1st Sight Analysis #7: Bruckner's 8 (part 1)

A famously awesome passage from the Finale of Bruckner's 8th Symphony, introduced by courtesy of the London Philharmonic low-brass section (thanks LPO).

The harmony here breaks the tonal system... and we are forced to introduce the Tonnetz and neo-Riemannian theory to make sense of it. As a result, instead of "i* - bVI - Vsub#6 - I", we get the much cleaner "L-H-L".

0:00 Introduction
1:40 The excerpt
2:19 A sequence by 5ths
3:23 Inside the sequenced phrase
4:45 Non-functional turn
6:34 The circle of Major 3rds
7:38 Vsub6?
8:54 An alternative approach
9:50 Neo-Riemannian basics
10:45 L - H - L
11:57 Circles in the Tonnetz
13:05 Into the second part

[Quotenwagnerianer]

Well the most obvious excerpt for a fascinating analysis is the coda of the 1st movement of the 6th Symphony starting at rehearsal Letter "W".

[vittoriosusmel]

Great video, this is a very interesting topic!

[paulwang]

I never realized that the D major to b flat minor in the first subject of the finale was just a neo-riemannian LPL transformation! Thank you so much, very informative :)

[kome]

Chords called power chord used in rock music can be understood as major and minor key 😝

[ballefranz]

could you look into wagner tannhauser ouverture, please :)

[xoknight]

Even though I am completely crap at music theory, wanting to learn Bruckner’s compositions so bad, these videos are really educational!
I would love to see an analysis on the 9th symphony (especially the third movement)

[paulalexander]

Thank you, I find this type of harmony very expressive and use it frequently in my music. Interestingly, I don’t have a well worked our theoretical construct for it other than the idea of expressive mediant harmonic movement. It’s been more of an intuitive process. I was wondering if I could share with you a short cello/piano piece that is constructed along these lines? Paul Alexander