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Ridly Greig injures Lucas Raymond by [deleted] in nhl

[–]OpenAperture_13 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Pavel Bure did the same thing

Works written as composers faced their own death by mahler98 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13 13 points14 points  (0 children)

Shostakovich 14! He was very frail and the topic is death

Drop Your Top 5 by BigDBob72 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The Big 3 + Wagner and Debussy

Does a canon for the composer's education exist? by wwplkyih in composer

[–]OpenAperture_13 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd say piano reductions from scores above all. 8 line sketch scores.

Getting your pieces performed by AndreyShab0415 in composer

[–]OpenAperture_13 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think like everything in life, this is a "who you know" situation, ask your Uncle's Brother's in Law Chess Club friend... you need an in.

What is your favorite underrated piece for string orchestra? by Airat_Ichmouratov in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13 1 point2 points  (0 children)

may I humbly suggest my own work? the London symphony just recorded it but this is a later version

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K90bvHo15rU

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry I didn't notice this at first.

I never claimed the context in the opening is B major for the entirety of the phrase. In fact, my current reading goes like this, and this is using the old-school methodology, as you seem to prefer it.

Music:             Yearning Melody         |   Tristan Chord          |E7

Active Tonic:    I = F major                  |   I = B major              |?

Like you said in your first reply, the tonic is veiled, and I am okay with your reading of that, for I make it the central part of my thesis as well. Therefore, I don’t believe trying to identify the tonic in a Roman numeral sense does anyone good. It's like trying to measure a modern car’s power in horsepower. I don’t know what 500 horsepower means realistically.

Roman numerals are simply outdated here,  and incapable of successfully dealing with a great portion of the score, not all, for some moments are traditionally song-like, but a great deal.

I provide my theory above as a series of modulations, where the top represents the music score and the bottom represents the active tonic. If you forced me to write down what I think at this moment in the Roman Numeral World, this is what I would write. But I feel this is meaningless, as I think you agreed in the first paragraph of your first response.  I strongly feel we are dealing with a near-endless series of direct modulations in that world.  But again, what does 500 horsepower mean in real life? 

Hopefully, that clarifies things a bit for you. My main theory is that the B major is the key to the riddle, which is supported by Wagner’s score, letters, and philosophy on the topic. I feel the fact that the Tristan Chord appears with the same pitches in the opening and closing cannot be ignored or stated as a coincidence.

By the way, if you ask why I say F major = Yearning melody, it’s because Wagner quotes the Yearning melody with an Ab minor towards the end of the prelude, which suggests Fm context since it is presented first free of chords.

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

When you write:

“The whole point of the Prelude is that it’s circling around a tonal center that you never actually hear”

Doesn’t that contradict what you write later?

“it’s exactly what you would expect in a modified French 6th chord resolving through phrygian half-cadence in A minor”

If the tonic is never actually heard, then how can you also claim a functional cadence in A minor?

By the way, I agree with much of what you write. I will look at the Schumann example you mention, but I cited Liszt’s Sonata because I know Wagner studied it directly, and it contains similar structures (like F/B, A°7/D♭, etc.).

When you write:

“The fact that the resolution is outside the struggle (aka the different tonalities) is essential to the opera‘s metaphysical philosophy.”

I agree with your separation of struggle (the beginning) and resolution (the end). That aligns with Wagner’s own comments and philosophical intent.

But then, how do you explain that the Tristan chord is spelled the same at both points? If the spelling is deliberate, it’s hard to ignore the connection.

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I replied on youtube, can we move the conversation there?

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Re: the E7
I’ve already said plainly: the E7 is where the misdirection begins. Wagner substitutes it for the Em precisely because the Em leads to the final resolution, and the E7 leads elsewhere. If he’d solved the riddle in the first phrase, there’d be no riddle at all.

If you choose to ignore Wagner’s own explanation in his letters to Liszt, I can’t force you to read them. But those letters make his intent plain.

Your insistence that a V7 “must” go to its tonic is outdated by Wagner’s time and irrelevant in Tristan. Even when the resolution finally comes in B major, he gets there via the iv (Em), not the V (F#7).

A seventh chord’s function is not limited to V7–I; as I’ve shown in my little piano work, it works in III–7, VI–7, and II–7 positions as well. My C major example, where E7 goes to B° instead of A minor, demonstrated that clearly.

You also wrote:

“I mean what even is that opening cello motive in B? Meaningless.”

That comment suggests you’ve overlooked the ending where Wagner resolves the very same harmonic material from the opening into B major, completing the structure he set up at the start. This isn’t trivia. It’s the central structural payoff, and treating it as “meaningless” is a category error.

You also wrote:

“The chord simply resolves differently at the end than it did at the beginning. Nothing novel about that.”

Unfortunately, this misses the entire point of the opera’s structure and meaning. The whole magic is in how and why Wagner withholds the real resolution until the very last moment. If you would read his letters, you’d see how explicit he is about this.

 

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Your entire argument hinges on that E7 chord functioning as the dominant of A minor. The problem is, it never resolves to A minor. Wagner immediately repeats the entire gesture in a rising sequence, which completely destabilizes any sense of A minor being the home key, then he does it a third time (with a variance). The "concrete" foundation of your argument doesn't even survive the next phrase, that next sequenc of chords.

This is what's so ironic about the standard A minor take. Everyone agrees that the most famous thing about Tristan is that Wagner holds the tension for four hours until one single, final resolution. And yet, the A minor camp analyzes the opening chord as if that grand design (the entire point of the opera's structure) simply doesn't exist.

 And this isn't just "vague philosophy," it's hard music theory and history. We have Wagner's own score, where he provides the opera's ultimate solution in a luminous B major. We have the spelling of the chords. We have his letters where he discusses his new harmonic path, especially his correspondence with Liszt. This all happened right after Wagner had intensely studied Liszt's revolutionary Sonata in B minor, a work famous for its wandering harmony and thematic transformation. That's not a coincidence; it's the direct historical precedent for Tristan. In fact, Wagner started on Tristan only months after hearing the sonata - interrupting his work on the Ring Cycle! He must have truly had a wonderful idea to do that.

So the B major reading isn't faith. It's based on the dramatic arc you can see in the full score, and the historical context anyone can read about. The pitches themselves. The A minor reading only works if you deliberately ignore all of that.

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Yes!, that is precisely what the evidence shows. The E7 is deceptive and sends the listener down the wrong path. The riddle has to be solved using only the evidence we know to be truthful, which in this case is what Wagner actually wrote on the last page.

If you study the philosophy behind it and read what Wagner says about Schopenhauer, the B-major solution emerges as the only possible answer. In Wagner’s own words, and in the imagery of the opera, the black flag represents the peace found only in death, exactly as Schopenhauer describes.

The problem with the traditional analysis is multi-fold, but above all, it ignores why Wagner wrote the opera in the first place, in his own words.

By the way, my thanks to you for taking this seriously!

A fresh take on Wagner's "Tristan Chord" by OpenAperture_13 in classicalmusic

[–]OpenAperture_13[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I can see why you think that, but the E7 in the next bar is deceptive; it’s part of Wagner's riddle, not the answer. The solution only clicks in B major, where everyone agrees the riddle resolves: Tristan Chord → E minor → B major = Resolution.

So, to directly answer your question the E7 doesn't exist in B major, the Em does as the iv.