It’s amazing how the main theme of section B is only based on the ordering of 4 note motif - ‘B’, 2 ‘E’s of different registers and ‘A’. Hence in a sense, it's like ‘paradidle’ in percussion since it essentially uses the various permutation of the 4 notes to actually spun a melody. (Note: I termed it 'paradidle' is because of the piece’s percussive nature and how such motivic ordering may be associated to the paradidle, but of course it is not to be taken literally). Sometimes the introduction of B flat and E flat might possibility be to create surprise or to create some voice leading tendency, to propel the music forward…
See how B flat leads to A in the diagram below:
This melody is always set over a submediant pedal, quite uncommon eh since we often encounter tonic or dominant pedal.. but submediant!
6 comments:
Interesting suggestion of paradidle, but not sure if you understand paradidle correctly. My understanding from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradiddle is that it is not any permutation of 4 notes. See also http://www.drummingweb.com/paradiddles.htm. (Mirza, any comments)
Yep.. you are absolutely right that it does not refer to permutation notes, but rather the variation of RLRL LRLR pattern.
BUT like what I've mentioned in my post, "paradidle" is just a term I borrowed from percussion and is NOT TO BE TAKEN AT FACE VALUE in this context. The reason why this term was used here is mainly because of the concerto's percussive nature- with the imitation of various drumming patterns and timbre.
Therefore I tried associating the motivic variation of this section to some sort of "paradidle variations" (though it does not exactly mean that).
I'm afraid it is not a question of taking things at face value. The essential meaning of a term must be retained, otherwise it loses its meaning. Sounds like you are too loosely equating paradiddle with anything associated with percussion.
On a different issue now: how did you come to hear/interpret the pedal as vi? Where and how is C as the tonic being established?
oops.. now I think I made a mistake. It would make more sense if the tonic here is A minor instead of C minor, with the absence of G# that further obscured the tonal centre... I think that's why the composer had the A pedal throughout to establish the tonic
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