Mystery Score #3: Music Examples

Question 1

168 MAURICE RAVEL, Le tombeau de Couperin

Answer 1

• Minuet and Trio
• Difference from Debussy
  
  • Minuet (starts at beginning)
    
    • Repeat signs
  • Page 57 Trio begins
  • Instead of just repeating the minuet (what you expect in a classical score) he actually writes it out vs repeat signs (p 62)
• Neoclassical elements
  
  • OrchestrationStrings + smaller wind section (no brass)
  • Flutes, Oboes …
  • Horns, Trumpets
  • Harp
• Texture
  
  • Monodic
    
    • Clear monodic line on top, treble dominated
    • Ensemble provides Harmonic background
• FORM:
  
  • Minuet and Trio (rounded binary) but final repeat is written out
• Harmonic Plan
  
  • Much more harmonic motion vs Debussy (little direction)
• Contrast to the Haydn Minuet (119c)
  
  • Treble dominated style
  • Classical style harmony

Question 2

165 Mahler, Kindertotenlieder

Answer 2

• Composed between 1901-1903
  
  • Middle to early part of his career
  • Myth: Songs for dead children
    
    • Mahler experienced much loss, but AFTER these pieces were composed. Not autobiographical. Not a reaction to those deaths of his family.
• GENRE: Accompanied Song Cycle
  
  • Song cycle (Schubert) + accompanied by an orchestra (vs piano)
  • One soloist- orchestra can out power a singer
• Poems by Friedrich Rueckert (1788-1866)
  
  • A generation before Mahler
  • Poetry is on the death of children of the poet. Honest reactions to the death of his own children. Deeply personal. Poems were never published. They were found after the death of Rueckert. Not intended for a wide audience (p. 21)
• Transcendent Themes
  
  • Mahler was preoccupied with the transcendent nature of the human spirit (what happens after you die)
  • Very sad, but glimmer of hope at the end. (Children are in a better place, done suffering)
• Large but sparse orchestration
  
  • Large variety of instruments)
  • How it’s orchestrated, sparse
  • Easier to see in the score
  • 1-2 instruments playing at a time
• Stark contrasts between (transcendence idea)
  
  • major/minor and chromaticism/diatonicism
    
    • Joyful / Sadness
• TEXTURE:
  
  • Wagner: Everyone playing all the time
  • Mahler: Few instruments at a time (Kindertotenlieder)
• IDIOMATIC
  
  • Vocalist
    
    • Mahler wrote very well for vocalists
  • Instrumentalists
    
    • Hard to play, doesn’t make sense idiomatically

Question 3

Mahler, Symphony No. 2 / No. 5

Answer 3

• Not in Anthology, Recording on Spotify Playlist.
• Unpublished program (Transcendent)
  
  • Not in your program at the premiere
  • Focus on the transcendence ideas
• Fairly direct references to Beethoven
  
  • Use of vocalists/choir
  • Prevalent use of motives
    
    • Beethoven developed symphonies motivically
  • Symphonic Funeral Rite
    
    • Beethoven’s funeral march, another connection to Beethoven
• Sounds like Star Wars
• Length of the piece is long (1:20:00)

Question 4

172 Schoenberg, Pierrot lunaire

Answer 4

• From his Expressionist period
  
  • Only time he is writing to portray extramusical ideas
• CHARACTER:
  
  • Pierrot: Commedia del arte character
  • Schoenberg is interested in music history. He is pulling a character from a stock character from the 17th-century
• GENRE:
  
  • Melodrama for speaker and ensemble
  • Song Cycle telling a story
• Expressionism characteristics:
  
  • Unraveling of Pierrot’s mind
  • Who song is Pierrot going crazy
    
    • Song 1: Dark giant black moths are killing him / blocking out the sun
    • Song 2: Moon is coming down to behead him with a scimitar
• Atonal: no pitch center
• Melodrama for speaker and ensemble
• Interest in Timbre:
  
  • Sprechstimme (Speak singing)
  • Chamber Orchestra
    
    • Bass clarinet, cello, singer, piano
  • Extended Techniques
• Melodrama for speaker and ensemble
• Nacht:
  
  • Developing Variation
  • Motivic “Passacaglia”