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AQA A2 Chamber Music from Mendelssohn to Debussy

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AQA A2 Chamber Music from Mendelssohn to Debussy KSKS55 AQA A2 Chamber music from Mendelssohn to Debussy by Alan Charlton Alan Charlton is an author, composer and examiner, and has written numerous books and articles on INTRODUCTION music education. He taught for a number of years at Bedford AoS3b, Chamber Music from Mendelssohn to Debussy, is one of the three options of Section C: Historical School, initially Study of the Unit 4 – Music in Context question paper. In the past, AQA examination questions have typically as a composer- asked students to compare aspects of two works or movements in detail, or comment on stylistic features of in-residence, and has a PhD in the music’s period, drawing examples from works they have studied. Therefore it is essential for students to be composition from able to refer to examples from specific works. the University of Bristol. This article will look at three movements from key chamber music composers from the Romantic period (Mendelssohn, Brahms and Ravel). Each of the three movements has been broken down into the elements of structure, melody, harmony/tonality, instrumental writing and texture, through which the general features of the period can be explored. The three works covered in this article are as follows, for which scores and recordings will be required: Mendelssohn: String Quartet No. 5 in E flat, Op. 44/3, first movement Brahms: Clarinet Trio in A minor, Op. 114, first movement Ravel, String Quartet in F, second movement Romantic chamber music Chamber music is music composed for a small group of musicians, usually performed without a conductor. It was originally intended to be played in a normal room (hence the word ‘chamber’), rather than a large concert hall, and was often written for the enjoyment of the musicians, rather than for public performance. However, it became so popular that public performances of chamber music eventually became commonplace. Well-known examples of chamber music from the Classical period are the string quartets of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. In the Romantic period, many composers continued to compose chamber music, but some, such as Berlioz, Wagner, Verdi and Mahler, wrote very little as they were more interested in exploring the potential of orchestral and operatic music. The best-known chamber music of the Romantic period therefore tends to be that by composers who were more ‘Classical’ in their tastes, being interested in structure and melodic development. Mendlessohn, Schumann, Brahms, Dvorˇák and Tchaikovsky fall into this category. Towards the end of the period, composers such as Schoenberg, Debussy and Ravel also saw the potential to use chamber music as a medium for exploring new forms, textures and harmonies. The main mediums of chamber music in the period were string-based ensembles (string quartets, quintets, sextets and octets), combinations of piano and strings (piano trios, quartets and quintets, as well as duos for a stringed or wind instrument and piano) and mixed ensembles (for instance clarinet quintet, clarinet trio and horn trio). The string quartet The string quartet was the dominant chamber music ensemble of the Romantic period, with examples composed by most of the leading composers of the day. It was an ensemble sufficiently large to produce colourful harmonies such as 7th chords and diminished 7ths, and could create rich textures. Additionally, it was already a well-established grouping, the quartets of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven being widely played, so it was relatively easy for composers to arrange performances of their own quartets in public concerts. Important quartet composers of the period include Mendlessohn, Schumann, Dvorˇák, Brahms, Smetana, Borodin, Tchaikovsky, Schoenberg, Ravel and Debussy. 1 Music Teacher June 2015 The string quartet offered huge possibilities to a skilled composer. The four instruments (two violins, viola and cello) all have large ranges, and are agile and capable of producing a large range of dynamics, effects and degrees of expression. MENDELSSOHN: STRING QUARTET NO. 5 IN E FLAT, OP. 44/3, FIRST MOVEMENT The German composer Felix Mendelssohn was a child prodigy as both a pianist and composer, and he went on to become a prolific composer as well as a conductor and pianist. Much of his earliest chamber music was composed for family members and friends, and by the time of his Octet for stringed instruments (1825), he was already a highly experienced composer who had developed a knack for very idiomatic instrumental writing. He was deeply influenced by the music of JS Bach and Beethoven, and counterpoint plays a very important part in his chamber works, which are deeply rooted in Classical forms. His chamber music output contained six string quartets, two string quintets, the Octet, two piano trios and three piano quintets. His Op. 44 string quartets were composed in 1837–8. STRUCTURE The movement is in sonata form, a well-established musical form that was developed in the Classical period, particularly by composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven. As is typical of Romantic composers, Mendelssohn is attempting to develop the form into something more personal through his treatment of motivic material. However, unlike the more progressive Romantic composers (such as Berlioz, Liszt or Richard Strauss), he is not changing the form radically, for instance through unusual key relationships or the redesign of the structure itself. Conventional aspects of the structure are the standard sections of exposition, development and recapitulation, the presence of repeat marks at the end of the exposition, the sub-groups of first and second thematic groups and codetta, and the conventional use of tonic and dominant keys (E flat major and B flat major) for the first and second thematic groups in the exposition. An interesting aspect of the structure is that the recapitulation contains further development of the material. The structure can be summarised as follows: bars Section Subsection 1–31 EXPOSITION First group (E flat major) 32–45 Transition 46–91 Second group (B flat major) 92–111 Codetta (B flat major) 111–206 DEVELOPMENT 207–240 RECAPITULATION first group (modified) (E flat major) 241–272 second group (E flat major) 273–296 development of codetta 297–349 further development 350–369 codetta (second group) (E flat major) A lot of the structural interest is in Mendelssohn’s handling of melody: this is explored in the next section. Music Teacher June 2015 2 MELODY Mendelssohn uses a number of short motifs, which he develops and combines in different ways, to form new melodies, dialogues and textural combinations. The main motifs he employs can be seen below. A1: semiquavers A2: legato crotchets A3: dotted A4: arpeggio T1 T2 bar 1 bar 1 b.5 b.8 b.19 b.20 B1: upbeats B2: legato crotchets C: Coda b.46 b.93 Each of these motifs has a distinctive rhythm and melodic shape. When Mendelssohn develops these motifs, quite often the exact intervals are not preserved, but the rhythm and the general shape of the melody are retained. Mendelssohn’s approach to melodic development can be seen in his handling of motif A1 (the semiquaver motif that opens the movement). A1 (an anacrusis of four semiquavers leading to an stronger downbeat) is developed extensively throughout the movement: In bar 5, the downbeat of A1 becomes a dotted rhythm (A2), which is further extended by sequential repetition in bar 7. In bars 32–37, A1 is passed to and fro between instruments in close imitation a beat apart. In bars 40–45, the semiquavers of A1 are repeated in a succession of descending sequences. This leads to the second group, in which the semiquavers of A1 are repeated in murmuring figuration accompanying the new theme, B1 (bars 46–56). Further development of A1 occurs in the development at bar 148–151, where the four semiquavers are again repeated at different pitches to create a four-bar passage which is then repeated sequentially (152–155). A1 is again used sequentially from bars 203–206, creating a climactic lead into the recapitulation at 207: here, the semiquaver movement is continued for four bars with the first violin’s rising line of semiquavers. Other motifs are treated in a similar way, being extended, used sequentially and combined with other ideas in counterpoint. Sometimes they form the main theme and at other times they appear in counterpoint or as part of the accompaniment. Other features of note include: The use of rhythmic augmentation: theme C (bar 93) is developed from augmentation of the dotted figure introduced in bar 5. Question-and-answer phrase structure: when Mendelssohn turns to longer melodies, they are often in question-and-answer phrase structure, which harks back to the Classical period. For instance the first four bars of theme C (bars 93–96) are answered by the crotchets of bars 97–100. Predominantly conjunct movement: where there are leaps (and there are many of them), the melody tends to move back within the leap, which is again a trait of music of the Classical period (eg after the leap of a minor 7th in the first violin in bars 19–20, the music descends). HARMONY AND TONALITY Mendelssohn uses functional harmony sharing many features with that of the Classical period, but with an added richness typical of early Romanticism. Conventional ‘Classical period’ features include: perfect cadences (eg leading into bars 92 and 350, and in the final five bars) plagal cadences (eg bar 2, beats 2–3) resolution of dissonances by step mostly the same palette
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