Workshop 74 mini-test

1. What is rhythmic reharmonization?

2. What is the difference between anticipating RH and anticipating bass?

3. Why can delaying a chord create expressive tension?

4. What is the difference between a chord attack and a true harmonic event?

5. Why does holding a pedal bass change root rhythm without necessarily stopping upper harmonic motion?

6. How does an early chord arrival affect its duration and therefore harmonic tension?

7. What is harmonic syncopation?

8. Why can a chord lasting one eighth-note still have clear function?

9. What does it mean for tonic to arrive in stages?

10. What is the deepest lesson of Workshop 74?

Answers

1. Changing the timing, duration, anticipation, delay, omission, or layered arrival of harmony while leaving much or all of the underlying chord vocabulary intact.
2. RH anticipation lets upper harmony imply the future before the bass confirms it; bass anticipation moves the harmonic foundation early while upper voices temporarily retain the previous chord/color.
3. The melody or bass may already imply the new harmony while accompaniment remains in the old one, creating temporary dissonance or suspended expectation before confirmation.
4. A chord attack is simply an articulation of the current sonority; a harmonic event changes the actual harmonic field/root/function. One harmony can contain many chord attacks.
5. The bass can remain fixed while upper structures and colors change above it, so root rhythm stays slow while color or even upper functional implication moves faster.
6. An anticipated chord begins earlier and therefore occupies more time before its resolution, often increasing its perceived importance or tension; a delayed chord does the opposite.
7. A real harmonic change occurs on an offbeat or otherwise unexpected metric location rather than on the normal downbeat/phrase boundary.
8. Strong context and immediate voice-leading toward a clear destination can establish function very quickly; duration affects weight, but even a brief secondary dominant or tritone approach can be perceptually clear.
9. Different components of tonic—bass root, melody resolution, guide tones, extensions/full voicing—arrive at different moments rather than as one synchronized block.
10. Harmony has its own phrasing: changing which voice arrives early, which arrives late, and how long each harmonic state lasts can transform the music even when the chord symbols stay almost exactly the same.

The central lesson of Workshop 74 is:

The next chord is not just a place to arrive. It is an event you can reveal early, postpone, foreshadow, or assemble one voice at a time.