Class Notes

Notes from Wednesday, March 12 class session:

Preparation For Wed. Mar 12:
1. Read textbook Chapter 5 (Baroque)--pages 31-38 (Music Guides 16, 17, 18)

2. Listen to "Classical Music Online" examples for Baroque Instrumental Music.

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Instrumental Music of the Baroque

(See Chapter 5 for details)

The following bold or bold/italic terms/works/composers were studied:

SUITE: A multi-movement set of dance pieces (often in binary form), played most often by either orchestra or keyboard.

In the Baroque, suites commonly revolved around the following four-movement framework:

[Suite may start with an introductory movement such as a prelude, overture, etc.]

- Allemande: In the Baroque, a stately German dance in 4/4 meter, with a moderate tempo

- Courante: In the Baroque, a moderately-quick French dance in 3/4 meter, with many cross-accents

- Sarabande: a slow, stately, Spanish dance in triple meter (3/2)

[A few other dances may be inserted at this point, before the gigue]

- Gigue: a quick, lively, Irish dance (later French) in compound meter (6/8, 9/8, 12/8 etc)-- we heard in class the "2nd Gigue" from Jacquet de la Guerre's Harpsichord Suite No. 1 (highly ornamented, binary form)

Other common dances of this era:

- Minuet (French, moderate speed, 3/4 meter, aristocratic dance)

- Gavotte (French, moderate 4/4 with a 2-beat pickup to start the phrase)

- Bourree (French, quick double-time 4/4 with a 1-beat pickup to start the phrase)

- Passepied (French, fast, simple, 3/4)

- Forlane (Italian, fast/lilting, compound meter (6/4 or 6/8)--we heard in class the "Forlane" from JS Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 1 (see Music Guide 18/Chapter 5)

Levels/Types of Counterpoint:

IMITATION: one voice starts, other voices echo somewhat freely in succession (works well in vocal music were the words and rhythm are similar or exact in the echoes, but pitches can vary somewhat)

CANON: strict rhythmic and melodic echoing of LEADER and FOLLOWER(S) [thus, effective in both vocal and instrumental idioms]

- Example played in class: Pachelbel's Canon in D (see Music Guide 16/Chapter 5)--see some fun links on the MUS1700 website relating to this piece

FUGUE: a lengthy, complex contrapuntal manipulation of a musical SUBJECT-- Example played in class: JS Bach's "Little Fugue in G minor (see Music Guide 17/Chapter 5)

- SUBJECT=the main idea of a fugue (these tunes are open-ended (they do not fully cadence until the start of the next entrance)

- ANSWER=a transposed echo of the subject

- COUNTERSUBJECT=contrasting melodic material that appears more than once directly against the subject in counterpoint

- Fugal "EXPOSITION"= a section with SUBJECT/ANSWER entries

- "EPISODE"=contrasting section(s) that involve a change of key center, usually accomplished by SEQUENCE (moving material successively by step several times in the same direction, like a melodic stairway that accomplishes a change of pitch level or key)

How to do a basic analysis of a fugue:

- Label Expositions (Mark entrances of the subject/answers, countersubject; Note the key center of each exposition in relation to the main tonality of the piece)

- Label Episodes and Sequences

- Look for advanced techniques (invertible counterpoint, inversion, retrograde, augmentation, diminution)

More advanced fugal techniques:

- STRETTO=a highly dense section of overlapping counterpoint intended to create massive tension.

- INVERTIBLE COUNTERPOINT: Changing the vertical interrelationship of subject vs. countersubject(s)

- INVERSION=a mirror-image presentation of a tune (using same melodic intervals as before, but go up instead of down/down instead of up)

- RETROGRADE= presenting material backwards (end to start)

- AUGMENTATION=doubling the rhythmic values of a subject/countersubject

- DIMINUTION=halfing the rhythmic values of a subject/countersubject