Application And Analysis Of Hindemith’s Harmony And Tonality Theory

Music in the twentieth century is attached much emphasis on "individualization" on the basis of the "generality" of composition. Therefore, music in this period lets "a hundred schools of thoughts contend". Hindemith’s unique theoretical view and distinctive way of composition occupies a pivotal position in the Neo Music Movement of the twentieth century. The Weber Symphonic Variations on a Theme, which is accomplished by Hindemith based on Germany composer Weber’s Piano Duet and the music theme of the drama Turandot in the early Romanticism, explicitly exhibits high integration of his theoretical system and practice of composition.By regarding Hindemith’s theory of composing techniques as a starting point and applying his distinctive harmonic language, this thesis conducts a detailed analysis of Weber Symphonic Variations on a Theme from the perspective of structural form of chord, harmonic progression and form of tonality, mainly including the chord construction, chord sonority, chord fluctuation, two frameworks, kinship of tonality, establishment of tonal center and pitch progression. From aspects of harmonic progression, sonority of chord, harmonic dynamics and tonal use, the present study attempts to prove Hindemith’s unity of theory and practice, which is deemed to help us better understand his theory of composing techniques and provide reference to the further musical analysis and composition.