Reharmonisation Part 4: The Power of Secondary Dominants

Welcome to the next part of this tutorial series about (re)harmonisation strategies. All the previous parts can be accessed here.

When I first learned about Secondary Dominants, I was not quite convinced that they would be a useful tool in my pursuit of "the film music sound" as I felt they sounded quite jazzy which I also liked alot but didn't feel like I could implement that much into the music that I wanted to write.

And for a few years, I put these in a box in my head that was labeled something like "Look into this when you write Jazz".

Then a few years later, I heard a piece by John Williams that is relatively unknown but that really created that "Wow" effect with me. I didn't realize it right away but it has stuck with me since this day as a prime example of the sheer power that a well placed secondary domininat can create, and that by no means this is limited to Jazz writing. But more on this later.

Let's first discuss what we're actually dealing with here. The principle of secondary dominants relies on the strong harmonic force of a V-I cadence which is strong enough to even defy the gravity of the tonal center of the music.

In a nutshell, it means that every chord in a chord progression can become a temporary I chord that can be reached by its respective dominant chord.

Let's specify a bit more. Here we have all available diatonic chords in C major:

As each of these chord can be a momentary I (except for the actual I of C for obvious reasons), we can reach them through a cadential V-I motion by placing their dominants in front of them, even if they introduce notes that don't belong to C major.

So the priniple is always the same, you look at the chord in question (e.g. Am) and ask yourself, if that was the I chord, what would be its V? So obviously, it would be E7. There's a slight exception here which is the Bm(b5) chord which in itself sounds more like a dominant chord (-> a G7 without its root) than a stable chord where a V-I doesn't sound like it's a plausible resolution so we leave this one out for now. You can make this V-I work as well but it would need a higher degree dissonant dominant than a straight forward dominant7 to create a plausible decrease of tension of this V-I.

So applying this principle and squeezing  in these secondary dominants, we end up with this. Just as a hint about a common confusion when trying to find them, you need to understand that you work retrospectively when you add secondary dominants. You look at the chord in question and search for its V to place it BEFORE that chord, not after.

I marked the V-I cadences with a slur. This example doesn't make musical sense so there's no use in providing an audio example as it just shows the theoretic possibilities. You see, some chords introduce quite a few notes that are not part of C major.

And actually, this is what makes these secondary dominants so attractive. In spite of being a very plausible harmonic motion, you can get a lot of new colors without needing to modulate or employing other "borrowed chord" strategies.

I've stated it in several other posts already but also here the fact applies that a dominant chord doesn't need it's seventh to still be perceived as a dominant so we could also just use plain triads in the same functional way.

Let me show you an example with secondary dominants in action:

https://soundcloud.com/robin-hoffmann/secondary-dominants-example/s-DoS95bJMVia

You see, besides chords that are part of the diatonic world of C major, we also have E and A in this progression. E is the secondary dominant to the following Am and A is the secondary dominant to the following Dm.

You see, none of that sounds distinctively jazzy or in a way that it would not be suitable in a "film harmony" context.

The application is relatively straight forward and easy with quick and musically pleasing results.

Now let's get back to Williams. In 1995, he wrote a piece called "Song for World Peace" for the tour of the Boston Pops to China and Japan. As this year coincided with the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II, Williams wrote that piece to be performed in this context. It is an uplifting piece with a positive outlook and in itself I find it absolutely beautiful. It might be debatable whether it might exude a bit of naivety considering the occasion and title but that is not what we're focusing on today.

The main idea of the piece starts at around 2:05 in the strings and repeats that theme (with a short intermission) till the climax. He reharmonises that theme slightly (with a pedal point at the climax) but the harmonic pivotal point that we want to talk about here remains intact.

Let me just sketch out what is happening in a simplified form in that theme (at the climax version at 3:40):

https://soundcloud.com/robin-hoffmann/song-for-world-peace/s-BkEsfErPqTK

There is so much to say about that theme and how he gets it to that point but I think we might all agree that the "star" of the harmonic progression is that G major chord happening at bar 5. This is a secondary dominant towards the following Cm (which gets delayed a bit through that descending bass line) and it is just that moment that creates that neck hair stand up situation.

And of course as always, Williams is extremely clever in the way he sets it up. That whole theme is incredibly diatonic, even excessively centered around the tonic in the first 4 bars, so he creates the maximum potential for that one chord that seemingly "rips open" the harmonic space of that theme and gives it the chance for its maximimum impact.

Interestingly, in all versions of the theme, Williams harmonizes it as a G with an added minor 6th (Eb) which in this context feels like a mix between Eb and G and has that relatively dissonant rub between  the D and Eb. To push this even further he places that rub on top in the first iteration and within the chord in the second one. Also, in the final statement there is clearly an Eb ringing in the orchestra during that G chord which makes it a bit more colourful and not as striking as a clear G would have made it.

The interesting thing to observe here is that this secondary dominant is actually the harmonic centerpiece of that theme so it is by no means just a technique that you can use to colorize but that even can be THE central harmonic moment of a theme or piece.

When applying these secondary dominants into your own music, you will notice that not every one works (most often restriced by the melody on top) and that an overuse very quickly makes a progression overwhelmingly busy. Especially in a chord progression that works quite well on its own already, it might not be the greatest idea to force secondary dominants into it. But it is definitely worth experimenting with these and memorizing the sound of them so you can put them into your musical toolbox.