Reading Aldwell-Schachter Profitably
Aldwell-Schachter’s Harmony and Voice Leading is filled with terrific information. It covers the basics of Western tonal practice with breathtaking thoroughness.
It is, however, disfigured by a downright glutinous writing style:
As we mentioned in section 4 of this unit, II tends to support ^2 or ^4 in the soprano more than ^6. II or II6 will seldom support 6 in a melodic progression rising from ^5 to ^8; it is difficult (sometimes impossible) to avoid 5ths in moving from I. However, the succession I-IV-II(6)-V(7)-I works well if the rhythm of the melodic line allows it—that is, if ^6 lasts long enough to serve as the top-voice tone of both IV and II (Example 9-17; also Example 16-7).
This is typical Aldwell-Schachter-ese. Awful stuff, and nearly impenetrable. Oh, you can figure it out, but it’s awfully dry and uninformative taken all by itself.
There’s a way to deal with it, though. First is to realize that the book is written in an outline form which enables you to work through it section by section. Each chapter is divided into primary sections (large all-capital type), with each aspect of an area to be covered in a numbered passage. Chapter 8, for example, has 15 such numbered passages, with four primary sections.
The average structure of a numbered passage is:
- A paragraph or two of text
- A least one musical example, usually more than one
- Sometimes a concluding paragraph that further explains the example
And this, in fact, is the key to understanding each numbered passage. The trick is to play through the example(s) first for each passage. Sing through it (them); play through it (them); do what you need to do to figure it (them) out. Use the CD that comes with the most recent edition to listen to the examples. Study visually and listen with your inner ear; that’s the best thing to do if your ear is up to the challenge. Work through the presentation as amusical idea first, and then go for the words, which will make much more sense once you have the gist of the thing in your ear.
Review
Each chapter ends in a section called “Points for Review”. Definitely go over this carefully and also refer back in the chapter to the points being made. The review section is written fairly clearly—proving that they can write decently when they want to—and so it can also provide a help for the verbal thicket of the descriptions in the chapter.