Judging Blues Accordingly

[admin]

For those who play or listen to The Blues, the value of the 7th chord cannot be overlooked. While we have had some great discussions on this Forum with regard to the origins of blues, I would like to exam the seventh chord in more detail. Perhaps the music historians here will be able to pinpoint a period in the history of blues in which the 7th chord was introduced.

Does this chord gain its power from its ultimate association with the plaintiff melodies of those who have faced hardship? Or is it the other way around, perhaps the chord structure has inherent tonal qualities that produce changes in our limbic system and auditory cortex?

By way of example, the A chord is resonant and sounds complete and the switch to the Am shifts our mood to a more somber place. The A7 is different again and by itself has a component of unfinished business that demands some degree of resolution but not a much as the Asus.

While the blues experts will no doubt have a plethora of examples to articulate the effects of the seventh chord on human behaviour, one approach to examining the role of the seventh chord is to choose an example.

One of the first songs that springs to mind is that of the Rolling Stones' Heart Of Stone. From the opening bar and long before the first notes of the song are sung we are faced with two chord changes from G7 to C. Two brief unresolved moments of G7 quieted only fleetingly by comfortable C chords. Whatever is about to follow is a tad foreboding and the lyric "There have been so many girls I have known" does not sound like the making of a satisfying relationship. It is not long before we move to the somber Am which leads us to Mick's, heart of stone, but that is beyond the scope of our current discussion.

I would argue that this chord change from G7 to C almost inherently has an effect on our central nervous system that fosters an element of worry. Some may argue that it is the pairing of the chord change with the ups and downs of the story line "there have been so many" that has conditioned the listener in a way that Pavlov would be proud. Having had an acoustic guitar in my room since early adolescence, however, I would not be swept away by respondent conditioning theory. Simply chording a guitar without a song in mind will lead many a budding guitarist to discover that different chords, even when discovered by accident, have an emotional impact that is not easily conveyed by verbal means. Regardless of the circumstances that have lead to our understanding of the G7 to C transition, even those who have a dislike of Heart of Stone can identify this song in two seconds.

I apologize for the rambling, but I am most interested in your interpretation of the seventh chord and the meaning it has had for you. I'll understand if my comments about the 7th have not struck a chord with you and have diminished your interest in judging blues accordingly.

[winston]

Peter,

I recall reading albeit sometime ago, that the human brain processes music and math in a way that is totally different from the way it processes all other information. We humans tend to like to find a way to resolve music and math.

With the 7th chord sounding as unresolved as it does perhaps it invokes some sort of tribal instinct to pursue the matter to resolution and because a piece that contains 7ths is never fully resolved; perhaps from a psychological viewpoint that's why we keep coming back to that genre, to see if we can find some resolution. If that makes any sense?

[admin]

Brian: Your comments ring true to me.

I agree with your thesis and consider that unresolved patterns are impressionistic as they capture our attention. I would argue that in trying to make sense of our world the we do indeed like to resolve outstanding issues. Call it unfinished business if you will.

The 7th chord has a complexity about it that the brain may be trying to resolve. Faced with tonal ambiguity we may indeed revisit the musical passage in our efforts to place it in a context or make sense, if you will, of the pattern before us.

As an aside, I have always felt that music is math and marvel at talented musicians who say that they are poor at mathematics.

[admin]

Brian: I have given our discussion some additional thought which has led me to do more reading with regard to the dominant seventh chord.

I read with great interest that of the seventh chords, the dominant seventh was perhps the first to appear with any degree of regularity in Western music. Perhaps its appearance or indeed it acceptance stems from its innate ability to significantly impact our emotions. The chord type does get our attention and in comparison to other chords has a strength that is stronger than most.

Further, as some musicologists have noted, the third of the chord is the leading-tone of the scale which has a strong tendency to pull towards the tonal center, or root note of the key. Again, is this pull toward the tonal center a feature that we find attractive through conditioning or does it have innate properties?

[winston]

Peter,

The effect of music on the portion of the psyche that Jung described as the "collective unsconcious" has been well documented and interpreted not only for use by practioners of psychiatric healing but in other areas of human endeavor as well. Interestingly enough this phenomena is so well known at a core level that it has been used for military purposes for centuries. The discordant distant sound of bag pipes for example have been used by the Scottish for centuries to invoke a feeling of fear and intrepidation in the enemy on the battlefield, long before the combatants would face off for the inevitable combat that would ensue.

That one particular chord resonates and invokes certain feelings is not altogther surprising. What is surprising is the consistency of these feelings. This is one of the mysteries of both nature and science that I hold no sway over or answer for. I only know that it works.

[admin]

Your examples are compelling, Brian and continue to flood my sensorium with events. I agree whole-heartedly that music continues to stimulate us in a reliable and often predictable manner.

That music can heighten an experience through augmentation as in the fear of war or attenuate it through therapy is remarkable. The precise mechanism by which this takes place, to my knowledge, remains unknown and the jury is still out in this regard.

That the observations that you have made seem multicultural and suggestive of universality would argue, at least in part, for a mechanism that is innate and stems from our evolutionary past. It is reasonable to assume that sound is important for our survival. I believe that the limbic system of our brain plays a central role in processing music and that it comes hard wired for certain sounds even before birth. While new sounds are learned it may be that this region is our reference point.

The limbic system sets the stage for emotional tone, provides a filtering of external events, is our storehouse of emotional memories and allows for motivation, appetite, sleep cycles, bonding and sexual actitity. Is it any wonder then that a particular chord or melody allows us to experience our past in the present, and feel the shivering or tingling up the nape of our neck when listening to a favourite song.

When the blues was born those in attendance knew instantly that they had found something that would endure. I believe that this music plays to our "old brain" and takes us down pathways that have been developed in the course of our survival. It allows for identification of sounds within milliseconds and is our go to region for identifying sounds such as the opening chord of A Hard Day's Night.

The Blues is impossible to ignore no matter how much we may claim that it is not "our genre." We have an innate preparedness to process this tonal information. Just as with the rhythm of the beating heart, I would argue that the blues is a universal genre for humankind.