Contrapuntal Aspects of the Mystic Chord and Scriabin's Piano Sonata No. 5

TL;DR

This paper uses computational and statistical methods to analyze the role of the mystic chord in Scriabin's Piano Sonata No. 5, revealing a significant shift in counterpoint characteristics between passages.

Contribution

It introduces a quantitative approach to studying the mystic chord's role in Scriabin's composition through statistical analysis of counterpoint symmetries.

Findings

Significant difference in counterpoint symmetries between passages

Quantitative evidence of the mystic chord's importance

Identification of a qualitative change in musical structure

Abstract

We present statistical evidence for the importance of the "mystic chord" in Scriabin's Piano Sonata No. 5, Op. 53, from a computational and mathematical counterpoint perspective. More specifically, we compute the effect sizes and $\chi^{2}$ tests with respect to the distributions of counterpoint symmetries in the Fuxian and mystic counterpoint worlds in two passages of the work, which provide evidence of a qualitative change between them.