Leaderboard

One easy way (surely not the best one!) to harmonise a given bass and melody with full chords is to look if you can harmonise everything with three chords, an idea that goes back to the 18th century: the tonic, the dominant and the supertonic, and some simple rules: The tonic (I) starts and ends the piece and can lead to all three chord types; the supertonic (ii) precedes a dominant; a dominant (V) can lead to back to the supertonic or to the tonic. Supertonic and dominant can be used as seventh chords with the seventh being resolved by going one step down, thus the supertonic seventh always leads to the dominant, the dominant seventh always to the tonic. You can use the chords in root position or inversion; the final cadence should see the dominant and tonic in root position. If the music has left the key, simply use the three chords of the new key. See e.g. Daube's Musical Dilletante for more information on this method of harmonising a melody. If you write out which notes belong to which triads and seventh chords, you will easily see which chords can fit to the given melody/bass-combination. There are far better methods than this one, but hardly easier ones.

Here is a violin duet that I have written.

@millert1409 Hi. Yes, you can try (and use, of course) rotations. Let's say if, for example, you have this set: C - Db - F - G# - A, you can reorder: Db - F - G# - A - C F - G# - A - C - Db G# - A - C - Db - F A - C - Db - F - G# --------------------------------------------------- Also you can use the complement set to one you have. Following Forte: The complement of set X is the set consisting of all the pitch classes not contained in X. Also you can use subsets and supersets. Subsets are smaller groups of pitches of an original set. A superset is when you add pitches to a set. This different manipulations can be used in other sections or phrases. I also like to mix different harmonic systems or languages: a PC set can be transformed into harmony by fourths or fifths ir the intervals are present in the set. Then you can make a smooth transition. Or change de PC set into an eclesiastic mode if in the set you have the minimum (tonic and characteristic note).

I like the speed-up and down, very well done!