Advanced Visualization Techniques for Music Theory

Authors such as Hook, Tymozcko, and Cohn have used still imagery to model relation systematic pitch correlation and convey new analytical insights. Here we explore the pedagogical advantages of using industry-level graphic software to produce animations in a visual language to which many users are habituated. This paper describes some of the technological resources and the advantages that they afford. It then presents fixed-image representations, and describes animated ones, of analyses of short cyclic progressions of harmonies in songs by Richard Rodgers (as performed by Ella Fitzgerald) and Nick Cave (as adapted and performed by Johnny Cash), as well as a passage of Schubert.