Mystic chord
{{Short description|Six-note synthetic chord that appears in compositions by Alexander Scriabin}}{{Infobox chord|
chord_name=Mystic chord|
first_interval=root|
second_interval=augmented fourth|
third_interval=minor seventh|
fourth_interval=major third|
fifth_interval=major sixth|
sixth_interval=major second|
forte_number=6–34
}}
In music, the mystic chord or Prometheus chord is a six-note synthetic chord and its associated scale, or pitch collection; which loosely serves as the harmonic and melodic basis for some of the later pieces by Russian composer Alexander Scriabin. Scriabin, however, did not use the chord directly but rather derived material from its transpositions.
When rooted in C, the mystic chord consists of the pitch classes: C, F{{music|sharp}}, B{{music|flat}}, E, A, D.
{{block indent|
\override Score.TimeSignature #'stencil = ##f
\relative c' {
\clef treble \time 4/4
} }
}}
This is often interpreted as a quartal hexachord consisting of an augmented fourth, diminished fourth, augmented fourth, and two perfect fourths. The chord is related to other pitch collections, such as being a hexatonic subset of the overtone scale, also known in jazz circles as the Lydian dominant scale, lacking the perfect fifth.
Nomenclature
The term "mystic chord" appears to derive from Alexander Scriabin's intense interest in Theosophy, and the chord is imagined to reflect this mysticism. It was coined by Arthur Eaglefield Hull in 1916."Skryabin and the Impossible", p.314. Simon Morrison. Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 51, No. 2. (Summer, 1998), pp. 283–330.
It is also known as the "Prometheus chord", after its extensive use in his work Prometheus: The Poem of Fire, Op. 60. The term was invented by Leonid Sabaneyev.
Scriabin himself called it the "chord of the pleroma" (аккорд плеромы akkord pleromy), which "was designed to afford instant apprehension of—that is, to reveal—what was in essence beyond the mind of man to conceptualize. Its preternatural stillness was a gnostic intimation of a hidden otherness.""Chernomor to Kashchei: Harmonic Sorcery; Or, Stravinsky's 'Angle'". Richard Taruskin. Journal of the American Musicological Society, Vol. 38, No. 1. (Spring, 1985), pp. 72–142. Cited in Morrison (1998).
Qualities
Jim Samson{{cite book|last=Samson|first=Jim|year=1977|title=Music in Transition: A Study of Tonal Expansion and Atonality, 1900–1920|publisher=W.W. Norton & Company|pages=156–7|isbn=0-393-02193-9}} points out that it fits in well with Scriabin's mainly dominant quality sonorities and harmony, as it may take on a dominant quality on C or F{{music|sharp}}. This tritone relationship between possible resolutions is important to Scriabin's harmonic language, and it is a property shared by the French sixth (also prominent in his work) of which the synthetic chord can be seen as an extension. The example below shows the mystic chord rewritten as a French sixth with notes A and D as extensions:
{{block indent|
\override Score.TimeSignature #'stencil = ##f
\relative c' { \new PianoStaff <<
\new Staff { \clef treble \time 4/4
\new Staff { \clef bass \time 4/4
>> } }
}}
The pitch collection is related to the octatonic scale, the whole tone scale, and the French sixth, all of which are capable of a different number of transpositions."Orthography in Scriabin's Late Works", p.60. Cheong Wai-Ling. Music Analysis, Vol. 12, No. 1. (Mar., 1993), pp. 47–69. For example, the chord is a whole tone scale with one note raised a semitone (the "almost whole-tone" hexachord, sometimes identified as "whole tone-plus"), and this alteration allows for a greater variety of resources through transposition."The Evolution of Twelve-Note Music", p.56. Oliver Neighbour. Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association, 81st Sess. (1954–1955), pp. 49–61.
Leonid Sabaneyev interpreted the Prometheus chord as harmonics 8 through 14, without 12 (1, 9, 5, 11, 13, 7 = C, D, E, F{{music|up}}, A{{music|13}}{{music|b}}, B{{music|7}}{{music|b}}), but the 11th harmonic is 48.68 cents away from the tritone (F{{music|#}}), the 13th harmonic is 59.47 cents away from a major sixth (A{{music|natural}}).
{{block indent|
\override Score.TimeSignature #'stencil = ##f
\relative c' {
\clef treble \time 4/4
} }
}}
However, to quote Carl Dahlhaus, "the interval-distance of the natural-tone-row [overtones] [...], counting up to 20, includes everything from the octave to the quarter tone, (and) useful and useless musical tones. The natural-tone-row [harmonic series] justifies everything, that means, nothing."Sabbagh, Peter (2003). The Development of Harmony in Scriabin's Works, p.12. Universal. {{ISBN|9781581125955}}. Cites: Dahlhaus, Carl (1972). "Struktur und Expression bei Alexander Skrjabin", Mu sik des Ostens, Vol.6, p.229. Elliott Antokoletz says the "so-called 'mystic chord'" approximates harmonics 7 through 13 (7, 8, 9, 10, (11,) 12, 13 = C, D{{music|L}}{{music|minus}}, E{{music|L}}, F{{music|L}}{{music|#}}, (G{{music|up}}{{music|L}}{{music|minus}},) A{{music|L}}, B{{music|13}}{{music|L}}{{music|b}}{{music|minus}}).Antokoletz, Elliott (1992). Twentieth-Century Music, p.101. Prentice Hall. {{ISBN|9780139341267}}. {{audio|Mystic chord on C overtone scale seven through thirteen.mid|Play}}
The notes of the chord also conform to a Lydian dominant quality, the fourth mode of the melodic minor scale.
Use by Scriabin
Some sources suggest that much of Scriabin's music is entirely based on the chord to the extent that whole passages are little more than long sequences of this chord, unaltered, at different pitches; but this is rarely the case. More often than not, the notes are reordered so as to supply a variety of harmonic or melodic material. Certain of Scriabin's late pieces are based on other synthetic chords or scales that do not rely on the mystic chord.
{{quote|There seems today to be a general consensus that the mystic chord is neither the key nor the generating element in Scriabin's method.|Jay Reise (1983)"Late Skriabin: Some Principles behind the Style", p.221. Jay Reise. 19th-Century Music, Vol. 6, No. 3. (Spring, 1983), pp. 220–231.}}
In in his 2023-2024 essay "Scriabin's Compositional Methods: Analysis and Review," Reise updated his position noting that Scriabin's close colleague and biographer Leonid Sabaneyev wrote that "Scriabin often said his music was based on his 'synthetic harmony.'"{{Cite journal |last=Reise |first=Jay |title=Scriabin's Compositional Methods: Analysis and Review |url=https://www.academia.edu/126625101 |journal=Journal of the Scriabin Society |volume=16 |issue=1 |date=Spring 2024 |pages=47–99}} Since this is how the composer himself described his famous chord, Reise has adopted the term in place of “mystic chord” (a term Scriabin never used) throughout his essay. Reise further points out (as have others) that in many of the late pieces, Scriabin extends the synthetic harmony by adding the note G - the next ascending P4. Reise posits that this expanded harmony, which contains all the notes of the acoustic scale, might be reasonably called the synthetic harmony+.
The synthetic harmony(+) is the referential element for the orthography, the procedures governing the voice leading of the whole tone and octatonic scales, the registral distribution of the harmony, and the derivation of the complete octatonic scale. According to Reise, all scales (including the 9-note scale of the Poème Op. 71 No. 1) either resolve or impliy resolution to the octatonic or whole scales.
Matthew Bengtson writes, “...the mystic chord acts as a kind of mediator, a convenient means of transit, hovering, as in mid-air, between the whole-tone and octatonic harmonic worlds."{{Cite book |last1=Ballard |first1=Lincoln |title=The Alexander Scriabin Companion: History, Performance, and Lore |last2=Bengtson |first2=Matthew |last3=with Young |first3=John Bell |publisher=Roman and Littlefield |year=2017 |isbn=978-1-4422-3262-4 |location=Lanham, Marylnd |pages=278}}
Other sources suggest that Scriabin's method of pitch organization is based on ordered scales that feature scale degrees. Since the mystic chord is a synthetic chord, the scale from which it derives, sometimes called the "Prometheus scale", is an example of a synthetic scale.
{{block indent|
\override Score.TimeSignature #'stencil = ##f
\relative c' {
\clef treble \time 6/4 c4 d e fis a bes c
} }
}}
For example, a group of piano miniatures (Op. 58, Op. 59/2, Op. 61, Op. 63, Op. 67/1 and Op. 69/1) are governed by the acoustic and/or the octatonic scales."Principles of Pitch Organization in Scriabin's Early Post-tonal Period: The Piano Miniatures". Vasilis Kallis, Music Theory Online, Vol. 14.3 (Sep 2008)
Contrary to many textbook descriptions of the chord, which present the sonority as a series of superposed fourths, Scriabin most often manipulated the voicings to produce a variety of melodic and harmonic intervals.{{efn|In the same manner that a dominant seventh, built on superposed thirds, will deploy intervals of a sixth, fourth, and/or second under inversion.}} A rare example of purely quartal spacing can be found in the Fifth Piano Sonata (mm. 264 and 268). Measures 263–264 are shown below.
{{block indent|
{ \new PianoStaff <<
\new Staff <<
\new Voice \relative c''' {
\set Score.tempoHideNote = ##t \tempo 4. = 46
\stemUp \clef treble \key e \major \time 6/8
\set Score.currentBarNumber = #263 \bar ""
s4_\markup { \dynamic p \italic { con delizia } }^\markup { \bold "Meno vivo" } b8^~ b4.
s4
}
\new Voice \relative c'' {
\stemDown
r4
4 fis8_( a4 fis8)\)
}
>>
\new Staff <<
\mergeDifferentlyHeadedOn
\mergeDifferentlyDottedOn
\new Voice \relative c'' {
\stemUp \clef bass \key e \major \time 6/8
s4. b^-
fis2.^-
}
\new Voice \relative c {
\stemDown
a8_( g'! cis b' g! cis,)
}
>>
>> }
}}
Incomplete versions of the chord spaced entirely in fourths are considerably more common, for example, in Deux Morceaux, Op. 57.
According to George Perle, Scriabin used this chord in what he calls a pre-serial manner, producing harmonies, chords, and melodies. However, unlike the twelve tone technique to which Perle refers, Scriabin, like Perle, did not use his Mystic chord as an ordered set and did not worry about repeating or omitting notes or aggregate combinatoriality.{{efn|"Half a dozen years or so after Scriabin's death, Schoenberg came up with the principle of ordering and Hauer with the principle of partitioning as a means of differentiating representations of the universal set of twelve pitch classes from one another, the foundational requirement for a twelve-tone system. Scriabin's sketches for his projected 'Prefatory Action' show that in the last year of his short life he was already preoccupied with the same problem."Perle, George (1996). The Listening Composer, p.178. University of California. {{ISBN|9780520205185}}. Cites Perle's article "Scriabin's Self-Analyses", p.119ff.}}{{efn|"Scriabin, in his employment of a...complicated set, of transpositions of the set, of invariant segment that function as pivotal elements among the various transpositions, and of consistent variants of the set, may be considered the first to exploit a set systematically as a means of compensating for the loss of the traditional tonal functions."Perle, George (1991). Serial Composition and Atonality, p.41. University of California. {{ISBN|9780520074309}}.}}
Use by other composers
{{Image frame|content=
\layout { \context { \PianoStaff \accidentalStyle piano } }
\new PianoStaff <<
\new Lyrics \lyricmode { I2 V/vii | vii V/V | V 1 | I }
\new Staff \fixed c' {
\key d \major
<< { r8 fis8~( \tuplet 3/2 { 8 8 8 } e4 fis) } \\ { r8
d4( fis) << {
<< { r4 \fermata r2 } \\ {
r4
}
\new Staff {
\clef bass
\key d \major
}
>>
|align=right|width=510|caption=The mystic chord as a dominant chord (in this case, as V/V) in Duke Ellington's 1958 piano piece "Reflections in D"{{citation needed|date=April 2012}}. The E dominant 9th chord has {{music|sharp}}11th and 13th appoggiaturas added, which resolve conventionally.{{citation needed|date=April 2012}}}}With the increasing use of more dissonant sonorities, some composers of the 20th and 21st centuries have used this chord in various ways.{{citation needed|date=May 2015}}.
In jazz music, on the other hand, such chords are extremely common, and in this setting the mystic chord can be viewed simply as a C13{{music|#}}11 chord with the fifth omitted. In the score to the right is an example of a Duke Ellington composition that uses a different voicing of this chord at the end of the second bar, played on E (E13{{music|#}}11).
See also
Notes
{{notelist}}
References
{{Reflist}}
Further reading
- Hewitt, Michael. Musical Scales of the World. The Note Tree. 2013. {{ISBN|978-0957547001}}.
External links
- [http://www.peachnote.com/#!nt=chordAffine&npq=48_6_4_6_5_5 Some occurrences of the Mystic chord in the scores of the Petrucci Music Library]
{{Chords}}
{{Alexander Scriabin}}
{{Atonality}}
{{Pitch segments}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mystic Chord}}