The third unit in Lona Kozik’s unique music theory course teaches harmony and style, featuring works by Schubert, Chopin and Brahms
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Why does Chopin sound like Chopin? Or does Brahms sound like Brahms?
Harmony, History & Style looks at the answers to such questions through the lens of harmony. In this course, you will:
One of the best things music theory does is to help you understand the specifics of musical style. When you understand style, you can play better, teach better and hear more when you listen to the music.
But to truly understand style, you have to locate it within a historical narrative. This unique course blends analysis and music history to produce deeper understanding and engagement with classical music.
In the third unit of Harmony, History & Style, we move into the lush and expressive world of Romantic piano music, where harmony blossoms into new colours and textures. Our focus will be on three iconic works: Schubert’s Impromptu in G-Flat major, Chopin’s Prelude in E minor and Brahms’s Intermezzo in A major. These pieces reveal how Romantic composers expanded the harmonic palette, weaving unexpected twists and turns into melodies that speak straight to the heart.
Together, we’ll explore how Schubert, Chopin, and Brahms use richer chord colours, borrow harmonies from related keys, and create drama with surprising resolutions. You’ll discover how secondary chords and subtle chromatic inflections heighten expression and how moments of harmonic ambiguity keep the listener leaning in. By the end of this unit, you’ll have a deeper understanding of the Romantic sound world — and new tools to bring that depth into your own playing and listening!
The course combines online content comprising video lessons and activities which are followed-up with live online workshops. The video lessons introduce concepts which are then put into practice in analysis exercises which are reviewed in the workshops. These sessions also provide an opportunity to ask questions arising from the course content and are recorded. Therefore you can send questions rising from the materials and exercises in advance and also watch the recordings afterwards if you are unable to join us live.
The unit is divided into six live sessions — two for each piece. Our first meeting for each work will open the score and set the stage for your own analysis; the second will bring us back together to share discoveries and insights. Along the way, we’ll uncover how these composers drew on borrowed chords, unexpected resolutions, and subtle chromatic colour to craft music that continues to move listeners today.
This course is suitable for pianists of all levels and is ideal for anyone who has a basic working knowledge of chords but wants to gain a deeper understanding of how harmony works.
I have been teaching music theory and composition since I began my graduate education in 1999. While studying for my MA in Music Composition at the University of Pennsylvania, I started teaching music theory to Penn undergraduates. I have since taught music theory and composition at Interlochen Arts Camp in Michigan, Plymouth University (UK), Dartington College of Arts (UK), and in my own studio at home. I own and operate the Totnes School of Piano.
I entered my undergraduate studies completely focussed on studying piano performance, but I quickly found that studying music theory improved my sight-reading and my ability to memorise music; it heightened my musical expression and understanding at the piano; and it eventually led me to composing music.
I hold dual undergraduate degrees in piano performance and music theory, an MA and PhD in composition from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and two MFAs in performance (improvisation emphasis) and electronic music and recording media from Mills College in California, where I won the Flora Boyd Piano Performance Prize in 2011.
But most importantly, I have a passion for teaching music theory. I believe it is the key that unlocks all musical treasures. It can be engaging in its own right, but music theory, for me, is best viewed as a means toward greater musical expression and creativity!
Read what participants in earlier parts of this course have to say...
"Lona Kozik's course took us on a fascinating journey into diatonic chromatic harmony and its development through the centuries. The deep dive into the harmonic and structural analysis of each well known piece we studied not only opened up a fresh understanding of the piece itself, but also provided a window into the mind of the composer and the way he chose to use chords and harmonic progressions (both the ordinary and extraordinary). The theoretical understanding we gained provided us with tools to analyse our own repertoire more thoroughly and to be able to interpret it in ways that we may have otherwise missed.
This course would be hugely beneficial to so many different types of musicians - piano/instrumental teachers, theory teachers and performers.
Lona is a wonderful teacher, whose own enthusiasm for the material is evident in her clear and articulate presentations. I highly recommend this course to all musicians!"