The Appreciation of Music - Vol. 1 (of 3)

EXAMPLE FOR ANALYSIS, No. 6.
Bach: Sarabande in A-Minor from English Suite II

The melodic germ from which the piece is developed is the following very serious and earnest phrase:

[PNG] [Listen]

FIGURE XX.—THEME OF BACH SARABANDE

a phrase in which great depth of almost tragic feeling is expressed. Against this is set, for the sake of relief, the lighter and more suave melody of measures 5 and 6, treated in freely sequential fashion. The whole sarabande is built from these two brief melodic figures.

This sarabande serves as an admirable illustration of the type of beauty common in the music of Bach. Its phraseology, if we may use the term, is quite different from that in use in the music of to-day; it is full of quaint and archaic turns of musical speech—formal sequences, little motives that sound to us almost mechanical. It is like an etching of D?rer's, full of detail, each line carefully drawn, and the whole picture instinct with life. Thus its type of beauty differs so materially from that to which we are accustomed that it often fails in its appeal. Only by using our imagination are we able to project ourselves, so to speak, into another milieu, another time, another point of view. And this is the test with which any archaic work of art confronts us. Without imagination in the beholder a picture by Botticelli, for example, is a curiosity rather than a work of art. Its strange allegory, its quaint idea of landscape, its figures with their unusual posing—all these are beautiful or merely curious according as we look at them. "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder."

The repetition at a higher pitch of the main motive in measures 3-4 is highly poignant; and throughout the expression is intensified by the use of rich and often complex harmony, as particularly in the last four measures of all.

Notwithstanding the earnest and impassioned character of this sarabande, its derivation from the dance is clearly revealed in the regularity of the balance of phrases consisting of equal measure groups, which divide up as follows: 2, 2, 4, 4 (double-bar); 2, 2, 4, 2, 2, 4. The symmetry is much more precise than in an invention or a fugue.

The form is binary or two-part. Part one, measures 1-12, begins in A-minor and ends in the "relative major," the key of C. Part two, measures 13-28, begins (with the original motive) in C-major, and returns to A-minor.

The sequence of measures 23-24, with measures 21-22, is very beautiful and deserves special notice.

Following the sarabande the reader will observe a more florid version of it, bearing the caption, "Les agr?ents de la m?e Sarabande"—"Ornaments for the same Sarabande." This is an example of the practice, common in Bach's day, of weaving a net-work of grace-notes, trills, and other decorations about a melody, a practice due in part to the natural fondness of all musicians for "effect," and in part to the fact that the instruments of that day were so small and poor that a tone could only be sustained by being struck many times. This custom of ornamenting melodies with all manner of embroidery gave rise to the "theme and variations," a form which we shall study later.

All the other English Suites of Bach contain very beautiful sarabandes; those in the French Suites are less interesting, though the first contains a fine example.

All of Bach's twelve suites end with gay and vigorous gigues, the most rollicking of all the dances used. This is natural enough, in view of the desirability of closing the suite with an impression of energetic vitality. These gigues are in the headlong 6-8 or 12-8 meter; they are polyphonic in texture, and constructed in the binary form. Often-times a high degree of contrapuntal skill is shown in their composition, but usually this does not interfere with their light and almost careless character. A curious feature of most of them is that in the second half the motive is inverted or turned upside down.

EXAMPLE FOR ANALYSIS, No. 7.

Bach: Gigue, from French Suite IV in E-Flat.

Theme of Gigue, Bach's French Suite IV, and its Inversion.

[PNG] [Listen]

Inversion of theme, beginning of second half.

[PNG] [Listen]

FIGURE XXI.

The gay little theme is composed of two motives, as indicated in Figure XXI, in which the long brackets show the theme and its imitation by the second voice to enter, and the short brackets show its component motives, of contrasting character. In measures 5 and 6 the theme is again imitated by the third voice (left hand part). In the course of the development a still more lively figure makes its appearance in measures 19, 23, 24 and 25.

The now familiar sequences are found at every turn. The form is binary (Part I, measures 1-26; Part II, measures 27-60). The inversion of the theme, shown in Figure XXI, makes the subject of the second half. The key-system is perfectly simple. Part I modulates from the tonic, E-flat, to the dominant, B-flat; Part II begins there and returns to the home-key.

III. THE HISTORIC IMPORTANCE OF THE SUITE.

In the course of the eighteenth century the suite gradually waned in popularity, and gave place to the more highly organic sonata. Modern suites, notable among which are such delightful works as Bizet's "L'Arlesienne," Grieg's "Peer Gynt," Dvor?'s Suite for small orchestra, opus. 39, Tschaikowsky's "Nut-Cracker Suite," and Brahms's "Serenades" for orchestra, are, after all, exceptional and infrequent, and not the inevitable mould in which the composer casts his ideas.

But the historical importance of the suite was great, and it fell into disuse only after its lessons had been thoroughly learned. Through it musicians developed the dance element which must always be one of the two main strands of all music; through it they learned to substitute for the ancient polyphonic style which is suitable to voices the homophonic style best adapted to the capacities and the limitations of instruments; and through it they became familiar with those simple binary and ternary forms in which such instrumental music is most conveniently and effectively cast.

Thus the suite formed the bridge between, on the one hand, (a) crude folk-songs, (b) primitive dances, and (c) strict polyphonic forms such as the invention and the fugue, and on the other, the sonatas, quartets, concertos, and symphonies of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven.

SUGGESTIONS FOR COLLATERAL READING.

Dickinson: "The Study of the History of Music," Chapters XIII and XIV. Parry: "Evolution of the Art of Music," Chapters VIII and IX; Mason: "Beethoven and His Forerunners," Chapter IV.