Jean-Philippe Rameau · section 22 of 109

CHAPTER EIGHT. On Imitating Cadences by Inversion

To imitate a cadence by inversion, we ordinarily remove the fundamental bass and take whichever other part seems suitable as the bass. We may even vary the progression of sounds that are not dissonant with one another, such as the fundamental and its fifth, as explained in Book III. From these different parts, each serving in turn as bass or soprano, we draw every imaginable melody. We vary harmony by placing in the bass a sound contained in the fundamental chord instead of the fundamental sound itself. We thus find at every step innumerable successions of melodies and chords from which to fashion a musical piece at will, constantly awakening the listener through the variety produced by inversion. Those who have felt the effects of inversion have not traced it to its origin: their rules and examples bear witness. For every different chord, a different example and a different rule. One says the seventh resolves by the third, fifth, octave, or sixth; another says the diminished fifth resolves by the third, fourth, tritone, or ninth, whether descending, ascending, or remaining stationary. This is how sciences are made obscure: each part is cited separately when all could be contained in a simple, intelligible whole. If the dissonance of the seventh can be identified as a diminished fifth, second, ninth, or eleventh, and can resolve through different intervals, this arises only from the bass's different progression. By passing through sounds derived from a fundamental chord, the bass gives the intervals a different form relative to these derived sounds. But the chords remain the same, though differently arranged, and their progression does not change. If an interval appears to change, relate it to its foundation: it will always be the same. The fundamental basses we carefully place beneath all our examples provide certain proof. It is only a matter of making things perceptible, as we hope to do.