Abstract:This article examines a unique family of six-four sonorities in the works of Richard Strauss. These six-fours typically sound with 6^, 4^, or 2^ (or modal variants thereof) in the bass but occur immediately prior to a cadential dominant, and thus impart a sense of predominant function despite their unstable inversion. In examining how the sixth and fourth behave, I suggest that rather than hearing these chords as consonant inversions of a triad, they can instead be interpreted as accented six-fours; in other w… Show more
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