Phrase Mods

There are several modifications that can be applied to a melodic phrase. Three of the common mods of an original phrase are:

• retrograde (played in reverse)
• inversion (inverted around the first note)
• retrograde/inversion (inverted around the first note and reversed)

When using the inversion technique the intervals of the melodic phrase are inverted so that a melodic motion up becomes a melodic motion down instead (and vice-versa). A scale context can be provided so that the notes can be constrained to a specific scale if desired. If no scale context is provided the default is the chromatic scale.

Experimenting with phrases:

When you enter a phrase and scale context using the lilypond format, the original phrase followed by each of the three mods will be played. On the retrograde and retrograde/inversion mods the rhythm of the original phrase is also reversed, while on the inversion the rhythm of the original phrase is maintained. If you want the original rhythm to be played on all of mods check the 'use original rhythms' box. After you have played it, you can click the lower buttons to hear each mod by itself. The lilypond output at the bottom of the page can be loaded into lilypond to see the notation of the phrase and its three modifications.

There are four examples using different scales contexts and feel free to enter your own phrases for experimentation.

(click stop in between plays)
use original rhythms
example 1 example 2 example 3 example 4
Enter your original phrase using lilypond note code here:
\\relative c' { r16 c16 d e f d e c g'8 c b32 a b16 c8 }
Enter your scale context using lilypond note code here:
\\relative c' { c4 d e f g a b }

swing | tempo: 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95 100 110 120 130 140 160 180 200 | mute | volume: -Infinity -30 -25 -20 -15 -10 -5 0 | loop
time sig: | Key sig:

Full lilypond score output:

Paste this code into lilypond to view the music notation. See instructions here

back to Tone JS Setup page