A few weeks ago, I reached my $100/article Goal on Patreon! As promised, I wanted to start a series of shorter (and free) articles, focusing not on a game’s soundtrack, but rather a specific music theory concept. The idea is that these can act as supplementary reading that will help readers expand their vocabulary when reading and talking about music theory in works of music. This is the first of such articles, and the topic (that I’ve more or less chosen by random, or rather “whatever I felt like”) is Harmonic Rhythm.

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Harmonic Rhythm

I don’t want to start out with a technical definition of Harmonic Rhythm that goes into notes per chord, harmonic shifts per bar etc. — let’s talk about rhythm as an abstract concept first. At the most basic level, rhythm — just rhythm — is simply a way of measuring our perception of time between musical events. Harmonic rhythm, then, is simply a way of talking about our perception of time between harmonic events, or in other words, harmonic change.

Why is harmonic rhythm an element of music worth examining? For me, the reason lies in our definitions of rhythm and harmonic rhythm above—namely, the word perception. Our perception of speed, of something sounding “fast” or “slow” has a lot to do with rhythm obviously, but I think equally to do with harmonic rhythm. I want to first show some examples of harmonic rhythm, and then get into how manipulating harmonic rhythm can change the way we perceive a work of music.

Example 1: All-Star Mode Rest Area from Super Smash Bros. Melee (Jun Ishikawa)

A really simple example to start us off. Let’s listen to just the first bar of music, which goes up to 0:03. Focus on the harp which plays an arpeggio of 4 notes which outline the harmony—this 4-note arpeggio is repeated 4 times in this first bar of music (so following the math, the harp is playing 16th notes). At the end of this bar (which is also marked by the last note of the piano phrase) the harp shifts to a new set of 4 notes, again playing it 4 times for a total of 16 notes in the bar, before we move back to our original harmony where we started.

This pattern of the harmony changing once every bar (i.e. every 16 notes played by the harp) stays constant throughout the piece and is a good example of what it feels like when you have a very stable harmonic rhythm. (At the very end of the loop, on the 8th bar (0:22), you finally have the harmony changing twice in the same by bar, during the harp flourish.)

So to summarize the harmonic rhythm of this track, we could say that it’s pretty much stable and sticks to 1-change-per-bar rhythm for the entire track.

Example 2: Dire, Dire Docks from Super Mario 64 (Koji Kondo)

Now listen through this 2nd example. If you were able to follow along with all of Example 1, then following this track, at least up until 0:22, should be simple (think of the bells the same way you thought of the harp in Example 1). Like the Example 1, this track also holds steady at a rate of one harmony change per bar.

At 0:22 and until 0:57, however, the harmonic rhythm changes. Can you tell how?

One way to keep track of what’s going on harmonically is to listen to the bass, because the bass is what provides the harmonic backbone in music. Note how the lower bells were playing a rising pattern every bar (0:00 – 0:03) that coincides with each harmonic change—and think of each time the bells dip back down to that low bass note as a new harmony. Note how this rising pattern is then shortened at 0:43—how the “dipping down” happens much sooner than it was.

What’s happening is that the harmonic rhythm is actually doubling in speed in this section, from a rate of 1-change-per-bar to 2-changes-per-bar. Now the question becomes—do you perceive this doubling in harmonic rhythm, and how does it feel?

To me, harmonic rhythm and normal rhythm are not too different in how they affect our perception of music. In the same way that a faster rhythm creates more energy and excitement, an increase in harmonic rhythm builds anticipation. This is because one of the primary functions of harmony is to create a sense of tension and release—a progression “resolves” when a harmonic buildup of tension occurs and is then released.

Another way to think about it is to imagine a harmonic progression as a story with a clear beginning, middle, and end. As a listener, we want to hear how the conflict and tension built up in the story is resolved. In the same way, our ears are naturally looking for resolution to built up harmonic tension (and inventive composers often surprise and beguile us by taking advantage of what our ears expect). Therefore, what harmonic rhythm really is is a way of measuring how quickly we’re progressing through the harmonic “story.” When harmonic rhythm speeds up, it’s as if suddenly elements of our story are coming together, building to a final resolution, in the same way a mystery novel can really “pick up” right before the grand reveal. That effect, I think, is ultimately what we feel when we sense an acceleration in harmonic rhythm.

Example 3: Darkmoon Caverns from Diddy Kong Racing (David Wise)

Faster harmonic rhythms would make sense in a soundtrack for a racing game, so I wanted to look at this one from Diddy Kong Racing (a game that is like 100x better than Mario Kart 64 but gets way less recognition for some reason???).

From the start the track establishes a pretty brisk harmonic rhythm of 2 changes per bar (first 3 changes are at 0:02, 0:04, and 0:06). This rhythm stays constant for a while as the track builds and layers, and then at 0:54, a sudden a burst of speed to a chord change every quarter note (4 per bar), marked each time by the cymbals.

Example 4: First Steps vs Forsaken City (Sever the Skyline Mix) from Celeste (Lena Raine, Maxo)

Next, I wanted to compare two very similar tracks (one is a remix of the other) to highlight the difference harmonic rhythm can make in how a tracks sounds/feels. Let’s listen to First Steps, which is the original track first:

After the introduction, the main melody comes in at 0:22. Note how until this phrase resolves at 0:43 and starts the 2nd melody, the backing harmony does not change for 8 bars (note how the piano pattern doesn’t change). (Starting at 0:43, the harmonic rhythm speeds up to a change per 2 bars, which is still quite slow.)

Now let’s listen to the remix:

Again, let’s start where the main melody comes in, at 0:11. Ignoring the fact that, yes, the rhythm of the track is faster, note how quickly the harmonies shift now, and how, for once, they’re not happening at regular intervals:

• very slight, subtle shift almost immediately at 0:12
• harmonic shift at 0:16 to complement the melody change
• two rapid-fire changes at 0:19 at 0:20

This is a really good illustration, I think, of how harmonic rhythm can affect the pacing and feel of a track.

In summary, harmonic rhythm is simply the measure of harmonic change over time. In the same way that changes in rhythm can affect our perception of speed or excitement, harmonic rhythm can be manipulated to affect our perception of the musical story, building anticipation by accelerating or slowing things down by ceasing to change. Try looking out for harmonic rhythm in your everyday listening, and try to notice how it changes, and how it manipulates how you feel at certain points in the track!

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I hope you found this Quick Concepts article interesting and educational. Let me know if you know any particularly interesting implementations of harmonic rhythm in the comments below! Thanks for reading 🙂

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