AKFG - Gekkou: a review of sorts
First song of supposedly mild complexity to musically stump me in theory.
Transition in key while resoloving a fading phrase is the musical trick implemented 25 seconds into the song.
The song starts off with a very famous solo piano classical piece. The original piece is in D flat, but they transpose it to C major (You can not fool perfect pitch :p)
It is in my, and anothers opinion, that AKFG specifically chose this piece due to its stepwise pattern. The stepwise pattern enables you to slur off of any phrase at anytime when it hits the key that interests you (for possible transition into another song). AKFG chose to make use of the phrase that would end in an E. E is an interesting note in that it is the Dominate of A major - but more on that later.
Now, the musically intriguing, and in my opinion, ingenious (in a way that a drunk man somehow hits bullseye in a game of darts) trick was that they cut off the phrase on the subdominant - the F just before the step-wise phrase resolved to its E. This leaves the listener hanging and during the next 5-6 seconds, they bring in their own original piece. But how?
Their piece is in A major, and it is known by elementary musicians that C major and A MINOR are the relatives not C major and A major. Its very difficult to transpose the major sixth of a scale in any case, as any musician can attest to. But AKFG did, and this is how:
F. F is the subdominant of C major. F is the best key to transition to when you are in C major as it is very natural sounding. On the other hand, the phrase naturally ends with the E, and stopping at F is almost a disaster as that results in a huge cliff hanger. E is the dominant of the key AKFG wants. They want A major, so if they can manage to use the dominant (E), they can be successful in this transposition. However, they just cliffhanged themselves out of it by not resolving!! or not?...
The distortion at the transition point consists of the following notes E,F,G,A. The G quickly distorts into a high B. This B is the 9th of A. 9ths are common complex tones in jazz and rock. With the F fading, you are left with an E,A, and high B. This gives you a very pleasent open A chord with 9th (technically octave + 9th). The transition has been completed. AKFG is in A major and ready to rock.
But aren't we still hanging off the cliff from the sweet piano classical piece? AKFG indirectly resolved this and it took great attention to realize this. The note A (the key AKFG is rocking in), is the subdominant of E. Thus, with the introduction of the A major chord, the phrase from the beginning as been resolved indirectly and subtly through a transposition - almost as if AKFG was a step ahead of you the entire time.
So, there was a transposition from C major to F major leading to guitar distortion which was harvested to gently edge in A major. The A major was also the result of resolving the piano phrase ending in an E - a hidden transposition.
AKFG used their A major transposition to "kill two birds with one stone" that is, finding a way to go from C major to A major, and resolving the precious piano phrase. Genious.
Transition in key while resoloving a fading phrase is the musical trick implemented 25 seconds into the song.
The song starts off with a very famous solo piano classical piece. The original piece is in D flat, but they transpose it to C major (You can not fool perfect pitch :p)
It is in my, and anothers opinion, that AKFG specifically chose this piece due to its stepwise pattern. The stepwise pattern enables you to slur off of any phrase at anytime when it hits the key that interests you (for possible transition into another song). AKFG chose to make use of the phrase that would end in an E. E is an interesting note in that it is the Dominate of A major - but more on that later.
Now, the musically intriguing, and in my opinion, ingenious (in a way that a drunk man somehow hits bullseye in a game of darts) trick was that they cut off the phrase on the subdominant - the F just before the step-wise phrase resolved to its E. This leaves the listener hanging and during the next 5-6 seconds, they bring in their own original piece. But how?
Their piece is in A major, and it is known by elementary musicians that C major and A MINOR are the relatives not C major and A major. Its very difficult to transpose the major sixth of a scale in any case, as any musician can attest to. But AKFG did, and this is how:
F. F is the subdominant of C major. F is the best key to transition to when you are in C major as it is very natural sounding. On the other hand, the phrase naturally ends with the E, and stopping at F is almost a disaster as that results in a huge cliff hanger. E is the dominant of the key AKFG wants. They want A major, so if they can manage to use the dominant (E), they can be successful in this transposition. However, they just cliffhanged themselves out of it by not resolving!! or not?...
The distortion at the transition point consists of the following notes E,F,G,A. The G quickly distorts into a high B. This B is the 9th of A. 9ths are common complex tones in jazz and rock. With the F fading, you are left with an E,A, and high B. This gives you a very pleasent open A chord with 9th (technically octave + 9th). The transition has been completed. AKFG is in A major and ready to rock.
But aren't we still hanging off the cliff from the sweet piano classical piece? AKFG indirectly resolved this and it took great attention to realize this. The note A (the key AKFG is rocking in), is the subdominant of E. Thus, with the introduction of the A major chord, the phrase from the beginning as been resolved indirectly and subtly through a transposition - almost as if AKFG was a step ahead of you the entire time.
So, there was a transposition from C major to F major leading to guitar distortion which was harvested to gently edge in A major. The A major was also the result of resolving the piano phrase ending in an E - a hidden transposition.
AKFG used their A major transposition to "kill two birds with one stone" that is, finding a way to go from C major to A major, and resolving the precious piano phrase. Genious.