There’s Even More to Playing the Piano


Chapter 3 - Cadences

Most music is constructed from phrases – often four-bars long – each of which ends with a “breath” in the melody. These “breaths” are known as cadences. More specifically, the last two chords of each phrase are known as the cadence. Cadences can be equated to punctuation marks:The imperfect cadence sounds like a breathing point, but not the end of the piece. It is therefore similar to a comma. The first chord can be anything (often I, II or IV); the second chord is always V. The perfect cadence sounds like...

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