How do you harmonize when your singing a duet?

Answer 1

You don't. I don't, either. But four of us could, each taking one 'voice' of the harmony.

It is not possible for humans to sing four notes simultaneously. (Yes, I know there are monks who can sing more than one note: they actually sing one note, and use the resonance of their throats and sinus cavities to reinforce harmonics of that one note. Even then, they can't produce more than the two sounds simultaneously, and they can't produce any intervals that are note defined as harmonics over the sung note.)

Four-part harmony is also called 'classical' harmony, because the rules for writing this kind of harmony developed out of the Classical tradition. It consists of four voices moving through harmonic progressions based on chord progressions, with each voice following certain rules of motion and certain overall rules which limit how the voices can move in relation to each other. These rules can be summarized as ways of avoiding bad-sounding chords and severe changes in sound.

Only instruments that can produce more than one note at a time, like keyboard instruments, Guitars, etc, can play four-part harmony alone. For singers, it takes four to tango!

Answer 2

A normal C chord in four part harmony would be CEGC; the bass note is repeated.

When you do a first inversion you take the tonic (in this case C) of the chord and put it on top: EGCC. Rather than the bass note being repeated you repeat the tonic of the chord.

If you are referring to how to use Ib in a chord progression it can just be used instead of chord I so you get better voice leading plus the progression becomes a lot less chunky.

Answer 3

Harmonising is when a note is matched or harmonised by another note.

Most vocal harmonies harmonise using 3rds, 4th, 5ths and Octaves.

Learning how to Harmonise can be a chore because you'll want automatically sing along with the main harmony as it's the stronger part.

If you have a piano play just play a C and then play an E and hear the birght happy relation they have, and then sing/hum the C and E relation and then try and play a C and then hum the E without the piano playing the E.

For more harmony practices,

C - E = Major 3rd

C - D#/Eb = Minor 3rd

C - F = Perfect Fourth

C - G = Perfect Fith

C - C = Octave

Practice makes perfect, try and listen to some of your favourite bands with back up singers and try and hear the harmonies. It might be hard at first since the back up singers aren't as loud in the mix of the music compared to the lead vocalist.

Answer 4

You need 3 people. One to sing each part. Hense... 3 part harmony.

Answer 5

everly brothers sing in parallet 3rds.

Answer 6

A Quartet