Heinrich Schenker, Harmonielehre (1906)

This continues from the previous post. I am tracing the line of influence from Sechter through Bruckner to Schenker and Schoenberg. As Wason summarizes the difference between these latter two, "if Schenker's Harmonielehre was written to build a 'bridge from composition to theory,' Schoenberg's was an attempt to build a bridge from Viennese Fundamental Bass theory to the new
music of the early twentieth century" (Wason 1982, 235). By 'bridge from composition to theory,' Schenker means that he intends his book to be comprehensive, neither merely speculative (or scientific) nor merely a series of mechanical exercises (Wason, 230).

The book, therefore, is in the traditional two parts: theoretical and practical. In the theoretical part, there are two divisions: systems (major, minor, modes) and intervals and harmonies. Under harmonies, there are three sections: three-note chords, four-note chords, and five- and more-note chords. These last are labeled "angeblich" (supposed or alleged). Nevertheless, Schenker gives sixteen pages to the dominant ninth chord and ten to the others.

He first criticizes the textbooks that allow a dominant ninth chord on the basis of stacked thirds but then restrict or forbid inversions. He then rejects the ninth chord as an independent harmony. In effect, it is a chimera, an accidental result of substitution (Vertretung). The three diatonic chords V, V7, and viiø7 share the diminished fifth ^7-^4 and therefore can substitute for one another (why the triadic vii° is missing is not clear) (1906, 249-251). He says that the space of the ninth these three chords share has deceived some into thinking that they can create a ninth chord from it (251; "Nun hat offenbar der Raum der None aber, innerhalb dessen die Vertretung der (verwandten) eindeutigen Akkorde sich abspielt, die täuschende Wirkung ausgeübt, dass man darauf verfiel, die Erscheinung unbewußt als eine Nonenakkordbildung zu kreieren"). This, of course, is no more an argument than those that reject inversions because they are "harsh"—it just offers us a different sort of statement of rejection of the ninth than we have seen in earlier authors.

Thus, although Schenker is said to have derived some of his system from Bruckner, his attitude toward the ninth chord is definitely more conservative, indeed is rather more negative even than Sechter's.

Schenker's repertoire examples—from Mozart, Chopin, and Wagner—are all about the minor dominant ninth, and so they are of less interest to us here. I will reproduce just one of them as a sample:

Reference:

• Heinrich Schenker, Harmonielehre (1906).    Source:  IMSLP; digital facsimile of a copy of unknown provenance. I did not have the Mann Borgese translation available at time of writing.
• Arnold Schoenberg, Harmonielehre (1912/3rd ed. 1922).   Source: Internet Archive; digital facsimile of a copy of unknown provenance.
• Simon Sechter, tr. C. C. Müller, The Correct Order of Fundamental Harmonies: A Treatise of Fundamental Basses, and their Inversions and Substitutes (1871).   Source: Internet Archive; digital facsimile of a copy in the Brigham Young University Library.
• Simon Sechter, Die richtige Folge der Grundharmonien, oder vom Fundamentalbass und dessen Umkehrungen und Stellvertretern (1853).   Source: Internet Archive; digital facsimile of a copy in the Wellesley College library.  
• Simon Sechter, Die Grundsätze der musikalischen Komposition. Part 1: Die richtige Folge der Grundharmonien, oder vom Fundamentalbass und dessen Umkehrungen und Stellvertretern (1853). Part 2: (1854). Part 3: (1854). Source: Google Books; digital facsimile of a copy in the Harvard University library.
• Robert W. Wason, Viennese Harmonic Theory from Albrechtsberger to Schenker and Schoenberg (1985). Reprint edition, 1995. Edited version of "Fundamental Bass Theory in Nineteenth Century Vienna," PhD diss., Yale University, 1981. I am using this last as a source because it is readily accessible to me.