Pour Le Piano (Prelude) Claude Debussy 1862-1918 Claude Debussy was a well know French Impressionist composer who created the Chevalier of the Legion of Honour in France in 1903. He uses non-traditional scales and chromaticism which influenced many composers and loved using a range of nontraditional tonalities. There are 3 movements in Pour Le Piano. The first part is the Prelude which was dedicated to his former pupil and the piece had revealed the degree of technical ability that Debussy used. The second movement is the Sarabande which was dedicated to Madame E. Rouart. The piece is marked as ‘avec une elegance grave et lente’ which means a summary of its mood. The final piece Toccata was dedicated to his other pupil Nicolas Coronio. …show more content…
He has been known to be the “father of the symphony”, as no other composers at the time had the combination of productivity and quality. Haydn was the first composer to develop the Sonata Form, in which it consisted of exposition, development and recapitulation. His early Sonata pieces were in a Galant style as the simplicity and immediacy of the style used for pieces that were written for teacher and students. His later Sonatas had a more mature compositional style and his pieces were mainly written for harpsichords. However, he substituted harpsichords for forte-pianos in the later periods. Haydn's Sonata in C minor, Hob.XVI:20 was dedicated to both Katharina and Marianna Von Auenbrugger. It starts off with the first movement, Moderato, where the exposition and recapitulation consists of quasi-cadenzas that Haydn wrote. There are also plenty of dynamics markings, some of which consists a contrast of fortes to pianos. The second movement, Andante con moto, has several passages which uses syncopation. This movement’s melodic line is decorated by many ornamental embellishments.The articulation of this piece is legato with several dynamic features for each phrase where there are also no tempo changes throughout the piece. The finale, Allegro, returns to the home key of C Minor. He uses a Sonata form movement to increase the difficulty …show more content…
His compositions features a wide variety of difficulty which portrays his intellectual depth and artistic mind. Partita No. 2, one of the Partitas which were composed between 1726-1731, was a collection of popular dances of the time. This piece is separated into 6 movements: Sinfonia, Allemande, Courante, Sarabande, Rondeaux and Capriccio. There are 3 parts in the first dance, Sinfonia. Grave Adagio starts off being bold filled with chords which gives a strong sense of the contrapuntal texture and starts with a serious character. In addition, dotted rhythms were used to enhance the atmosphere. The second part is the Andante: a slow paced section with a sense of a singing style. Performers will have to distinguish the melodic line with the accompaniment by having several dynamics for each phrase. Finally, It ends with a Cadenza with several demi-semi quavers being played. Moreover, the last part , Allegro, comes back being very rhythmic and articulated with a two- voice texture; a stand out technique during the baroque period. Next, the Allemande which is a very legato and slow piece. The word "Allemande" means German in French. It is used as the title of the piece as it includes many features of a German dance. The second section starts off with an improved version of the first section. Later on throughout the piece, the melodic