Playable BooksREADING EDITIONS
Rimsky-Korsakov, Practical Manual of Harmony in English

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov · section 83 of 96

CHORDS PRODUCED BY THE LOWERING ALTERATION OF THE IInd DEGREE

Read and hear this section in the playable edition →
Also in
Theory of HarmonyArnold Schoenberg · the Neapolitan sixthHarmonic AnalysisBenjamin Cutter · the Neapolitan sixth

§ 79.— 1) When the root of the three-note chord of the second degree is modified by a lowering alteration, the result is a major triad, used as a first inversion with the third doubled, which resolves to the cadential six-four chord or to the tonic triad:

Example in C major and then C minor: the II chord over F (6) with the soprano D moving to Db (6–b), i.e. the lowered second degree Db–F–Ab with doubled F; it re
Fig. 342 · See it in the reader

2) It can be used in cadences as an independent chord, preferably preceded by the triad of the Ist degree:

Example in C major and then C minor: I – II (the lowered second degree Db–F–Ab over F, as an independent chord) – in parentheses the cadential six-four (6/4), w
Fig. 343 · See it in the reader

REMARK.— Its resolution to the triad of the Vth degree or to the dominant seventh chord requires one of the parts to move down by a diminished third:

Diminished third (3ce dim.): Db falls to B natural, which rises to C.
Fig. 344 · See it in the reader

3) The same downward alteration of the 2nd degree also produces the dominant seventh chord with diminished fifth:

[Example]
Fig. 345 · See it in the reader

The student will use these chords in his modulating exercises, though without overusing them.