Passamezzo moderno

The Gregory Walker or passamezzo moderno (modern half step, also quadran, quadrant, quadro pavan) was "one of the most popular harmonic formulae in the Renaissance period, divides into two complementary strains thus:"

I|IV|I|V|| I|IV|I-V|I||

(Middleton 1990, p.117).

Which is as follows in C Major:

C|F|C|G|| C|F|C-G|C||

The progression or ground bass, the major mode variation of the passamezzo antico, originated in Italian and French dance music during the first half of the 1500s, where it was often used with a contrasting progression or section known as ripresi. Though one of Thomas Morley's characters in Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke denigrates the Gregory Walker, comparing unskilled singing to its sound, it was popular in both pop/popular/folk and classical musics through 1700. It's popularity was revived in the mid nineteenth century and the American variant (below) evolved into the twelve bar blues. (van der Merwe 1989, p.198–201)

Examples

• several in The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book
• "Up and Ware Them A Willie"?
• "Jimmie Rose"?
• "Darling Nelly Gray"
• "The Old 97"
• Woody Guthrie's "There is a House in This Old Town"
• Irving Berlin's "Alexander's Ragtime Band"
• The Beatles' "I Saw Her Standing There" (1963)
• The Rolling Stones' "Honky Tonk Women" (1969)
• Carole King's "You've Got a Friend" (1971)

(ibid)

The American Gregory Walker is a variation in which the subdominant (IV) chords become the progression IV-I, popular in parlour music. (ibid, p.201–202)

I|IV-I|I|V|| I|IV-I|I-V|I||

(Middleton 1990, p.117).

Which is as follows in C Major:

C|F-C|C|G|| C|F-C|C-G|C||

Examples

• "Jesse James"
• "The Titanic"
• "My Little Old Sod Shanty"
• "Cottonfields"
• "Gus Cannon's "Walk Right In" (1929)

(ibid)

External link

• Musica Viva: The Encyclopedia of music: Passamezzo

Sources

• Middleton, Richard (1990/2002). Studying Popular Music. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0335152759.
• van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0193161214.