In this post I am looking at the classic acoustic piece by Michael Hedges from his 1981 album of the same name. It is in a nice tuning in fourths, an inversion of tuning in fifths, which is more suitable for the guitar. Here is a link to it on Youtube:
I cannot find any other analysis of this piece anywhere on the internet so this may be the first, but if you know of any others, please post in the comments below.
Firstly, I want to draw attention to the influence that Toru Takemitsu seems to have had on Michael Hedges’ piece, utilising the same scales to create the unusual modal landscape, in particular the Melodic b5 and Melodic b4 scales. Mere coincidence? I think not, and we know that Takemitsu’s influence on Leo Brouwer was immense, as mentioned in another of my posts Below are links to the articles I wrote on Takemitsu’s use of the Melodic b5 and Melodic b4 scales and his influence on Leo Brouwer:
I won’t be able to reproduce the score in its entirety here for copyright reasons, but shall include sections from it in order to explain the analysis in greater detail. The score I am using is from the magazine Guitar Extra, Vol. 1 No. 4 from 1991. Now onto the piece.
The first chord sets the tone for the entire piece. See example 1 in the score. The notes in it are B, F#, C#, G# over a C natural bass note. Some would call B, C and C# a tone cluster, three adjacent notes separated by semitones. However, I don’t subscribe to that terminology or that way of thinking, preferring to relate the notes to a scale or one of its modes. Now, the simple alteration of C# to Db gives us a scale:
C Db E F# G# A B = A Melodic b4/C = C Lydian +b2
That’s right, this is a chord from the A Melodic b4 scale, and with C in the bass the mode is C Lydian +b2 (1 b2 3 #4 #5 6 7), mode III of the Melodic b4 scale. This is the mode that Toru Takemitsu uses in the second movement of his In The Woods suite, Rosedale.
In the second chord, the C#, which we were calling Db, is now D natural, making the scale simply A Melodic, over C again is simply mode III, A Lydian +. So the change is:
C Lydian +b2 – C Lydian +
Bar 4 has the following chord, C, G, A, D, E with the G# now replaced by the G natural and the F# that follows confirms it is now in the scale of G Major, shown in Example 2. Over the bass note of C, this is the mode of C Lydian, and now we have an interesting progression of modes, altering one note at a time, or the incremental approach:
C Lydian +b2 – C Lydian + - C Lydian
Bar 5 has the chord: F#, C#, G#, A, E which moved the music into A Major over an F# which is simply F# Aeolian, and stays here for 2 bars, shown in Example 3. The progression is now:
C Lydian +b2 – C Lydian + - C Lydian – F# Aeolian
Bar 7 is the first truly 8 note scale, the notes are C G D B F# C#. Taking C Lydian as our home mode, the C# is a b2, so we have here C Lydian (add b2). Remember in bars 1 - 4, the change was C Lydian +b2 to C Lydian + to C Lydian, well now the variation on that idea is:
C Lydian (add b2) – C Lydian + - C Lydian
The progression for the whole piece so far is:
C Lydian +b2 – C Lydian + - C Lydian – F# Aeolian -
C Lydian (add b2) – C Lydian + - C Lydian
You can now see the sequence, with the variation in the second time round and now instead of F# Aeolian, Michael goes to this chord in bar 9:
D A E F C G = C Major/D = D Dorian (D minor 11 chord)
The next section is the development section, moving through various keys and scales:
Eb Lydian (Bb Major/Eb) – E Aeolian (G Major/E) – F Lydian (C Major/F) – C Mixolydian ( F Major/C) – C Dorian (Bb Major/C) – D Aeolian (F Major/D) – C Major – D Major
First, the tasty change from D Dorian to Eb Lydian in bar 13 then the music moves into a symmetrical sequence, G Major then back a fifth into C Major then again into F Major and once more into Bb Major, which is the pivot point for the music to move back in the opposite direction, then reverses direction to F Major then again to C Major but ends with a twist, a move through two keys from C Major to D Major:
G Major – C Major – F Major- Bb Major- F Major – C Major – (D Major)
Bar 17 - 28 is a repeat of the music from bar 4 to 15 and then the coda is a phrase in C Lydian and then the C Lydian +b2 chord to end.
The whole piece is now summarized as follows:
Section 1:
C Lydian +b2 – C Lydian + - C Lydian – F# Aeolian -
C Lydian (add b2) – C Lydian + - C Lydian – D Dorian
Section 2:
Eb Lydian - (G Major – C Major – F Major - Bb Major - F Major – C Major – D Major)
Section 1: (Repeat From bar 4 – 15)
So you can see that this piece has some good ideas but is nowhere near as complex as you might think. Thanks for reading.
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