I commented to my teacher yesterday that a couple of consecutive notes in a Bach piece I'd taken along "didn't sound right". He said it was Baroque discord. I've tried to do some research on this on Google but I'm not much the wiser, other than discovering that the term applied to Baroque art as well as music.

Is there anyone out there who can give a bit of background information about "Baroque discord"?

I haven't heard that specific term, but I would assume that it refers to a suspension; consider the key of A minor, thus dispensing with sharps or flats, just to make things simpler, with this descending phrase:

- F - E - D - C
E - D - C - B

You could play these notes RH 45342312

Assuming that each of these notes represents a crotchet, so that you play the E and hold it down whilst playing the F a quaver later, then hold the F and play the D a quaver later, .... you'll get an overlap of adjacent notes, each adjacent pair forming a discord.


Of course a Baroque Discord might be nothing of the sort!

Try searching for Baroque Dissonance instead, and if you have access to Groves I think there is quite a bit of info.
N

Thanks for these replies

Clavicembalo - reading up about suspensions and resolutions was very enlightening (and lots of references to Pythagorus who I'm sure you must be descended from!)

nova - yes, Baroque Dissonance was a much more fruitful search. I've read up the Wikipedia article on Baroque Dissonance and I've got access to Groves through my library card so I'll read that tonight.

Thanks again, both posts very helpful.

Probably not what you're after but here's some pretty exteme Baroque discord!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK13g3twALc