Need some explanation about what is happening functionally in this piece.

Thank you
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rbarata wrote:Accept the chords that come from the available notes or try deliberately a certain function to each chord?
rbarata wrote:What is the general practice when one is harmonizing a melody? Accept the chords that come from the available notes or try deliberately a certain function to each chord?
GilesAnt wrote:There is no right answer regarding 'the general practice' of harmonising a melody. It all depends on the musical style or genre you are working with, and of course the particular effect you are trying to create. So many things really.
The style of the musical example you have provided is homophonic, rather like a section of a church hymn - if you wish to develop that style you should look at the chorale harmonisations of JS Bach. But that is simply one approach.
GilesAnt wrote:rbarata wrote:Accept the chords that come from the available notes or try deliberately a certain function to each chord?
I don't understand what you mean here. A melody only consists of one note at a time, so there are no other 'available' notes.
GilesAnt wrote:@rbarata - was this an exercise of some kind?
rbarata wrote:GilesAnt wrote:
As I wrote before I'm reading Knud Jeppeson's book about Palestrina style. I wrote a piece with two voices only and it seemed to be correct but, just for fun, I tried to add a third voice.
GilesAnt wrote:I'm guessing one of the 4 repeated Gs in the top part was mean to be an E. You might want to look at bar 4 again where the lower 2 parts both move in parallel from F to G.
It makes more sense with just the bassline and the melody. I did another version where I took your idea of a scalar bassline from bar 2 and kept that going.rbarata wrote: If you disregard the last two measures and the top voice you'll notice that it is according the "rules".
GilesAnt wrote:As I wrote before I'm reading Knud Jeppeson's book about Palestrina style. I wrote a piece with two voices only and it seemed to be correct but, just for fun, I tried to add a third voice.
GilesAnt wrote:In the spirit of constructive criticism I would suggest the bass in bars 2/3 where the G is repeated is weak. I would revoice the last beat of bar 2 to avoid this. Also you have parallel octaves from last beat of bar 3 to first beat of bar 4.