Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The second tone of a diatonic scale.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In music, the tone in a scale next above the tonic or keynote; the second, as A in the scale of G.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Mus.) The note next above the keynote; the second of the scale.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun music The second note in a diatonic scale.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun (music) the second note of a diatonic scale

Etymologies

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Examples

  • The major third prediction is brought about all the more strongly by having heard the tonic and supertonic from the western equal-tempered system already, i.e. why would the audience sing any other third tuned differently when they have already been placed within the western tuning system from the initial equal tempered notes?

    World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale on Vimeo 2010

  • In this respect Palestrina's later style is apparent; but in harmonic terms he is still under Josquin's influence in, for instance, regularly using the minor supertonic triad even when it is leading to the dominant chord.

    Archive 2009-04-01 Lu 2009

  • As to the "Egyptian" sound, the whole exotic "Egyptian" scale, with its flattened supertonic was invented by Verdi for Aida it's about as authentic as Sir Walter Scott's version of Scotland but everyone since has used it from Maurice Jarre in Lawrence of Arabia to Jerry Goldsmith in The Mummy.

    Music to paint by legatus hedlius 2008

  • As to the "Egyptian" sound, the whole exotic "Egyptian" scale, with its flattened supertonic was invented by Verdi for Aida it's about as authentic as Sir Walter Scott's version of Scotland but everyone since has used it from Maurice Jarre in Lawrence of Arabia to Jerry Goldsmith in The Mummy.

    Archive 2008-10-01 legatus hedlius 2008

  • Like that dominant pedal that was supposed to have upset Haydn's contemporaries: Kramer never mentions that it resolves an earlier pedal on the flatted supertonic, a much more radical and ear-catching formal device than a dominant pedal.

    'Music à La Mode' Kramer, Lawrence 1994

  • In the last measure but one, both the supertonic and leading tone should appear.

    A Treatise on Simple Counterpoint in Forty Lessons Friedrich Johann Lehmann

  • Castelvetrano, but had not noticed that it was a particularly noisy place, indeed, I could no more have distinguished between the tranquillity of Castelvetrano and that of the mountain than between the acute and the grave supertonic.

    Diversions in Sicily Henry Festing Jones 1889

  • In ascending they pass over the grave supertonic and take the acute supertonic, and in descending they pass over the acute supertonic and take the grave supertonic; the two supertonics being only a comma apart, as the two islands are only a very little way from one another.

    Diversions in Sicily Henry Festing Jones 1889

  • It's a lively melody in 9/8, ending on the supertonic.

    The Sandgate Lass on the Ropery Banks 1872

  • The Roman numeral analysis for the D7 chord would be V7/ii - that is, the dominant seventh chord of the supertonic chord (ii) in our original key.

    Recently Uploaded Slideshows 2010

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