The Subdominant Tritone in Film and Television Music

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Published Feb 10, 2021
DOI https://doi.org/10.52214/cm.v107i.7840

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Brad Osborn
University of Kansas

Abstract

Tritones sounding over subdominant harmony, either as suspensions, accented passing tones, or incomplete neighbors, constitute a class of sonorities regularly heard in film and television music. I collectively refer to these phenomena as “subdominant tritones” (SdTT), and theorize a link between the SdTT and emotions it engenders. The article presents close visual/musical analysis of selected SdTT-tinged passages in feature films that animate various heightened emotional states, including longing, nostalgia, relief, and melancholy.


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Author Biography

Brad Osborn, University of Kansas

Brad Osborn is Associate Professor of Music theory and affiliated faculty in American Studies at the University of Kansas. He is the author of the monograph Everything in its Right Place: Analyzing Radiohead (Oxford University Press, 2017). Osborn’s other research on post-millennial popular music is published in Music Theory Spectrum, Perspectives of New Music, Music Analysis, and Music Theory Online. He currently serves as Associate Editor for Music Theory Online. Brad writes and records shoegazey post-rock as the artist D’Archipelago. 

Article Details

Issue
Vol. 107 (2020): Current Musicology, Fall 2020
Section
Articles
Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

How to Cite
Osborn, B. (2021). The Subdominant Tritone in Film and Television Music. Current Musicology, 107, 62–92. https://doi.org/10.52214/cm.v107i.7840