Minor key series, part 8a (Couperin)

Quote from my article "The Ascending Urlinie" (Journal of Music Theory 1987):

Compositions using the ascending line in the minor key are very few indeed, but they include one of the most powerful examples of the rising line and three-part Ursatz in the entire repertoire of traditional tonality: Francois Couperin’s masterful Passacaille (en rondeau), from the Pièces de claveçin, 8e ordre. The rondeau, whose reprises alternate with a total of eight couplets, consists of two statements of a phrase that seems to offer no counterbalance to its ascending Urlinie: all parts including the bass are swept upward to the cadence. Even the ornamentation contributes, with the arpeggios of measures 2-3. There is a subtle opposing force, however, in a structural alto that descends from ^5. On the scale of the whole Passacaille, the reiterations of the rondeau result in a combination of grandeur and bleak inexorability that certainly justifies the high praise many commentators have given this composition.

Here is the rondeau theme:

And here is an annotated version of the lower part of my Example 12 from the JMT article. "Overlap" was the term Allen Forte used for one instance of what is more commonly called "reaching-over" (Schenker's Übergreifen). A line can be generated by means of a series of overlaps, as here.

Figure g is reproduced in (a) below. The root movements underlying Couperin's actual bass are aligned with (a) in (b). At (c), figure g is transposed to B minor and shown as the basic progression of the rondeau theme; at (d) the cadential 6/4 and the inner voice from ^5 (see my Example 12 again) are added.

The couplets in a French baroque rondeau cover the range of possible relations to the rondeau theme, with respect to motivic design and other textural and expressive features. In some rondeaux, the couplets are so closely integrated with the theme that the pieces sound like Italian binary-form movements. In many others, variety seems to be the priority: the first couplet might sound like the opening of a B-section and the return of the rondeau theme, therefore, like the reprise in a small ternary form, but then the second couplet might be quite different, etc. In the B-minor passacaille, variety of texture and figure definitely seems to be a high priority, along with descending movements that counter-balance the powerful figures of the theme. All this is obvious in the incipits of the couplets:

Minor key series, part 7 (progression g and partimento)

Francesco Durante, "an eighteenth-century composer from the J. S. Bach generation, was perhaps the central figure in the partimento tradition" (Robert Gjerdingen in Monuments of Partimenti, entry: Francesco Durante). Link to the Monuments home page: link. For definition, description, and illustration of partimento pedagogy, see this page on the site: link.

Simple cadences include a 4-3 suspension over the dominant. Double cadences add a prior 6/4: see the example below (link to it on the Durante pages).

The force of the three downward resolving suspensions (9-8, 7-6, and 4-#) makes a rising motion in the cadence very difficult indeed, especially in the minor key, as here. A simple realization in four parts might look like this:

Rearranging the parts (alto becomes soprano, soprano becomes tenor) is no better from the standpoint of a rising line:

Still another version, this time in three voices, highlights the problem of the natural-^6: see the bracketed notes.

It must be said that the double cadence seems quite old-fashioned for the 18th century: it was a staple of sacred music in the 16th century (the progression above sounds far more like Palestrina than it does Corelli) and probably survived mostly because of the needs of that genre in the 18th century (which, oddly, was more conservative than it had been through much of the 17th century).

Among Durante's simple cadences is one that looks much more typical of 18th century practice: (link)

A realization of this progression makes a rising line more manageable. In three voices, it's difficult to realize the iiø6/5 -- I've left it as a simple subdominant triad in this version.

Here is another attempt, in which the correct subdominant type does appear. Putting a 6/4 on the first beat of the second bar might make for a bit smoother inner voice.

This last progression above does fit Durante's bass correctly, but neither of my two realizations quite matches figure g (reproduced below). 

Here are two further versions trying to reconcile Durante's bass and figure g, again in three voices. At (a), the awkward tritone (C3 in the bass, then F#4 in the treble) is prominent, but in fact it's not an anomaly in minor-key pieces. I am more concerned about the similar motion in all parts from the D major to E major triad. At (b), that problem is solved, and the "structural alto" for many rising lines "magically" appears: ^3-^-2^1, as C4-B3-A3.

Minor key series, part 6b (Couperin)

Repeated from an earlier post:

Figure f underpins the Dorian-octave elements with a very tonal third divider and the ubiquitous move i to III, minor tonic to relative major. The example is a very striking, counter-intuitive one, where the surface appearance of the structural cadence is down, not up. I am grateful to Charles Burkhart for sharing his reading with me and for permission to reproduce it along with his commentary.

The composition is "La Flore" from Ordre 5, and Burkhart told me that he worked on a reading of the piece because a former student had asked about it.

Levels (a) and (b), background and middleground, are shown below. Level (a) is nearly identical to figure f; the G3 in the bass of the figure appears at bar 12 in level (b). As level (b) clearly shows, the move from i to III is elaborated as a circle of fifths move A-D-G-C. Once ^#7 over V is reached, it is significantly elaborated.

Level (c) is the foreground, shown here in three systems. The first is bars 1-19 and covers the initial ^5 over i to ^7 over III, reached in the typical internal cadence to the opposite mode at bar 19.

The second system here is the expansion of ^#7 over V and the completion with the arrival of ^8. Bars 19 to 27.

This third system shows the coda, bars 27 to 31, whose elaboration out of a set of parallel octaves is traced through its levels (a), (b), and (c).

We pick up Burkhart's commentary now (in italics). An important compositional feature is a hill-shaped motive whose basic shape— E-F#-G-A-G-F-E—occurs several times. In my graph, at Level c, the motive is marked by brackets numbered 1, 2, and 3. The changes this motive undergoes are an important narrative strand.       ----   See the sketch fragments below, where the three versions are also collated with the score.   ----

Prominent in each version of the motive is the note G4, which is always metrically strong. Also important is A5, the peak of the hill. What happens to this note? 

Bracket 1: A5 is a weak neighbor tone.


Bracket 2: A5 is stronger—an accented neighbor, but part of an (unstable) 6/4 chord.


Bracket 3: A new harmonization of the motive emphatically brings A5 as an essential member of a I6 chord. Yet this A5 is still not entirely stable, occurring as it does within a larger V#.

 The complete Urlinie, E-F#-G-G#-A, stretching from bars 3 to 27, is an enlargement of the rising notes of the hill-motive—the motion up to its peak. However, La Flore's final two phrases—bars 20 (with pickup)-27—complete this enlargement—and the Urlinie—by plunging downward to end in the lower octave, that is, on G#3 and A4. How should we understand these plunges? They extend the down-side of the hill-motive, recall earlier downward motions, and provide a dramatic conclusion. Of course they strike the ear like the fall of a traditional Urlinie, but this is illusory. Their source is the upward progression G#4-A5, as Levels a and b of the graph reveal. Thus, it is the A of the enlargement that brings the motivic narrative to a close.

The coda (mm 27ff.) now celebrates, mimicking the hill-motive's up-down at a different pitch-level, and echoing 26-27.       [Coda level graph reproduced below. It's the same as the one shown earlier.]

And here is the coda, level c again, aligned with the score:

Update (21 September 2017): At the Euromac conference in July of this year, Stephen Slottow read a paper responding to Burkhart's analysis. Here is the abstract: link.

Minor key series, part 6a (La Guerre)

See background information on Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre in this previous post: link.  The suite in D minor (with Dorian signature) from 1687 has two courantes, the first of which is discussed here.

The opening is in some ways a mirror of the opening in the second courante, where a slowly ascending, mostly linear figure coupled F4 to F5. Here a fully linear descent from D5 to F4 occupies the first three measures, but the larger figure is an initial ascent from the opening D5 to the first Urlinie tone, F5, in measure 4 -- marked in the score.

In the final measures, ^3, as F4, is clearly heard again in the typical internal cadence to the opposite mode (at "x"), then an insistently rising pattern starting at "y" leads upward through the octave, but—as in the opening—the larger figure goes the opposite direction as the Urlinie descends in an unequivocal way from ^2 to ^1 in the final two bars. The point of interest is "what might have been" -- at "z" natural ^7 gives way directly to ^#7 over the just established V harmony.

The notation here is from Steve Wiberg's edition, available on IMSLP: link.

Minor key series, part 5 (progressions d-j)

Figures d-j offer some other possibilities for ascending lines with ^#6, including variants of figures b and c and two that introduce natural-^7. In the examples that will follow in later posts, figures e, f, and i are represented but the larger number (5 items) use figure g.

The progression in figure d elaborates a bit on the TSDT pattern, but the result seems to exaggerate a tendency for the minor  to "collapse into the major." I have found no examples in the repertoire so far.

The progression in figure e introduces the natural-^7 into the ascending line, providing room for a substantial amount of attention to the Dorian octave. That being the case, the first of two courantes by Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, from 1687, will be a plausible example in part 6a's entry. The second courante was discussed here: link.

Figure f underpins the Dorian-octave elements with a very tonal third divider and the ubiquitous move i to III, minor tonic to relative major. The example is a very striking, counter-intuitive one, where the surface appearance of the structural cadence is down, not up. I am grateful to Charles Burkhart for sharing his reading with me and for permission to reproduce it. This will be in part 6b of the series.

Figure g is a variant of figure b (link), where ^3 in the bass could support i6 or III. Partimenti by Francesco Durante, the Couperin passacaille that I analyze in my 1987 JMT article, music by three other composers from the later 17th and early to mid-18th century, and a song by Hugo Wolf all make interesting use of this relatively simple design. The posts will be parts 6b through 9.

Figure h is a variant of figure c, where, again, ^3 in the bass might support i6 or III. No examples.

Figure i varies figure g slightly: B substitutes for D in the bass. I will have something to say about the Tristan Prelude in connection with this. (In part 10.)

Figure j is figure h where ^#6 now is given harmonic support. No examples--I suspect that ii rather than the more likely iiø in the minor key is an impediment.

Minor key series, part 4 (Beethoven; Kiefert)

Today an odd couple from opposite ends of the long nineteenth century. Both use figure c in their cadences.

The second movement is unquestionably the best known of the four in Beethoven's Symphony VII. It was popular from the start, being the one subject to audience requests for encore during the symphony's premiere, a practice that continued in concerts throughout the 1830s and 1840s. In England, it was even given a title: "Chorus of Monks."

Though fanciful, that label has a thread of plausibility: musicologist Wolfgang Osthoff observes that stylistic traits (including the sustained chord in the winds with which the movement opens and ends) link the movement to a Viennese tradition of litany singing, including the Wallfahrt or Trauermarsch (that is, outdoor funeral procession), so that a religious connotation does seem strong. (AfMZ 34/3 (1977))

An elaborate dance-trio/double variation design begins with this theme, to which my comments are restricted.

As is already clear from the final two bars, ^#6 ascends over the dominant harmony. I have appended a facsimile of my draft sketch. I have developed the idea of the pervasive 5-6-8 pattern/motive elsewhere, in an article under preparation.

I had intended to write that nothing is known about Carl Kiefert, whose Allegro Agitato No. 1 [for General Use] was published in 1916. Wikipedia, however, came to the rescue. Here is a condensed version of their entry:

[Johann] Carl Kiefert (1855–1937) was a composer and conductor who spent much of his career conducting at the Hippodrome and other London theatres. He wrote songs, arranged dance music from shows and wrote or co-wrote the scores to several London musicals. He orchestrated several West End musicals early in the 20th century and later several Broadway musicals. "His acknowledged expertise and speed at instrumentation made Kiefert the most sought-after arranger of theatre scores and he regularly orchestrated for Lionel Monckton and Osmond Carr."

Kiefert's Allegro Agitato (score on IMSLP: link) is typical of a large repertoire of practical dramatic music and would have served equally well in the theatre or in the cinema. Here is the first section:

And an analysis, which shows the positioning of the upper voice on ^5 at the beginning and the clearly marked ascent above the dominant in the cadence.

Minor key series, part 3 continued

Gaspard Le Roux (1660-1707) was a professional keyboardist working in Paris. His Pieces de Clavessin, published in 1705, is a remarkable volume -- not only is the music in each of the seven suites skilled and aesthetically satisfying but each piece (excepting the preludes) is given in an alternate trio version for treble melodic instrument and continuo (where the treble of the keyboard part is realized). By way of an appendix, he adds a gigue in G major for two harpsichords and a contre partie (second part) that renders four pieces from the earlier suites into duos.

The gigue and the duo version of the courante in the seventh suite in G minor are of interest here. We'll start with the latter; here it is in the sequence of the suite. The solo version is at the top, the trio version at the bottom of the page. Note that a firmly descending melodic line in the cadence in the solo version (at "x") is counterpointed by a more complex and partly ascending line in the trio version (at "y").

Here is the page with the contre partie, which adopts the counterpointing line for its own closing cadence.

And here are two analyses of the ending (the notation is from an edition by Alfred Fuller). The original line (above) and its counterpoint (below) create a striking wedge figure (we will see this again in the gigue, below).

Asterisks show the complexity of treatments of scale degree ^6 (a reminder that the key signature is G minor/once-transposed Dorian). From this, the most plausible Urlinie for the contre partie rises from ^5 using the raised ^6 (E5), but this by no means erases the problem of Eb/E natural. A detailed analysis of the several structural levels would be quite an exercise. 

The Gigue for two harpsichords is much simpler by comparison. Here is the opening. Note the wedge shape approaching the cadence in the second phrase.

Le Roux uses the same figure in the interior cadence to the opposite mode and also in the ending, shown here again as an analysis using the notation of Fuller's edition. Although the rising line is shown as the upper voice, performance options—which are so rich in Le Roux's volume—might place the descending line above if the second harpsichordist takes advantage of the direction "en haut si lon veut" (an octave higher ad lib) [see Pierre's Gouin's edition on IMSLP: link]

For a detailed table of contents to Le Roux's Pieces de Clavessin, go to the bottom of the IMSLP page: link.

Minor key series, part 3 (three French composers)

As is well known, the Dorian was the only mode to retain some kind of identity in secular music throughout the 17th century, even if that identity was sometimes nothing more than the lack of a key signature for pieces we would readily accept as being in D minor (or in G minor with one flat rather than two -- or even in C minor with two flats rather than three).

Nevertheless, vestiges of the Dorian octave facilitate rising lines that move fluidly from the lower part of the octave through ^8. I will explore the treatment of the Dorian octave in music from the early part of the 17th century in several posts at the end of this series. Here I am interested in how ^6 and ^7 interact with the three Urlinie figures I showed in the series introduction -- they're reproduced below.

We will start with a menuet by Jean-François Dandrieu (1682-1738) from the collection Trois livres de claveçin de jeunesse, edited by Brigitte Francois-Sappey (Paris, 1975). The pieces in this volume come not from the more familiar three volumes of Pièces de Claveçin but from smaller and earlier collections published between 1704 and 1720: two titled Livre de claveçin and the Pièces de claveçin courtes et faciles. Also unlike the larger volumes, which use the fanciful character titles common in the generation of François Couperin, the three smaller collections use dance and other generic titles.

The menuet in G minor uses the transposed Dorian signature -- see the opening below, where I isolate an unfolded fourth as the central figure. (One can also easily hear the interior third-line Bb4-Bb4-A4-implied G4 -- not marked in the score.)

The ending works its way through this fourth twice, in both cases using what I've marked as the "Dorian ^6."

 The more abstract version below shows the background, which fits the model of figure b above.

Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre (1665-1729) was one of the most prominent French musicians of her generation. A child prodigy, she was a skilled harpsichordist and composer who spent her teenage years in the court at Versailles and later lived and worked in Paris. The first suite in the Pièces de Claveçin of 1687 is in D minor using a Dorian signature and contains two courantes. The second of these opens with a strongly defined ascending gesture that charts a coupling of F4 and F5. (The notation is from an edition by Steve Wiberg published on IMSLP: link.)

 In the close, the coupling is repeated, with a completely filled linear ascent, after which a straightforward background descent ("x") is elaborated with a fairly simple leading-tone third-line ("y"). An interior ascending figure ("z") cuts across these: it is shown as a fourth ^5-^8 but is properly a third A4-C#5 that reaches and connects to the final note of "y."

In a continuation of this post, I will discuss a gigue and courante for two harpsichords by Gaspard Le Roux (1660-1707).