Grieg, Lyric Pieces, Op. 68, part 1

The ninth of Edvard Grieg's ten sets of highly accessible piano miniatures, the Lyric Pieces, was his Op. 68, written in 1898-99 and published in 1899. The second piece in Op. 68 is titled "Grandmother's Menuet." It is delicate and whimsical, presumably in the familiar mould of humorous "old people's" dances, the best known of that type being the "Großvater Tanz," a traditional tune familiar to everyone even nowadays through its quotation in the "Grandfather's Dance" in Act 1 of The Nutcracker.

The design is ABA'BA', where each version of A is 16 bars (8 + 8 where the second eight repeats the first an octave higher), B is 20 bars, A' is also 16 bars but the second eight form a stuttering repetition of the cadence (to be discussed below), and B, then A', are literally reprised.

The opening is striking -- and is referenced in undergraduate textbooks -- for its secondary dominant ninth chord (V9 or V), a "proper" harmony whose ninth resolves directly into the next chord. (On the dominant ninth chord and its several types, see my blog On the Dominant Ninth Chord.) Despite the positioning of ^3, as B4, over that secondary harmony, a traditional Schenkerian reading would assume a displacement, as if the B4 has been shifted over from its proper place above an implied I on the first beat. In that case, ^2 is first offered in the foreground in bar 2 but then implied in the middleground in bar 4, initiating a leading-tone third-line with G4 in bar 5 and F#4 in bar 7.

I prefer a more literal minded reading, as shown below. The stable note at the opening is ^1/^8, as G4, and we give that preference in the unfolding of G4-B4. The unfolding reverses itself in bar 5 in the sense that the lower note is now subordinate to the higher one, which is again G4. Although I have shown the ending as ^6-^7-^8, I would probably simplify the reading overall to ^8-^7-^8, or G4 in bar 1, F#4 in bar 7, and G4 in bar 8.

Section B, on the other hand, pounds away at B4 and sometimes B5 for all of its twenty bars. Since the texture is quite different from A, is entirely in octaves, as shown in the beginning, and it's clear that the underlying key is E minor, I don't hear this section as promoting B4 in the main section.

The altered reprise of A in its second phase repeats the cadential phrase but stops before the tonic (see the first one-bar grand pause). Single-bar repetitions occur an octave higher, then an octave lower before the tonic concludes. The overall effect, of course, is to give exaggerated attention to the rising cadence figure.

Two hymns from an 18th century service manual

"Das Grab ist leer, der Held erwacht" is an Easter hymn published in the Landshuter Gesangbuch in 1777. The editors of the volume were presumably responsible for the unsigned music and text: Norbert Hauner and Franz Seraph von Kohlbrenner. This hymn became quite popular and remained so through the nineteenth century. The version below is a duple meter variant published in 1874. The opening of the original triple-meter version is reproduced at the bottom of this post.

The design of the opening holds for the entire verse, in melodic shape a proto-background ^3-^8, as shown below (though possibly ^3-^5-^8, as suggested by the ^5 in parentheses), the line being a neighbor ^8-^7-^8, which might possibly be heard as a double neighbor figure depending on the details of a particular harmonization.

Below: The opening of the 1777 version, which clearly combines the heroic and pastoral topics. The F#5 in bar 6 is a hint of what follows (not shown), where I would find ^3 to be plausible focal tone.

Reference: Wikipedia page for "Das Grab ist leer": link.

Hummel, German Dance, op. 45n4

Hummel's Opus 45 (1812) is a set of dances meant for performance in the Apollo Saal, one of the largest of such entertainment centers in Vienna, with multiple rooms in which one could dance, talk, eat, or gamble (link to German Wikipedia). As a published collection in piano arrangement, Op. 45 consists of a march introduction, six menuets with trios, six German dances with trios, and a lengthy coda.

The fourth German dance is easily heard with a simple rising line in the first strain and an extended ^8 with double neighbors in the second strain. Performance practice would dictate the likelihood that the first strain would be repeated after the second. An interesting point about the first strain is that the first phrase gives us half-note length Urlinie notes on the strong beat—D5 in bar 2, E5 in bar 4—where the second phrase does the reverse, giving us F#5 immediately in bar 5 and G5 in bar 7. The symmetry makes for an elegant theme.

Alternatively, one might decide to take the initial ^8—which I have called a cover tone above—and regard that as the focal tone, a reading that makes sense given the figures of the second strain, as described above. If so, the result is an ^8-^7-^8 Urlinie with a middleground ascent connecting to ^7 in the second phrase (see ^5 and ^6 in parentheses in the first phrase).

Still another alternative would be to wait till the middle of the second strain to reach ^3, as B5. An initial ascent is easy enough to hear, as is a descent in the cadence. Whether such an expressive toppling of the formal design is justified, whether it makes much musical or artistic sense, is a matter of opinion. Such late placements of the initial focal tone are not uncommon in traditional Schenkerian analysis but are rarely very convincing. Here, of course, if we take performance practice for dance music into account, this reading could only be sustained in the case of AB or ABAB, not if the first strain is repeated to end, ABA or ABABA.

Hugo Wolf songs, part 1

In my rising lines table (link), songs by Hugo Wolf take an unexpectedly prominent place:

“Fussreise.”     (Mörike Lieder)
“Lieber alles.”   (Eichendorff Lieder);
           -- see Everett, Journal of Music Theory 48/1 (2004): 51-4
“Frech und Froh I.”   (Goethe Lieder);
           -- see Everett, Journal of Music Theory 48/1 (2004): 51-4
"Cophtisches Lied II.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Dank des Paria.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Erschaffen und Beleben.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Frech und Froh II.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Komm, Liebchen, komm!”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Nimmer will ich dich verlieren!”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Der Schäfer.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Die Spröde.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"St. Nepomuks Vorabend.”  (Goethe Lieder)
"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!”  (Goethe Lieder) 

From these I have chosen four as the material for a series of posts beginning today. Those are

"Cophtisches Lied II.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Erschaffen und Beleben.”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Komm, Liebchen, komm!”   (Goethe Lieder)
"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!”  (Goethe Lieder)

I have already written about "Der Schäfer" (Goethe Lieder no. 22) on the blog: see this post. In this song, the relation of a rising line to text is quite simple: a lazy shepherd suddenly perks up and becomes industrious when a romantic relationship blooms (or possibly when a nagging spouse gets him moving). The rising line -- and closing cadence -- mimics the new energy. Overall, one can hear a rising line from ^5:   -- see the earlier post for details of the reading --

"Trunken müssen wir alle sein!”  (Goethe Lieder no. 35; published in 1889). The poem is in two verses, each of which is six lines long, consisting of three rhymed couplets. An English translation of the first verse is here: link.

Not your average drinking song, this one is more forceful than exuberant and it is predominantly in a minor key, including in the ending. The initial F#5 (as written) is maintained throughout as a focal tone ^8. Its chromatic descent is marked with circles below. The box shows the first instance of a vigorous ascending figure that becomes more and more prominent as time goes on.

The second couplet goes the opposite direction, with a diatonic line upward from C#5 through D5 to close on E5. The piano interrupts with its ascending figure (boxed), here set in a wedge.

The third couplet offers a rare example of a ^5-^6-(^8)-^#7-^8 minor key ascending Urlinie, against which the left hand of the piano part offers another version of its rising octaves (boxed). The coda has still another one of those to end, this time as a simple minor key rising line through an octave.

The first and second couplets of the second verse are set to even more vigorous music, eventually reaching an interval frame E#5-C#5 with a third line at the PAC—end of the example below.

The third and final couplet of the second verse offers an expanded version of the minor-key ascending Urlinie. Note, incidentally, that the two unfolded thirds, D5-F#5, E#5-C#5, expose the minor key problem in an even more obvious way than did the end of the first verse: D5 moves to C#5 and has to be reconceived in order to be heard as moving upward (against the grain of the voice leading) to E#5. A familiar Schenkerian dodge has to be called into play to make this happen: the device Allen Forte called overlapping (and which is one species of upward register transfer or Übergreifen). In a sequence, a note may be obliged to resolve downward, but another voice may overlap it, and still a third overlap that--and the resulting "line" going up may nevertheless be regarded as a unitary figure. In this case, ^6 resolves down to ^5 and is overlapped by ^8, which also moves down. There is no ^9 to overlap again: ^8-^7 just repeats itself.

Here is the entire texture. The piano hammers away at the rising figure -- see the box in bar 2 -- and finally bursts out in an extended chromatic run (boxed in the second and third systems). Both voice and piano, then, provide an ascending line to ^8 in this structural cadence. (The final bars look like they might be a reprise (see at "Wie zu Anfang"), but they are in fact a fairly brief recall acting as a coda.)

Mozart, Menuets, K. 164 (1772)

While working on a project to describe formal functions in the first strains of menuets from Mozart to Schubert (link to the essay), I noticed some ascending gestures in both n4 and its trio.

In the old Mozart Werke, K. 164 has four menuets and trios. Two others--titled "2 Menuette" as Series 24 N.14a--were found to belong to the set as well; these became ns 3 & 4 in the complete set of six. When I use "n4" I am referring to that number in the complete set. Here is the IMSLP link for both files: K164.

The rising scale is certainly fundamental to the first strain of n4, the entire octave G4-G5 being traversed before going one tonic chord tone "too-far" to B5 in bar 8, then dropping back. (Only violin1 and bass are shown here.)

The scalar mid-point D5 is reached in bar 4 and its role firmly settled with the echoing extension of bars 5-6. The melodic design of the whole is comfortably read with Schenker-style lines:

The second strain doesn't follow up on the hierarchy suggested by this arrangement of lines. Instead, it sets itself in the upper tetrachord, emphasizing ^8 with another confirming echo (bars 5-6). The parts shown are flutes, violin 1, and bass. The violins drop down an octave at the last moment (circled), but the flutes reiterate and reinforce the upper register.

In the trio, the gesture of ascent is, if anything, even more obvious and results in a simple ascending Urlinie figure, ^5-^6-^7-^8, across the first strain. Parts shown are flute, violin 1, and bass.

The second strain is in a sense the reversal of the second strain in the menuet: instead of holding to the high note reached there as the end of the line (G5), here Mozart turns back to the initial note of the line (G4 in the violin). Note the (unmarked) "one-too-far" C5 in bar 5.

A pairing of thirds in bars 1-4 involves an overlap--F4 should resolve to E4 but is "overlapped" by the recovered G4. I've always thought this stepwise overlap (as opposed to more vigorous "reaching over") was a bit of reductive sleight of hand but it is common in Schenkerian analytic practice and there is no question that ^5 as G4 is recovered, then dominates the rest of the strain's melody. At the end is one of those "nearly audible" ^3s that later became commonplace in the waltz (and polka) repertoire.

Here is a link to the first of three posts on formal functions in K. 164 on my blog Dance and Dance Music, 1650-1850: link.