History
Renaissance composers thought in terms of intervals rather than chords, "however, certain dissonant sonorities suggest that the dominant seventh chord occurred with some frequency." Monteverdi (usually credited as the first to use the V7 chord without preparation) and other early baroque composers begin to treat the V7 as a chord as part of the introduction of functional harmony. The V7 was in constant use during the classical period, with similar treatment to that of the baroque. In the romantic period freer voice-leading was gradually developed, leading to the waning of functional use in the post-romantic and impressionistic periods including more dissonant dominant chords through higher extensions and lessened use of the major-minor chord's dominant function. 20th century music either consciously used functional harmony or was entirely free of V7 chords while jazz and popular musics continued to use functional harmony including V7 chords.
However, according to Schenker, "'The dissonance is always passing, never a chord member (Zusammenklang),'" and unprepared dominant seventh chords still originate in voice leading:
8 7 3 5 - 1Read more about this topic: Dominant Seventh Chord
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“History takes time.... History makes memory.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“Postmodernism is, almost by definition, a transitional cusp of social, cultural, economic and ideological history when modernism’s high-minded principles and preoccupations have ceased to function, but before they have been replaced with a totally new system of values. It represents a moment of suspension before the batteries are recharged for the new millennium, an acknowledgment that preceding the future is a strange and hybrid interregnum that might be called the last gasp of the past.”
—Gilbert Adair, British author, critic. Sunday Times: Books (London, April 21, 1991)
“Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth. It is astonishing how few facts of importance are added in a century to the natural history of any animal. The natural history of man himself is still being gradually written.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)