On Wenlock Edge

Question 1

Ralph Vaughn Williams

Answer 1

• 1872-1958 (English composer)

- Most famous pieces include The Lark Ascending for Violin

Question 2

Vaughn Williams influences

Answer 2

• English folk song. Some aspects of folk music style, particularly modality influences his own musical style.
• English choral tradition, notably Tudor church music of composers such as Thomas Tallis.
• French ‘impressionist’ composers. Vaughn Williams studied with Ravel in Paris shortly before writing On Wenlock Edge. This influence can be hears right from the first bars of the song cycle, with the use of tremolo strings and parallel harmonies. The bell effects in ‘Bredon Hill’ are reminiscent of Debussy’s piece ‘The submerged cathedral’

Question 3

On Wenlock Edge key facts

Answer 3

• It is a song cycle written in 1909 (quite early in William’s career)
• A group of six songs setting poems from ‘A Shropshire Lad by A.E Housman’ written in 1896.
• The poems describe rural life and convey a nostalgic sense of lost innocence

Number 1,3,5 are studied

Question 4

Describe the instrumentation and vocal style of the work as a whole

Answer 4

• Instrumentation is unusual for Vaughn Williams
• The combination of a solo voice and a piano quintet is extremely rare.
• He supplied an alternative part for solo piano that could be used in the absence of a string quartet

Question 5

Describe the features of the piano style

Answer 5

• Block chords. This type of homophonic style is particularly apparent in the last song to illustrate the sound of church bells
• Trills (e.g bar 33 in the first song)
• Parallel chords (e.g bar 2 first song where there are parallel first inversions)
• Una corda (1 string) i.e use the left ‘soft’ pedal.
• tre corde (three strings) e.g. bar 9 of ‘Is My Team Ploughing’
• Ostinato accompaniments. Semiquaver ostinato figures from bar 5 of the first song
• Rapid arpeggios (e.g bar 31 in the first song)

Question 6

Describe the features of the strings

Answer 6

• Tremolo strings feature right from the start in combination with pizzicato from the cello. Cello here also uses tenor clef.
• Cello in bar 8 has triple stopped pizzicato
• Sul ponticello is used from bar 57 of the first song. (creates an unnatural metallic tone quality) Here it is used for word painting to illustrate the gale in the text. Vaughn Williams uses the term ‘naturale’ to return to normal bowing technique
• The instrumentation is reduced to a solo cello and piano in bar 9 of ‘Is my Team Ploughing. Also just a piano is uses in bar 52 of ‘Bredon Hill’
• Con sordino (e.g end of ‘Is My Team Ploughing) they are also marked FF at this point so the mute is used to tone quality rather than to make the music quieter.
• > a PP muted effect can be heard at the beginning of ‘Bredon Hill’ where the upper strings have double stops
• A combination of pizzicato and arco is used to suggest the sound of bells in the last song (e.g bar 100)
• Open harmonics are used for the string chords the end of ‘Bredon Hill’. They illustrate another bell effect.

Question 7

Describe the vocal style

Answer 7

• For a tenor soloist
• Not particularly virtuosic
• There are occasional high notes such as the top A for the word ‘dead’ in ‘dead man’s sweetheart ‘Is my Team Ploughing’ bust most of the music is within the standard tenor range
• Mainly syllabic. There are occasional melismas, e.g bar 31 of ‘Bredon Hill’ on the word ‘happy’
• Frequent use of an anacrusis to fit the iambic nature of much of the poetry. E.g beginning words of ‘Bredon Hill’

In/summertime on/Bredon The/bells they sound so /clear

• At the beginning of ‘Is My Team Ploughing’ the solo tenor sings in recitative style.
• Free tempo at the end of ‘Bredon Hill’

Question 8

Describe the Melodic style

Answer 8

• Modal style of the folk song-influenced writing right at the beginning of the first song.
• Opening vocal line has a restricted note range. Pentatonic outline as only 4 notes are used before the F on the word ‘Wrekin’.
• Repeated notes to emphasise the power of the gale (bears 11-12)
• style changes after the forte climax in bar 13 as the voice descends chromatically. This change adds to the drama of the storm.
• Recitative style at the beginning of the second of the songs is in Dorian mode. (D-D with flattened 3rd and 7th)
• First song begins with a simple diatonic modal start leading to a more chromatic style. The beginning of the song is mainly conjunct.
• Bredon hill begins in the standard key of G major but flattened 7th indicates modal writing. (Mixolydian)

Question 9

Describe the rhytm and metre

Answer 9

• Triplets and sextuplets are heard from the beginning of the first song
• The sextuplet semiquavers at bar 3 produce a cross-rhythm with the semiquavers in the piano left hand
• From bar 31, there are hemidemisemiquavers in the piano part
• Long notes in ‘Is My Team Ploughing’ to allow the voice to sing in free time in the manner of a recitative
• Frequent time signature changes combines with speed changes
• ‘Bredon Hill’ features sustained bell chords using tied semibreves
• Vaughn Williams careful attention to the accentuation of syllables and an attempt to reach as closely as possible the natural rhythms of speech

Question 10

Describe the texture

Answer 10

• Beginning of the first song there are parallel first inversions
• piano doubles the upper string parts here while the pizzicato
• Reduced texture towards the end (bar 50-54) The song ends with the piano on its own
• Homorhythmic at the start of “Is My Team Ploughing” all instruments move together
• Chordal homophony in the strings allows the voice to sing in free tempo
• Bar 50, tutti FF
• “Bredon Hill’ features solemn sustained chords imitating the sound of bells
• Mel- Dom-Hom in “Bredon HIll’ as the voice enters over the sustained chords allowing for a recitative like freedom

Question 11

Describe the Tonality and harmony

Answer 11

• Lots of consonant harmony e.g. first chord of the piece is Eb in first inversion
• Parallel chords feature from bar 1. This is a typical impressionist feature
• False relation in bar 3 between the Db in the cello and the D natural in the following quaver in the second violin
• The modal character of much of the harmony is shown as early as bar 3 when the note G appears as the tonic of pentatonic style harmony
• Dissonance appears for the word ‘gale’ (example of word painting)
• Chromatic chordal movement (bar 14-15) or ‘heaving hill’ chromatic slides (bar 37)
• Dorian harmony heard at the beginning of ‘Is My Team Ploughing’
• Seventh chords dominate ‘Bredon Hill’

Question 12

Structure of No.1 “On Wenlock Edge”

Answer 12

5 verses in Housman’s text

Overall structure is AABBA/B where the last verse combines both A and B elements

Question 13

Structure of No.3 “Is My Team Ploughing?”

Answer 13

Vaughn Williams omits the third and fourth verses of Housman’s poem

The structure of the song is modified strophic with three pairs of verses:

1. AB
2. AB
3. A1B1

Question 14

Structure of No.3 “Bredon Hill”

Answer 14

Seven verse structure is:

Introduction-A-A-B-B1-C-D-A1-postlude