F♯ in bar 5: tonicisation or modulation in an unseen excerpt
An unseen excerpt is played twice in the examination. It is 16 bars long in 4/4, and the candidate has established that it begins and ends in F major. Bar 4 is an A minor chord. In bars 5–6 the ear hears F♯, and the candidate has written the harmony as D major followed by G major. Bar 7 brings a C major chord held under a fermata with a marked ritardando in the recording, and bar 8 returns to F major. The candidate's draft says: "Bars 5–8 modulate to C major, because F♯ appears and the music cadences on C." A comment from the teacher on an earlier attempt reads: "a chromatic note is not a modulation". The melody across bars 5–8 is stepwise, rises to C on the fermata and then falls back to A. Nothing else in the excerpt is chromatic, and the candidate has no score - only what they hear, plus the bar numbers given on the question paper.
1. Is the draft's claim defensible? Decide, and state the aural evidence you would need in order to settle the question either way.
Read the worked answer
The claim is not defensible on the evidence described. A modulation is a change of tonal centre confirmed by a cadence in the new key and continued in it; a chromatic note on its own proves only that something has been borrowed or tonicised.
Reading the bars as they stand: D major in F is V/V, G major is V, and the C major chord in bar 7 is the dominant of F, not the tonic of a new key. It is approached as a dominant and left as one - bar 8 returns to F. The fermata and ritardando underline that reading: a dominant arrival with a pause is a half cadence in F, not a confirmation of C. Melodically, rising to C and falling back to A is 5 to 3 in F, not a sustained tonic in C.
Aural evidence that would settle it:
- Whether B♮ is heard and resolves upward to C as a leading tone, with F♮ suppressed for the whole span.
- Whether a G chord (with or without a seventh) actually precedes the C as a dominant, and whether the bass makes the root motion G to C.
- Whether the music continues in C afterwards, or turns back immediately.
- Whether the phrase that begins after bar 7 behaves as a new phrase in C, or as a return.
On this evidence the answer should say tonicisation of C, not modulation.
2. If the passage had been a genuine modulation, which chord would serve as the pivot, and what would the candidate have to write differently?
Read the worked answer
The pivot can only be a chord that is diatonic in both keys, and it must come before the chromaticism. Bar 4's A minor chord is the obvious candidate: iii in F major and vi in C major. The D major chord in bar 5 cannot be a pivot at all, because F♯ makes it chromatic in F - by the time it arrives the music has already left, so it would be analysed as the new key's V/V leading to V.
What the answer would then need:
- A stated point of modulation at the pivot, with key signatures or accidentals handled consistently (a new signature, or F♯ and B♮ written as accidentals if the answer keeps one signature).
- A labelled cadence in C major, ideally a perfect cadence with C in root position, since a modulation is confirmed by cadence rather than by colour.
- Analysis of the following bars in C major: F♯ retained, B♮ treated as leading tone, F♮ avoided or marked as a chromatic lower neighbour.
- A phrase describing where C major ends, because the excerpt finishes in F and any modulation must be closed off.
A good answer also concedes the limit of the evidence: without a score, the candidate is inferring the bass, and should say so rather than state a pivot with false certainty.