Mode mixture and other modal harmony applications in Turkish rock music: An anthology

Abstract

This study examines mode mixture and other modal harmony concepts in Turkish rock music. It is an anthology consisting of 40 songs with original transcriptions and analyses. In the introduction part of the study, the purpose and motivation of the study are stated. The primary purpose of the study is to create a resource containing the analysis of popular music songs to be used in music theory education. Thus, listeners and students who are familiar with popular music, not classical music, which is used as an example in the music theory curriculum today, will be able to understand the theory concepts more easily. Another purpose of the study is that this source is a guide for songwriters. At the end of the chapter, the connection between musicianship and music theory and the benefits of learning music theory as a songwriter are discussed. The second chapter discusses the relationship between popular music and analysis. Although it has been studied under disciplines such as sociology, literary and cultural studies, the study of popular music under the academic field of music is a relatively new phenomenon. Popular music analysis is inherently bound to be interdisciplinary and has not yet formed a discipline in its own right as it concerns smaller parts of each of the aforementioned disciplines. Despite their interrelation, different fields of study on production, consumption, musical text, and reception have attracted varying levels of interest from scholars of different disciplines. This chapter focuses heavily on discussions of why popular music should not be analyzed with the same analysis methods applied to common practice period music. In relation to analysis tools, three arguments have been offered. First, popular music is designed for mass distribution to large and often socio-culturally heterogeneous audiences. Second, popular music is stored and distributed in unwritten media. Third, popular music can only exist in an industrial monetary economy where it has become a commodity. These arguments point out that it is impossible to evaluate popular music according to some sort of Platonic scale of ideal aesthetic values, and that notation should not be the analyst's main source material. Moreover, popular music differs from common period music in terms of representation. Western music is represented by printed music material, while popular music is represented by studio recordings and live performances. This makes it difficult to analyze popular music on the basis of classical Western music. In the last part of the chapter, the inclusion of popular music in the music theory curriculum is discussed. Thanks to this approach, it is seen that students learn music theory concepts more quickly and their participation in the course increases, while the inadequacy of popular music in terms of printed music materials and the necessity of constantly updating the samples due to the rapid consumption of popular music songs is emphasized. While the third chapter includes a brief history of Turkish Rock music, the scope of the songs in the anthology and the song selection process are stated. There are forty songs from thirty-six different artists, and these forty songs are from twenty-two different years. While twelve out of the forty songs are from Turkish rock music's golden era, the 2000s, there are fourteen songs from the 2010s, six songs each from the 2020s and 1990s and two songs from the 1960s and 1970s. The song selection process started with choosing a random artist. All of the discography has been listened to and the songs that sounded as they included an instance of mode mixture were jotted down. Next step was to pick another artist from the artist's "Fans Also Like" section on Spotify. The process was repeated and finished once there were forty songs. The two features that these thirty-six different musicians have in common are that they are Turkish, and the songs have a guitar played on the records; mostly electric guitar but there are some songs that have acoustic or classical guitar as well. The genres that these bands/musicians are identified with vary from alternative rock to indie pop, jazz, grunge, folk rock, progressive rock, Anadolu rock, alternative metal, post hardcore, industrial metal, indie rock, protest rock, psychedelic rock, hard rock, heavy metal, pop rock or simply, rock. The fact that this study's primary focus is mode mixture and to create a source that analyzes, illustrates, and explains the phenomenon with the songs of popular known artists, the entire anthology is gathered under the roof of rock music instead of going into a genre discussion. The fourth chapter comprises the theoretical and methodological content of the study. The concept of mode mixture is explained. Mode mixture is when a song "borrows" a chord or note from a tonality and/or modality other than the tonality and modality it is in. The scope of the study includes the seven modes of the diatonic scale and the harmonic minor mode. In the rest of the section, the structural elements of the popular song form and the outer forms are explained: intro, verse, pre-chorus, chorus, transition, bridge; strophic form, AABA form and verse-chorus form. The section ends by specifying the analysis method: After determining the forty songs in the anthology, they have been transcribed by ear and the notations have been prepared in MuseScore. Chords have been labeled and after a Roman numeral analysis, the keys of the songs have been finalized. Any instances of mode mixture, modulation and secondary dominant/leading tone instances have been explained in the accompanying text. Regarding the chords, two functions have been taken into consideration: quality and category. The chord qualities of major, minor, diminished or augmented have been defined with the degree of the scale to which the chord corresponds. Category, on the other hand, refers to the chord's role within the harmonic circuit. That is to say, the iv chord has a quality of minor but in the circuit, it may function as the dominant. The basic harmonic circuit, T–PD–D–T has been taken into account and if needed, formal units have been also designated to have a harmonic function: a verse section that prolongs tonic, a pre-chorus section that has a predominant function in the harmonic circuit. Roman numeric identity of the chords displays the chord's relation to the tonal center, whereas its categorical function depends on its relationship with other chords. The fifth chapter contains analyses of forty songs released between 1966 and 2022. After giving a short information about the song and the artist, the chord progressions, the borrowed mode and chord(s), the quality and function of the chord and the formal sections in which mode mixture appears are indicated. The sixth chapter talks about the statistics that emerged as a result of the analysis of forty songs. Statistics such as the most used main mode, the most borrowed mode, the formal section where the concept is used the most, the percentage distribution of the concepts in the song form, the most borrowed chord are presented. The seventh and final chapter includes recommendations for songwriters, suggestions for future research, and the conclusion of the study. Under the guidelines for songwriters' section, recommendations are given to songwriters within the scope of the results in the sixth section: The formal section where mode mixture is used most often, the most frequently used mode for mode mixture, the most interacting mode pairs, and the most frequently used borrowed chords. The study ends with a conclusion that also gives a brief summary of the study, followed by a section of recommendations for future research.