Module 21 mini-test

1. What is reharmonization?

2. What are the three things you should protect before changing chords?

3. What are common tonic-family substitutions in C?

4. What can substitute functionally for F as predominant in C?

5. How can you strengthen the approach to Dm?

6. What does C → C♯°7 → Dm achieve?

7. What does F → Fm → C achieve?

8. Why is bass-line design useful for reharmonization?

9. Is a more complicated reharmonization necessarily better?

10. What should you check after finding a theoretically clever replacement chord?

Answers

1. Changing the harmonic interpretation of a melody while preserving enough melodic and structural identity for the result to remain coherent.
2. Melody fit, harmonic/phrase function, and overall direction/cadence.
3. C, Am, Em can often occupy tonic-family roles.
4. Dm
5. Use A7→Dm or a full Em7♭5→A7→Dm.
6. It creates a chromatic passing diminished connection with bass C→C♯→D.
7. It borrows iv from C minor and creates the expressive line A→A♭→G.
8. A coherent bass line can make even chromatic harmony sound connected and intentional.
9. No.
10. Play the entire phrase and ask whether it actually improves the musical effect and still supports the melody.

The central lesson of Module 21 is:

Reharmonization is not the art of finding a more complicated chord. It is the art of finding a different reason for the melody to make sense.

Module 22 will go deeper into chord substitution specifically: tritone substitution, relative substitutes, dominant substitutes, backdoor dominants, common-tone substitutions, and how something as strange-looking as D♭7 → Cmaj7 can replace G7 → Cmaj7 while preserving the same underlying dominant tension.