself did, I don't really find these chords difficult to decipher when they're inverted due to their transparently just being extended dominant chords. See ua-cam.com/video/1CtmdgxtMHs/v-deo.html (Op. 73 No. 1 ***). Sure, he plays with the bass notes very heavily here, and the later measures also employ various false relations which was a feature of his final style, but these chords sound to me to obviously be centred in A, regardless of the E's or D#'s (not Eb's!!!!) in the bass. This also gives evidence for my companion theory that Scriabin's extreme stylistic change wasn't abrupt at all, but was just a natural succession of his increased reliance on dominants, 13th chords, and inversions designed to make chord function less assertive. As far back as his 4th Sonata (first movement), and with every other chord in his 5th, he used inversion over the fourth and fifth scale degrees to lessen the "functional implications" of seventh chords. This is to say nothing of the fact that inversions were used very often in common practice harmony, and yet I think you'd be hard-pressed to find people who justify these inversions as chords with separate roots after the baroque era.
As for the V-I "cadence", because of the ambiguous chord function, I'm going to revise my statement and say I don't know for sure that the ultimate chord of the "cadence" is the tonic. ua-cam.com/video/-OamDGhQwJs/v-deo.html (Sonata 9, m. 50-51) This is at least an indisputable movement counterclockwise the circle of fifths, between F13#11 (mystic) and Bb7b9#11b13 (octatonic with a b13? Part of some other overarching set?). This theme in the Sonata starts in E, so this might be a very brief tonicization of Bb--which is what I'm inclined to hear--or it could just be part of a longer movement towards the tonic E at m. 53. Neither of these explanations are particularly satisfying, probably by design, but this suggests that Scriabin never intended to dispense with function entirely.
P.S. Thank you for using an edition with bar numbers in your score videos. You've made my life much easier.
********* EDIT: You mentioned that Scriabin often starts and ends on the same bass note. At the end of this piece, I realized it happens to be that Scriabin ends with an octatonic chord on A with a dropped 11th, and in the second bar of the piece, he uses this exact A octatonic chord, spelling and all, the only difference being that it's in fifth inversion. I can't ignore that the functions of these chords sound identical to me while having a different bass note.
@@zionfortuna See below: infamous troll and put-down artist Whatismusic123. *But* I share the opinion with him that Scriabin's music is (definitely) not atonal and (probably) not composed with set theory in mind.
Something I'd say needs to change in about set theory education is that it desperately needs more practical lessons. Usually, when people are introduced to it, they are introduced to its basic concepts like sets, vectors and inversions, plus some analysis here and there, but when it comes to how to apply set theory to their composing processes, they get nothing.
Yes, I agree! I show how Scriabin’s late era music can be analyzed with set theory on this channel. Perhaps I could make a video on how to compose with set theory!
Because it's a pseudoscience. It doesn't teach you anything. You can't use it for composing unless you wish to compose random noise.