5 mark questions- Impressionism (PALDF)

-loose ternary form

-ambiguous structure (unclear)

-theme and variation

-contrasting section

-the piece begins and ends in E major, giving a sense of completion to the structure.

- Mix of conjunct and small leaps
- legato
- chromaticism (chromatic movement)
- pentatonic and whole tone elements

-recurrence of the main flute theme throughout the work, which provides an ongoing point of reference as the piece progresses.

-However, each time the theme occurs it is different lens, with subtle changes to both the shape of the theme and the accompanying texture that display the composer’s rich imagination.

-modulations to unrelated keys

-The theme itself contains tonal ambiguities; despite being written in E major, it begins curiously on the sixth note of the scale and then falls through a tritone down to a Gnatural

-when the theme returns towards the end of the piece, the falling tritone is softened to a perfect fourth, making the theme much more harmonically ‘comfortable’, and suggesting a resolution of some kind -

-slow
-hemiola effect in 3/4
-slight tempo changes
-hard to find pulse (free sounding)
-no sense of 6/8
-cross rhythms
-free sense of rhythm

-opens monophonic
-mostly homophonic
- doubling of instruments
-blocks of different contrasting dynamics and texture

-large orchestra
- solo wind lines
- mutes and sororities
-lots of string techniques (tremelando, muted, pizzicato)
-glissando in harp
-percussion instruments are another source of unusual timbre, such as the use of antique cymbals

-there are no brass instruments apart from horns, and no percussion other than antique cymbals (themselves an exotic addition to the usual orchestra).

-The variety of textures played by the string section shows the composer’s remarkable awareness of the different shading requirements of specific passages. The players are asked to play with mutes (bar 5), on the fingerboard (bar 11), pizzicato (bar 32) and tremolando (bar 94).

-not many cadences
-parallel movement
-dissonance
-unusual harmonic progressions

-dissonance

-Debussy’s fondness for incorporating scales other than the usual major and minor into his melodic material can be seen through his use of the whole-tone scale in the clarinet and flute parts between bars 32 and 37.

-The chromatic aspect of Debussy’s harmonic progressions also adds to the tonal fluidity of the piece and provides magical moments such as the slip from a D majorbased chord in bar 62 into D-flat major in the following bar.

-The use of parallel harmonies, another feature typical of Debussy’s style, can also be found in the piece (for example, in the strings in bars 36-37 and 49).

-The interval of a tritone, which is one of the main characteristics of the opening theme of the work