Purcell- Music For A While Flashcards
1
Q
Music for a while:background information (3)
A
- baroque era
- 1692
- written for play: Oedipus
2
Q
Music for a while:harmony (5)
A
- ground bass
- diatonic
- perfect cadences throughout
- dissonances
- Right hand harpsichord: elaborate realisation
3
Q
Music for a while:melody (6)
A
- Main a melody:soprano singer
- mainly syllabic with melismatic sections
- mostly conjunct
- Ornaments: trills, appoggiaturas, grace notes, mordants
- descending sequences bar 20
- rests used to break up melodic phrases
4
Q
Music for a while:Word painting (5)
A
- “eternal”-long melisma
- “drop”-repeated in a descending pattern
- “free the dead”- bright key of G major
- “wondering”-legato, melismatic melody
- “pains were eas’d”- dissonance and resolution
5
Q
Music for a while:tonality (2)
A
- A minor: sad, sombre
- During the B section, modulates to several unrelated keys: E major, G major, C major, A major, A minor
6
Q
Music for a while:texture (3)
A
- homophonic
- accompaniment: ground bass
- Elaborate realisation on harpsichord may feel polyphonic
7
Q
Music for a while:rhythm and metre (5)
A
- 4/4 metre
- ground bass uses repeated quaver rhythms
- quavers and semiquavers
- dotted rhythms and vocals
- occasional syncopation
8
Q
Music for a while:instrumentation (4)
A
- soprano singer, harpsichord, bass viol
- harpsichord and bass viol= basso continuo
- viol and LH harpsichord play ground bass
- RH harpsichord plays elaborate realisation
