The present chapter contains excerpts from the most striking and, for the history of analysis, probably the most important chapter in Grundlagen: a discussion of polyphonic melody (“The Polyphony of a Single Line,” Grundlagen, 3rd edn., part 3, chapter 8). Kurth devotes eighty-six pages to the topic, making the chapter by far the largest in Grundlagen. Kurth's discussion of polyphonic melody is historically important because it investigates large-scale melodic connections which in some cases resemble, superficially at least, the large-scale melodic continuities discovered at around the same time by Heinrich Schenker (see EKATA, 99, 101–2).

In describing such large-scale continuities, Kurth introduces the notion of the “apparent voice” (Scheinstimme, pp. 279, 282), consisting of registrally related, nonadjacent pitches. The “actual voice” (Realstimme, p. 302) is the note-to-note melodic development. The apparent voice may create an “apex line” (Höhepunktslinie, pp. 273, 275–76), or “rim line” (Randlinie, p. 289). Such lines consist of nonadjacent pitches called “rim points” (Randpunkte, p. 277). Kurth calls the resulting broad melodic continuities “higher-order linear phases” (übergeordnete Linienphasen, p. 272), or simply “overarching lines” (übergreifende Linien, “Zur Motivbildung,” 98–99). They provide “curvilinear intensification” (Kurvensteigerung, p. 272) and thus are essential for creating and regulating dynamic form.

Kurth begins with some general remarks on polyphonic melody and illustrates the idea with a few introductory examples (pp. 258–60).