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Subdominant vs "pre-dominant" distinction in Synfire ?

Posted

Hi,

When using the palette with the circle of fifth (version 2.2.3 build #5) I've been surprised by a behaviour. I first thought it was a bug but maybe it's a feature :)

the 4th degree of a natural minor scale is also the 2nd degree of its relative major scale but this is not displayed in the circle of fifth.

Example : 

in C major, when pressing the 2nd degree (Dm), the circle of fifth shows this chord has a subdominant function in A minor (good)

Now if you switch to Am key, and press the Dm chord again the circle of fifth won't show the subdominant function it has in C major.

So, yes, the 2nd degree is not a subdominant chord by definition but both II & IV are "pre-dominant" chords and I assumed that it's what the "s" symbol meant.

Am I missing something ?

 


Fr., 25.08.2023 - 10:06 Permalink

I think you've already answered the question for yourself: "S" means subdominant, but Dm is not the subdominant of the C major scale. It's the F major chord.

Fr., 25.08.2023 - 11:52 Permalink

Thanks Juergen,

The "Am I missing something ?" at the end of my question was a sort of hope I didn't find a setting that would allow me to display these kind of relationships in the circle of fifths (I mean, they're used in pretty common modulations)

Fr., 25.08.2023 - 12:33 Permalink

If all these secondary or subsidiary triads were labelled in the circle of fifths, the circle of fifths would certainly look rather cluttered, wouldn't it?

If you were using Synfire Pro or Express, I would recommend that you simply open multiple palettes of the relevant keys at the same time, because then the selected chords will be marked in all the palettes at the same time. When doing modulations, this is the usual procedure to get an overview of the harmonic relationships.

Fr., 25.08.2023 - 12:54 Permalink

ok, thanks for the tip ! 

About the clunkiness, it seems pretty reasonable compared to the "maximal" layout of the palette hehehe