Ab Major - Research on Harmony - Variation 3

Seven notes played Lent, mp, legato, in four — a bell contour that rises from the sub-bass Ab1 through alternating roots and thirds, cresting at C7. The root appears four times, the third three, the fifth nowhere. Ab and C trade places across six octaves, the two pitch classes weaving around each other in slow, deliberate arcs.

The bottom is heavy and dark: Ab1 and Ab2 together press blue toward black across a wide field. Red emerges in the middle where C3 and C4 sit, warm against the surrounding darkness. Higher, the roots at Ab4 and Ab5 turn to cool gray-blue, and C7 at the summit dissolves to near-white. No blue-violet anywhere — the fifth's absence leaves the palette stripped to two colors, blue and red, dark and warm.

A study in omission. Without the fifth, Ab Major loses its violet dimension and becomes a dialogue between root and third — cool weight below, a slow red glow above.