Stravinsky's Chords (I)

Author(s): G. W. Hopkins
Source: Tempo, New Series, No. 76 (Spring, 1966), pp. 6-12
Published by: Cambridge University Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/942939
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TEMPO

sounds that strike with immediate impact, attaching themselves instantly and
permanently to the mind of the listener. "Once heard, never forgotten"; or is
it partly because they are heard again and again that they are never forgotten?
Memorability, at any rate, is enormously enhanced by Copland's power of "staying with his material" by repetitions of short motifs; expanding, contracting,
varying, but always remaining within aurally perceptible reach of the original. His
music has what the advertisers call "penetration", which is achieved by talking
about one thing and going on talking about it; "talk about 3,000 things, and you
lose penetration-you don't do that in advertising".
Another copy-writer's maxim comes to mind: "you don't really know why
to do it, you just know how to do it". How far Copland's command of the techniques of communication is instinctive, how far conscious, is in some doubt; he
has said that "the sense of the audience being with me came after the writing of
those works, rather than the writing of them out of that feeling of connection
with the audience". Yet always he has shown concern for the listener, has
watched the tightening and slackening of the thread of attention that attaches
listener to music, at least as closely as the graph of his own fluctuating emotions.
The intelligentsia may, occasionally, take offence at the way in which he
takes the meaning and lays it, as it were, at one's doorstep. The old concept of
the composer living in a hermetic world of sound is still very much alive; in
January, 1966, it was possible to read an article in which one eminent composer
congratulated another on "his courage in following his imagination wherever it
may lead without regard to the demands made on performers and listeners".
For myself, I would reserve my warmest congratulations for the composer who
takes the listener with him on his journey into the inner world of sound.
So far, I have touched only on more familiar aspects of Copland's music,
and the enormously effective, if limited, language he evolved over the first twenty
years of his career as a composer. Perhaps he had by the end of this period
solved the problem of "how to do it" rather too completely. He has, at any rate,
refused since then to rely exclusively on tried and successful formulae; in a
second article I hope to discuss the appearance in his music of techniques evolved
to meet new expressive needs, and to reach new audiences.
(to be continued)

CHORDS
STRAVINSKY'S
(I)
by G. W. Hopkins
Vertical thought performs many and diverse functions in Stravinsky's
music. This brief look at some of his harmonies is an attempt to find some
examples of chords and harmonic technique which recur at different periods in
his life. To try to isolate vertical sound from horizontal sense is a tricky procedure, but may be justifiable in the case of a composer who, in common with
Ravel, frequently invites us to listen to his harmonies largely for their own sake.
Analytical dismemberment in this sense can assist understanding of Stravinsky
much more than it would do in the music of Sibelius, for instance. The precise
purposefulness of Stravinsky's harmonies is one of the characteristics which
distinguish his music from that of his imitators. In the main, it will be found
that he has taken over the 'classical' function of dissonance (stress preceding
?

1966 by G. W. Hopkins

STRAVINSKY'S CHORDS

resolution) and extended it in harness with rhythm. In this way, a harmonic

stress is equated to a rhythmic stress. 'Motoric' rhythms being frequent in
Stravinsky, there is only rarely an unambiguous resolution of stress. This is of
course less true of works based on a pastiche style, in which the associational
values of classical stress/resolution are relied on.
In the process of generating rhythmic energy by harmonic means certain
types of dissonance prove particularly useful; those which have a built-in stress/
resolution structure (affirmation/negation of a tonal base) are those best able to
sustain a prolonged rhythmic invention. For this purpose, the chords most
effectively constructed are those with 'tonal interferences' and those of bitonal
Such chords are conceptually related to the 'objet sonore', an idea
structure.
which has really come into its own with the advent of musique concrete, and
which here may broadly be defined as a musical device used in such a way as to
produce an effect of harmonic stasis. Thus the concept may be made to embrace
ostinato patterns and 'modes of limited transposition' besides the chords I have
mentioned and derived chord-complexes. It is the way such a device is used
rather than its inherent nature which determines whether or not it may be
classed as an 'objet sonore'.
The genesis of similar concepts in Stravinsky's output may be traced back to
the added-note chords in the finale of The Firebird and the bitonal clashes in
Petrushka. However it is in the cantata The King of the Stars (Zvezdoliki) that he
first seems concerned to develop a consistently individual harmonic style. It has
been conjectured that Debussy (to whom the work is dedicated) had this work
in mind when he wrote of the young Russian's "dangerous" bent towards the
style of Schoenberg, but it seems more probable that the major influences were
Scriabin and Debussy himself. It is also worth remembering that Stravinsky was
in Paris in 191 O (the date of the cantata is 19 I ) and probably knew Satie's music.
This early work gives us examples of a highly involved harmonic style which
is apparently developing simultaneously in a number of different directions. In
Ex. ia the first progression is a parallel-chord one with transposition, and the
final cadence uses the second mode of limited transposition (C-D flat-D sharp-EF sharp-G-A-B flat; note the alteration of D flat to D natural on the first beat of
Ex.

A,,,,> g.

.:,

N 6,_,,,.

Tenors

-a

Basses

,
(b)

..> *,:

7'~1~
?t###

#?
^

.^
Modal

.atic"3
br..C
harmonic
Enharmonic

(,,r;
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Si?b; ^

Strings
W,W.

Horns

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Modal
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oda)

I-

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'(Orch.)

ity
X1?

TEMPO

this bar, giving a cadential feeling in C which is also accentuated by the prominent
position of the final C major/minor chord). Between these progressions lies a
more problematic passage, of which Ex. ib is a skeletal extract. The harmonies
are obscured by doublings and internal polyrhythm. The asterisk marks an
(unresolved) Neapolitan sixth formation in D, showing the constant concern with
points of tonal or polytonal focus.
Stravinsky has never exploited the dramatic potential of 'objets sonores'
as relentlessly as he did in The Rite of Spring. Here these devices appear in
complex and alternating forms, and are sometimes derived from what were
previously simply elements of a harmonic language. The pair of alternating
harmonies which generate so much energy in the 'Danse de la Terre', for instance,
(Ex. 2a') strongly recall the first chords of Ex. ia. At the same time they suggest
a whole-tone bitonality (C-D) which is very characteristic of Stravinsky's
harmonic thought. The ubiquity of 'objets sonores' in this work is suggested by
the further examples (arpeggiated chord, patterned ostinati and neutralizing
whole-tone scale) from the same dance in Ex.2b.
mode-i.e.
Ex. II
(a)
A

rn
Ai-1
0

?4

In
t-e Nue a

.4 -

614

J6t

is 3exm
-h n

In the Nuages-like opening of the ballet's second part, there is an example

of chord alternations working on two levels. A D sharp minor/C sharp minor
interchange over a D minor bass in turn alternates with A sharp minor/E minor
over E major. In other passages harmonic fields are built up by polyphonic
means. In the opening bars of the ballet conflicting tonalities interact and generate a tonal neutrality; at fig. o we can identify about seven different tonalitiesmany using modes with flattened seventh-centred around an E/B flat polarity.
It should be noted that the flattened seventh is by far the most important
of Stravinsky's tonal interferences, appearing in modes and in 'dominant
seventh' chords. The other important modifications to the scale are the sharpened
fourth (see Ex.2a), the flattened supertonic and the sharpened supertonic
(generally in major/minor formations). Of these four, the first two can be
derived from whole-tone bitonal superimposition of triads (see above), the third
from a semitonal superimposition, the fourth from a minor-third bitonality;
examples of these last two types of bitonality can be found in The Rite in the
'Danses des Adolescentes'. (This is merely one way of establishing correlatives
between harmonic and modal or bitonal thought; many others are equally legitimate).
There is a melodic passage in the 'Action Rituelle des Ancetres' which well
illustrates in a horizontal context these tonal interferences. Four are shown in
Ex. 3, and will be considered with respect to the tonalities of B flat and of G:
I All references to The Rite of Spring are to the 1947 score,

STRAVINSKY'S CHORDS

(G not yet implied); sharpened supertonic in B flat

in B flat: flattened supertonic in bass; in G: sharpened supertonic
(3) in B flat: sharpened fourth
(ia) sharpened fourth in G (at this point, the incoming melody is written,
though not heard, in C sharp, as becomes clear at fig. 134 in the score,
where the C sharp mode has implications of flattened supertonic,
sharpened supertonic, sharpened fourth and flattened seventh)
(2a) in B flat: flattened supertonic other than in bass
(4) in G: flattened seventh
(4a) in B flat: flattened seventh; in G: flattened supertonic.
An interesting example of the use of all these interferences in a more harmonic
way is the passage after fig. 86 in the score.
A further point about bitonal procedures in the 'Danses des Adolescentes'
is that the minor-third bitonality (fig. i6) is arrived at by a chain-of-fifths idea,
and clearly it is possible to use the same idea in connection with whole-tone
bitonality. This Stravinsky does, and in Renardwe shall even find him using a
chain-of-fifths in semitonal bitonality. The same idea also yields the notes of the
pentatonic scale which plays a crucial role in works such as The Nightingale.
Although it is not true to say that the harmonic cohesiveness and individuality
of The Nightingale are brought about by the consistent use of polytonal superimpositions applied to the pentatonic scale (as has been suggested), these scales
certainly have a germinal importance in the opera. The 'Marche Chinoise'
combines the scale's exotic suggestiveness with its usefulness as a polytonal
agent. In Ex.4 it is used in the brass in D, and in the strings and woodwind in C
and in F sharp (triplets): in the latter it is harmonized 'diatonically'-with
flattened supertonic and flattened seventh. The final chord of the first bar of the
example is constituted as follows: octave transposition of upper parts, and continuation in lower parts of the chain-of-fifths from E (B-F sharp-C sharp). In the
subsequent bar these lower parts 'resolve' on to an F sharp major triad. The
three tonalities used at this point yield a dominant-seventh-like formation
-C-D-F sharp.
(i)

(2)

Ex. IV
>

kF

Brass

v'IF'IJ~..
?.^y

_F5.

.'

W~" _F
Strings

W.W.

'-

v X~
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l

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a .

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St

-P

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AL

TEMPO

Io

Working in the more sober medium of the string quartet, Stravinsky gives
us in the Three Pieces the quintessence of his newly acquired stylistic consistency.
In the first piece, semitonal relationships abound, and ostinato figures sustain a
folk-like melody in sharply-etched G/F sharp bitonality. The second piece is
built on sharp contrasts held together by a sort of chain-of-fifths scheme in which
the middle link is a tritone, or diminished fifth (e.g. A-E-B flat-F, first chord;
A flat-E flat-A-E, second chord; D-A-E flat-B flat, plus E-F sharp, at the first
3/4 bar, etc). The last movement is a study in polyphonic bitonality in homophonic style, using a limited number of recurring chords in the manner of 'objets
sonores'. Naturally the alternations here are of a complex and irregular order.
This style was to reach its apotheosis in the 'Symphonies of Wind Instruments'.
Ex.s shows some similarities between the first piece and the 'Bagatelles' for the
same instruments which Webern had written the previous year (i913); at the
same time it shows up the fundamentally tonal thinking of Stravinsky, evident from
the spacing and from the misleading bass tritone relationships (D flat and C) with
the 'home' keys.
Ex. VVn

(a)

(_ -V
V~...

p:
jbyb,FF
-lr
-

b F - i'rI
I
" i

eL'

V
.

r~

( Webern

"d

i L_
b.
r
L

Op. 9, No.V)

.t3

tv O.

r
I

.!

-kro77:

If in the melodic and rhythmic simplicity and the textural openness of these
pieces we can see the first stirrings of Stravinsky's mature neo-classical style, it is
rather in certain folk-like passages in Renardand The Weddingand above all in the
more consciously classical leanings of The Soldier's Tale that this development
becomes more evident in the harmonic style. In Renard,the identity of horizontal
with vertical pitches (as in the pentatonic harmonizations of The Nightingaleand of long stretches in, for instance, 'De l'aube a midi sur la mer' before it)
is taken a step further. All through this period, there seems to have been a sort
of latent serialism in Stravinsky's thinking. This comes to the fore in the use of
succinct motifs, often of four notes, such as we have met with in the first of the
string quartet pieces; and it is also relevant to the type of vertical/horizontal
correspondence with which we have to deal in Renard. The first vocal entry of the
work (Ex. 6a) introduces a four-note motif based on the chain-of-fifths, which has
already appeared as a harmonic feature (broken up into consecutive fifths) at the
first instrumental passage after the introductory (virtually) unison march. We
find the idea again at the gavotte-like ('grazioso') dance of joy after the Cock's
first lucky escape (Ex. 6b). It is at this point that the chain is extended, giving a
G bass to a tonality of F sharp with flattened seventh. Now the fifths extend from
G to C sharp-there is even a prominent G sharp by way of appoggiatura. The
semiquaver figuration here features sharpened fourth in E, flattened seventh and
VI
Ex.
(a)

f6

Viv pI f

Ir-II

1
Wind

ToIorI

J7.t
eJ

, .

,c

Strings
^ff^

etc.

r
*

fl?--^IT

STRAVINSKY'S CHORDS

II

flattened supertonic in F sharp. Another four-note motif is used melodically and

harmonically when Renard seizes the Cock (figs. 20, 53; D-E-F-G over a bass
of C sharp-F sharp).
The attraction of fifths must have been doubly potent when Stravinsky came
to write The Soldier's Tale with its spotlighted solo violin. In this work there are
examples of whole-tone bitonality clearly associated with the chain-of-fifths.
More significant, there are simpler diatonic passages in a spirit of parody which
play upon associations of cheapness and vulgarity; I need only mention the thirds
and sixths of the central dance-tableau and the patent melodrama of the 'Devil's
Dance'. The open-string violin writing becomes tiresome very quickly. The
tonal interference of a sharpened fourth which is consequent of whole-tone
bitonality is used to good effect melodically in the cornet figure just after fig. 3
in the 'Soldier's March' and in the famous cornet tune in the 'Royal March',
where the mode appears to lack a leading-note.
The harmonic centre of gravity of the work is the 'Chorale'. Ex. 7 gives the
'Little Choral' as the score calls it. As far as I know, it is the first example of
Ex. V11

Qi

( g'J

,
,tr
#2i

Xr
F-r A'
, '"'""
?

- 'r r #rr
X:
tfF

classical pastiche in Stravinsky's music. The effect is achieved by imitation in

rhythm and in conjunct movement of Bach's chorale technique-not by any form
of corresponding harmonic discipline. It is largely added-note chords and parallel progressions which give this piece its flavour; and in addition, it is the harmonic sophistication which enables the composer to give a novel twist to his
cadences-an instance of the associational use of classical stress/resolution.
In the second bar, the bass C (flattened seventh) neutralizes the effect of the
G sharp on the first beat (sharpened fourth).
The Wedding was actually composed before The Soldier's Tale, and in it
Stravinsky achieves a remarkable brilliance in his treatment of modal harmony.
Much of the vocal writing is harmonically traditional enough-unison or parallel
movement, or simple diatonic or modal harmonizations. In the instrumental
accompaniment there are many parallel-chord passages, often using simple triads.
At the very beginning of the work a germinal figure is announced (Ex. 8) from
which can be derived the greater part of the work's melodic material. Obviously
the figure has flattened seventh connotations which can be used to evolve a domEx. VIII
IT

I-2 1

12p'>>

11

^4']

LJ;
I[3442}

1!J

I,

tD

inant seventh formation; Ex. 8 shows this and indicates other derivations from the
original figure using the basic idea of three-note groups with major second/
major or minor third intervallic relationships. For other examples I must refer
the reader to the score. The germinal motif is used as a basis for polytonality
(A-C-D) at fig. 62-the C and D triads alternating in a familiar way; A is combined with G at fig. 70 giving a sharpened fourth in G as well as added flattened
seventh and flattened supertonic. The motif is used in the form B-E-D flat asa tonal

I 2

TEMPO

The chain-of-fifths is used

sequence for the first three 'fugal' entries at fig.69.
in the vocal writing
fifths
and
at
fig.74
harmonically
again implied by parallel
after fig.97. A novel feature is the use of piano clusters at figs. 91, 127.
If in consideration of these early works I have often departed from the purely
vertical, it has been with 'serial' thought in mind. For Stravinsky's harmonic
language frequently takes a cue from his melodic thought; and the interchangeability of melody and harmony is a logical consequence of the use of 'objets
sonores', where harmonic fixity implies a limited melodic range also. The exuberant freedom with w hich Stravinsky makes use of such a wide range of techniques
-far more richly than I have been able to show here-is later curbed to some
extent by the stylistic necessities of neo-classicism. But it will be useful to remember the basic ways of thinking-tonal interference, bitonality, chain-offifths-discussed here.
(to be continued)

DELIUS'S

REQUIEM'
by Anthony Payne

With the advent at the turn of the century of compositional techniques

that depended to a large extent on nervous and sensual responses, great problems were incurred at the psychological moment when a composer found that
his nerves were not quickening with their former vibrancy, or else became
aware, as possibly in the case of Debussy, that he was no longer able to trust in
If such a crisis is not to lead to a psychological
his private sense-world.
and artistic cul-de-sac, in the attempted recreation of a past condition, a realignment is needed of conscious intellectual workings and the composer's natural
in which elements
responses. In the case of Debussy this process led to a language
whose sole original purpose had been to embody his sense-wxorld were now
intellectually reshuffled to shore his personality against ruin. In other words they
were stripped of their sensuous meaning and combined to form a consciously
To uncompreconstructed art which would fill the newly apparent void.
a
in inspiration,
off
hending ears this artistic change merely represented falling
is
about
the
world
for the ripe sensual response to life and
commonly believed
in
of
lack
to be synonymous with inspiration. The
sensuality late works like the
constructive
piano studies was recognised but not properly construed, the heroic
effort ignored.
about the
Something of the same problem seems to have confronted Delius
lines
the
same
on
a
solution
and
he
time of the first world war,
broadly
attempted
was
Delius
Not
that
a
similar
as Debussy, only to incur
spurmisunderstanding.
red by the same spiritual problems that beset Debussy. Delius the autocrat
seems to have commanded his inner world with ease, and at this time was either
or else attemptcombating the increasing lack of precision in his sensual memory,
rather than
sense
an
in
himself
above
to
rise
exploratory
spiritually, though
ing
in that of Debussy's move towards self preservation. Whatever the inner comharmonic
pulsion, though, the stylistic results were comparable, in that a
I Delius's Requiem, composed in I914-I6 and dedicated "To the memory of all young artists fallen in the
war", was first performed at a Royal Philharmonic Concert on 23 March 1922, but thereafter totally disappeared from view until it was revived at a concert of the Liverpool Philharmonic Society on 9 November
A study score
The only other recorded performance is one in New York on 6 Novembe-r 90o.
last year.
with German and English texts has recently been published by Boosey & Hawkes, price ten shillings.
() 1966 by Anthony Payne

From Stravinsky's The Card Game at Covent Garden (choreography

John Cranko,designs Dorothea Zippel)

Houston Rogers

Reg Wilson

Edmund Rubbra (seated) with his fellow-composers (1. to r.) Richard Rodney Bennett, John
Gardner and Malcolm Williamson, who played the four pianos for the new Covent Garden
production of Stravinsky's The Wedding