The Tierce di Picardie

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The tierce de picardie seems to me to be a strange musical device - popular in the late Rennaissance and Baroque eras. The idea of ending a work or movement in a minor key with a major chord seems insensitive at the very least, and can be destructive of the mood of what has gone before.



Various reasons have been given inits defence:

"A strong ending" is one. I'm reminded of Salieri's comment in Amadeus: "You didn't even even give them a loud chord at the end to tell them where to clap."

"Minor chords have major harmonics that clash, so ending with a minor chord is less satisfactory."

(Yer what?)

Let me explain:

You'll need a piano that's in tune (and it won't work on an electric one). Hold down the sustaining pedal and thump out a series of low Cs (and don't release the pedal).



The harmonics will be heard for this chord:



and especially the E:



Some theoreticians maintain that this will clash with the E flat of a C minor chord. Hmm.

Personally, I just despair that Bach could compose the most magnificent fugue ever to open his B minor Mass, and then destroy the mood so viciously by ending with a major chord.

Just occasionally it can work. Act III of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake concludes with Odile revealing her true self, and the sudden switch to the major key at the end emphasises the devastating hurt that Prince Siegfried is feeling.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The final tierce in the Bach creates "the mood" - the "destruction" (as you hear it) is the point.

[Richard Barrett]

I think, EA, you are probably imputing to major/minor tonality an overarching expressive significance that belongs more to later music than to music of the baroque. In music of that period it usually "means" little more than a sense of closure, given that (for the reasons you illustrate) the major triad is a more stable consonance than the minor, consisting of the first, third and fifth partials, rather than first, third and 19th. It's only "destructive of the mood" if you judge the mood and its destruction by 19th century standards. A 17th or early 18th century composer wouldn't have known what you were talking about.

[greenilex]

Nothing to do with the artist's duty not to leave his victim in despair?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

In music of that period it usually "means" little more than a sense of closure, given that (for the reasons you illustrate) the major triad is a more stable consonance than the minor, consisting of the first, third and fifth partials, rather than first, third and 19th. It's only "destructive of the mood" if you judge the mood and its destruction by 19th century standards. A 17th or early 18th century composer wouldn't have known what you were talking about.

It's true that our judgements today are influenced by equal temperament, where the major 3rd is not at all stable.

I think, EA, you are probably imputing to major/minor tonality an overarching expressive significance that belongs more to later music than to music of the baroque.

I might query this. If it were so, why did composers even bother to write in minor/aeolian modes?
Even J.S.Bach appears to have moved a little on the issue. In Book 1 of the "48", nearly every minor movement ends with a major chord, but in Book 2, it's fewer than half.

[Richard Barrett]

I might query this. If it were so, why did composers even bother to write in minor/aeolian modes?
Even J.S.Bach appears to have moved a little on the issue. In Book 1 of the "48", nearly every minor movement ends with a major chord, but in Book 2, it's fewer than half.

Exactly as I say - times were changing by the mid 18th century. Previous to that, there was obviously a feeling that a minor-key piece "ought to" end in the major; subsequently, not. Nothing to do with destroying moods, to be sure.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Looking through the score of Purcell's Dido & Aeneas, much of which is in the minor mode, there don't appear to be any tierce de picardies. Either the minor chord is used, or there's the ambiguity of the open fifth. That was late 17th century.

[Tetrachord]

Looking through the score of Purcell's Dido & Aeneas, much of which is in the minor mode, there don't appear to be any tierce de picardies. Either the minor chord is used, or there's the ambiguity of the open fifth. That was late 17th century.

I think Purcell is a very interesting case study. Here is a composer chronologically belonging to the middle baroque period and yet so much of his music 'belongs' in the very early baroque/late renaissance. Much of Purcell's music is still very modal to me (particularly the anthems, hymns etc.) and, as such, I expect modal cadences and not tierces. There may be some tierces in Purcell's music, but I just cannot point to any one in particular.

Perhaps we can say that the tierce de picardie is a consequence of the kind of 'instability' found when music was moving from fully modal to diatonic triadic sonority? I'm asking, not telling.

And I love it in the B Minor Mass, or wherever else these devices are found.

[Richard Barrett]

Perhaps we can say that the tierce de picardie is a consequence of the kind of 'instability' found when music was moving from fully modal to diatonic triadic sonority? I'm asking, not telling.

I would agree with that, and add that indeed the functions of different tonal devices have never been uniform across history or geography - Purcell (like Monteverdi in a different way, and like many other 17th century English composers) bestrides modality and tonality and some of the most striking moments in his music come from frictions between the two.

[Tetrachord]

I would agree with that, and add that indeed the functions of different tonal devices have never been uniform across history or geography - Purcell (like Monteverdi in a different way, and like many other 17th century English composers) bestrides modality and tonality and some of the most striking moments in his music come from frictions between the two.

And absolutely glorious for it, I have to say!!

[jayne lee wilson]

No place for me at all in a discussion like this, but noticing the title... didn't Hans Keller make a point of mentioning Schoenberg's use of the tierce de picardie, at the end of his 2nd String Quartet? It might have been in "Music 1975"**...

EDIT**: it is in Music 1975 (in the section "The Schoenberg Trauma") included in "Music, Closed Societies and Football" Toccata Press 1986, see pages 164 ff.