page_title: Chromaticism
section_title: Development of chromaticism
hierarchical_section_title: Chromaticism / Development of chromaticism
caption_attribution_description: English: Mode mixture. The four consonant triads of the harmonic minor scale may be assimilated into the major scale or substituted for the expected major scale triads.
context_page_description: Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic pitches and chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. Chromaticism is in contrast or addition to tonality or diatonicism and modality. Chromatic elements are considered, "elaborations of or substitutions for diatonic scale members".
  Not only at the beginning of a composition but also in the midst of it, each scale-step [degree] manifests an irresistible urge to attain the value of the tonic for itself as that of the strongest scale-step. If the composer yields to this urge of the scale-step within the diatonic system of which this scale-step forms part, I call this process tonicalization and the phenomenon itself chromatic.
  — Heinrich Schenker
  Chromaticism is almost by definition an alteration of, an interpolation in or deviation from this basic diatonic organization.
  — Leonard B. Meyer
  Throughout the nineteenth century, composers felt free to alter any or all chord members of a given tertian structure [chord built from thirds] according to their compositional needs and dictates. Pronounced or continuous chordal alteration [and 'extension'] resulted in chromaticism.
context_section_description: The following timeline is abbreviated from its presentation by Benward & Saker:
  Baroque Period (1600—1750) "The system of major and minor scales developed during the early part of the baroque period. This coincided with the emergence of key consciousness in music."
  Classical Period (1750—1825) "The major and minor keys where the basis of music in the classical period. Chromaticism was decorative for the most part and shifts from one key to another...were used to create formal divisions."
  Romantic Period (1825—1900) "Chromaticism increased to the point that the major—minor key system began to be threatened. By the end of the period, keys often shifted so rapidly in the course of a composition that tonality itself began to break down."
  Post-Romantic and Impressionistic Period (1875—1920) "With the breakdown of the major—minor key system, impressionist composers began to experiment with other scales....particularly...pentatonic, modal, and whole-tone scales."
  Contemporary Period (1920—present) "The chromatic scale has predominated in much of the music of our period."
  Jazz and Popular Music (1900—present) "Popular music has remained the last bastion of the major-minor key system....The blues scale ["a chromatic variant of the major scale"] is often found in jazz and popular music with blues influence."
  As tonality began to expand during the last half of the nineteenth century, with new combinations of chords, keys and harmonies being tried, the chromatic scale and chromaticism became more widely used, especially in the works of Richard Wagner, such as the opera "Tristan und Isolde". Increased chromaticism is often cited as one of the main causes or signs of the "break down" of tonality, in the form of increased importance or use of:
  mode mixture
  leading tones
  tonicization of each chromatic step and other secondary key areas
  modulatory space
  hierarchical organizations of the chromatic set such as George Perle's
  the use of non-tonal chords as tonic "keys"/"scales"/"areas" such as the Tristan chord.
  As tonal harmony continued to widen and even break down, the chromatic scale became the basis of modern music written using the twelve-tone technique, a tone row being a specific ordering or series of the chromatic scale, and later serialism. Though these styles/methods continue to (re)incorporate tonality or tonal elements, often the trends that led to these methods were abandoned, such as modulation.
caption: Mode mixture, using minor triads in the major key[10]
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