Resolution (music)

File:Dominant seventh tritone resolution.png

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File:Regular resolution.png

Audio file "Regular resolution.mid" not found}}Template:Category handler. One common tone, two notes move by half step motion, and one note moves by whole step motion.

Resolution in Western tonal music theory is the move of a note or chord from dissonance (an unstable sound) to a consonance (a more final or stable sounding one).

Dissonance, resolution, and suspense can be used to create musical interest. Where a melody or chordal pattern is expected to resolve to a certain note or chord, a different but similarly suitable note can be resolved to instead, creating an interesting and unexpected sound. For example, the deceptive cadence.

Basis

<score vorbis="1" lang="lilypond" override_midi="Beethoven - Piano Sonata in B-flat major, Op. 22 - dominant seventh.mid">

   {
     \override Score.SpacingSpanner.strict-note-spacing = ##t
 \set Score.proportionalNotationDuration = #(ly:make-moment 1/12)
     \new PianoStaff <<
       \new Staff <<
           \relative c' {
               \clef treble \key bes \major \time 2/4
               r8 <es a>-.\p <d bes'>-.[ <c' es a>-.] <bes d bes'>-.\ff r
               }
           >>
       \new Staff <<
           \new Voice \relative c {
               \clef bass \key bes \major \time 2/4
               \stemUp <d bes'>8 \stemNeutral <f c'>-.[_\markup { \concat { "V" \raise #1 \small "7" \hspace #1.5 "I" \hspace #2 "V" \raise #1 \small "7" \hspace #1.4 "I" } }

bes-.] <f, f'>-. <bes, bes'>-. r \bar "

Dominant seventh resolutions in the last measures of Beethoven's [[Piano Sonata No. 11 (Beethoven)|Piano Sonata in BTemplate:Music major, Op. 22]] (1800).

Resolution has a strong basis in tonal music, since atonal music generally contains a more constant level of dissonance and lacks a tonal center to which to resolve.

The concept of "resolution", and the degree to which resolution is "expected", is contextual as to culture and historical period. In a classical piece of the Baroque period, for example, an added sixth chord (made up of the notes C, E, G and A, for example) has a very strong need to resolve, while in a more modern work, that need is less strong - in the context of a pop or jazz piece, such a chord could comfortably end a piece and have no particular need to resolve.

Example

An example of a single dissonant note which requires resolution would be, for instance, an F during a C major chord, C–E–G, which creates a dissonance with both E and G and may resolve to either, though more usually to E (the closer pitch). This is an example of a suspended chord. In reference to chords and progressions for example, a phrase ending with the following cadence IV–V, a half cadence, does not have a high degree of resolution. However, if this cadence were changed to (IV–)V–I, an authentic cadence, it would resolve much more strongly by ending on the tonic I chord.

See also

• Circle of fifths
• Corelli clash
• Irregular resolution
• Lipps–Meyer law
• Doubling (music)