Learning Pathway Videos
The 75 videos accessible from this site provide exemplification of Harmony Signing in practice, sequenced so as to illustrate the manner in which leaders and participants can build their experience and confidence in the leading and responding to signing. They are real-life examples, sometimes containing errors or hesitations that convey how a group can self-correct where the leader provides encouragement and the opportunity to allow the musical intentions to ‘speak for themselves’. They are subtitled to allow viewers to distinguish between them, though verbal introduction and communication were for the most part kept to a minimum during the sessions in which they were filmed. Similarly, this guide to the sequence is intended to permit users to locate the video they choose to view: it does not seek to explain further the nature of the content.
The 75 videos are divided into 13 Chapters to permit viewers to select the topic and sequence that is mostly to meet their needs and interests.
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Getting voices ready
This represents the kind of warm-up that sensitises participants to the natural harmonies engaged when varying vowel sounds over a…
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Making chords
Having listened to the way that Harmonic Series partials appeared in the warm-up of Video 1, participants explore within their…
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Signing an ‘alap’
The term ‘alap’ is borrowed from Classical Indian music to represent the exploration of melodic pitch relationships to the fundamental…
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A wordless ‘alap’
A further example of an ‘alap’ on the lines of Video 3. But the melody is sung to a continuous…
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Adding Chord IV
The first experience of chord-change conveyed through secure voice-leading: I to IV, and alternations between the two.
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Working with Chords I and IV
Continuing from Video 5, and introducing rhythmic performance of the chords.
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Adding Chord V
Introducing movement between chords I and V.
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Working with Chords I and V
Further exploration of the relationship introduced in Video 7.
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Practising the Primary Triads
Building on the integration of Video 9.
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Signing the chromatic array
The 12 notes in the chromatic octave employed in relation to Harmony Signing: discriminating between the tones and semitones involved….
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Exploring the chromatic intervals
Building on Video 13: singing the chromatic scale to signs and note-names. Up, then down, visiting each expanding interval.
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Signing the minor
Introducing the minor versions of the Primary Triads. A little verbal explanation proved necessary to direct participants in which note…
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Exploring the minor 1
Building on what was first experienced in Video 15.
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Exploring the minor 2
Exchanging leaders and exploring the major-minor alterations further.
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Exploring both Major and minor
A different leader (a first-time exponent, even), and further exploration of the major-minor relationships within the Primary Triad family.
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7th Chords and Modulation
Commencing with a verbal explanation of how seventh chords are audible in nature as components of the Harmonic Series, the…
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The ‘tonicising’ sign
Introducing the ‘tonicising sign’, this builds on Video 19 in conveying the stages through which a progression passes in modulating…
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Confirming modulation to the Dominant
Confirming how Video 20 was achieved.
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Modulating to the relative minor
Employing the sign for si, the sharpened fifth, to enable modulation to the relative minor: ‘old’ chord vi is moved…
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Modulating to the relative minor
An ‘alap’ (see Videos 3 and 4) explores the intervallic relationships to a tonic drone available through the pitches of…
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Diminished triad (i)
Experience of the full chromatic array permits exploration of the sound and potential of the diminished triads. The first introduced…
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Diminished triad (ii)
The second diminished triad introduced is that in which can be formed over a sustained tonic drone.
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Diminished triad (iii)
The remaining diminished triad is the one in which the tonic rises a semitone while notes 3 and 5 remain…
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Exploring the diminished triads
Playing with the relationships between all three diminished triads contributes to confidence with chromatic tunings, and provides a perspective on…
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Modulation to Chord IV
Adding a dominant 7th to chord I, and employing the tonicizing sign to module to the Subdominant.
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Exploring modulation (i)
Addressing the challenge of employing the procedure outlined in Video 55 to continue modulating through the circle-of-fifths.
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Exploring modulation (ii)
A further illustration of modulation through the circle-of-fifths employing dominant 7th chords.
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Exploring modulation (iii)
Exploring progressions that involved modulation to and from both the dominant and subdominant.
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Exploring modulation (iv)
A student improvises with the procedures illustrated in Video 58.
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Exploring modulation (v)
A graduate student improvises a modulating progression.
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Exploring modulation (vi)
A graduate student explores a wider variety of chord choices including modulations.
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Exploring modulation (vii)
Further exploration of a wider selection of chords.
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Signing what one hears (i)
The first of a sequence of videos (63-67, and following) that illustrate ‘tracking’, a warm-up procedure that requires participants to…
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Signing what one hears (ii)
This tracking exercise challenges participants to find voice-leading solutions to movement between less closely related harmonic fields.
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Signing what one hears (iii)
A further example of harmonic excursions that participants track.
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Signing while singing what one hears (i)
In this example, students set out to track what chords are being performed both through providing their own voice-leading pathways…
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Signing while singing what one hears (ii)
Building on the experience illustrated in Video 66, participants aim to select the appropriate gesture to track the wider variety…
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Signing while singing what one hears (iii)
An a cappella rendition of the same progression that students tracked from its presentation on the piano in Video 67.
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Signing while singing what one hears (iv)
Participants develop their capacity to respond both vocally and in gestures to tracking a progression played on the piano. The…
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Signing while singing what one hears (v)
Employing the same progression to refine awareness of the pathway taken through the chords in Video 69.
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Signing while singing what one hears (vi)
An a cappella rendition of the same progression that students tracked from its presentation on the piano in Videos 69…
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Signing while singing what one hears (vii)
Rehearsing the a cappella progression of Video 71 in order to familiarise participants with chords ii, iii and vi (the…
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Improvising with Harmony Signing (i)
A graduate student works with a sophisticated selection of chords in order to contribute to developing discrimination.
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Improvising with Harmony Signing (ii)
Further exploration of progressions that include both modulation and the wider array of chords available.
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Improvising with Harmony Signing (iii)
Turn-taking around the group: participants improvise with chord selections and their rhythmic presentation. The sequence concludes with examples of vocal…
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