Van Canto = Hero-metal a cappella (not counting the drummer)!

Power chords are interval distances taken from a triad (the backbone of tonal music); –i.e. the root and the fifth.  I always think of bagpipes when I think of power chords, although the highland bagpipe’s drones are tuned to octave A’s, not a perfect fifth (octaves and perfect fifths are a specific musical distance apart). 

There’s true energy in the interval;  energy enough to hear and judge the temper of the intervals (temper = how equal the step sizes are).  The piano tuner I apprenticed with during my college years taught me to tune a tempered octave by equalizing the beating you can hear between a P4 and P5(perfect 4th and perfect 5th). It’s quite easy to hear if  the P4 beats are much slower or faster than the p5 (but you should mute 2 of the 3 string of a piano’s notes before trying this, else you could get too much interference to tell if motion is present).

So what’s this got to do with choirs?  Hang on–…I’m getting to that.

Plainsong was originally sung in unison, but by the middle of the 9th century, music historians tell us that it was common for people to sing songs in parallel P4ths, P5ths, and P8ths.   Power Chord harmony!

It wasn’t until the 1300s that folks got tired of power chords and started to phase it out.  

Imagine that!  Folks in the Dark Ages got tired of power chords…funny stuff!

 Actually, power chords in vocal music never really died.    And this style of voicing is re-emerging and becoming fashionable. 

 http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1704683,00.html

(thanks ypulse via Listenerd)

And there’s a new movie,too (which I just ordered for my classes.). 

You can check it out here:

http://www.awakemysoul.com/

 Power chords for choirs.  

Rock on!