GG: Bach sarabande, and more on the repeats question

[Bradley P Lehman <bpl@umich.edu>]

Juozas wrote:

>Even if there are additional ornaments provided specially for the
>repeats, the ABAB form may seem almost illogical. For example, I've
>looked at the score of the Sarabande from the 3rd English Suite and there
>are actually two scores for this same work - one score with little
>ornaments (let's name the parts A1 B1 in this score) and one more with
>many of them (A2 B2, "Les agrements de la meme Sarabande" - can anyone
>translate it?)
>
>So I've heard 3 ways of playing the Sarabande: A1 A2 B2 (Gould), A1 A1 B1
>B1 (someone at MP3.com), A1 B1 A2 B2 (Leonhardt). The most logical way of
>playing seems to be the 1st one because A1 is an introduction, A2 is an
>ornamented preparation for the final and the B2 part is, well, the final
>part.


If those are the only three performances you've heard, then you've never
heard it played the correct (and most logical) way yet.  That is, A1 A2 B1
B2.  That is, AABB (the complete standard dance form) where the second
time for each section uses the more highly ornamented version, as an
elaboration.

Get a good recording: Edward Parmentier or Alan Curtis.

-----

For more music like this, explore the "Fitzwilliam Virginal Book" (a
collection of hundreds of pieces from the late 16th century), "Parthenia,"
"My Ladye Nevells Booke," the Elizabeth Rogers Book, etc, and hundreds of
other pieces from the 17th century.

There's A NORM for dance music and for instrumental arrangements of
popular songs, and for popular songs themselves (Dowland, Caccini, etc).
Every section (however many there are, typically two to four) is repeated
before going on to the next section, and often the ornamented version for
the second time around is written out in full...for example, in William
Byrd, Peter Philips, J P Sweelinck (setting of Dowland's "Lachrymae"),
etc, etc.

Even our Most Clever Glenn Gould had no way around this in his recordings
of Byrd and Gibbons.  Those composers wrote out their ornamented repeats
of each section so clearly that not even Gould could slash them away and
make them lopsided.

In the "Salisbury pavane and galliard" by Gibbons, Gould's favorite
composer, a convenient feature comes up.  The harmonic scheme is:

A section: A minor (ending with A major chord: "Picardy third")
B section: E major
C section: C major modulating back to A minor

Gibbons did not write out ornamented versions for the three sections in
the pavane, so Gould simply plays them ABC with no repeats.  (I say
"convenient" because the C section, horrors, does modulate from C major
back to A minor (with Picardy third) for the ending, and it would have
broken Gould's harmonic rule to repeat that C section, taking that same
homeward journey again.)  But then Gibbons the rascal confounds him in the
galliard: all three of its sections do have written-out repeats with
ornamentation, and there's no way around playing all of it, even though it
forces Gould to do what must have been a thoroughly unpleasant leap from
C1's ending in A minor (on an A major chord) back to the C major of C2,
for that same trip home a second time.

Poor, poor Gould, being forced to amend his own quirky harmonic agenda
when confronted by music of his own very favorite composer!  :)

Thanks goodness William Byrd was clever enough to write out the ornamented
repeats in his pavanes and galliards, such that was compulsory for Our
Hero to get it right.  But even then, the harmonic motion may have pained
Gould, because Byrd was even more confounding than Gibbons:

In the fifth P/G the harmonic scheme is:

A section: start and end in C minor
B section: start in F major and modulate to G minor (!)
C section: start in E-flat major and modulate back to C minor

Since each of those sections has to be repeated if all the written-out
notes of the composition are to be played, there are those "uncomfortable"
leaps from G back to F, and C back to E-flat.  Too bad.

In the first P/G the scheme is:

A section: start and end in C minor
B section: start in B-flat, modulate to G minor
C section: start in F, modulate back to C minor

Again there are these "primitive" leaps suddenly from one key to another,
especially when starting repeats.

That's something that a more "advanced" composer such as Bach would not
do...his music moves more conveniently among tonic, dominant, and mediant
instead of to these weird relationships.  No rifts jumping from key to
key.

-----

And moving in the other direction away from Bach, there's music such as
Scott Joplin's, where each strain is simply in a different key from the
previous one.  No big problem.  You play each section with its own
repeats, then you move on to a new key and play each section with its own
repeats, etc.  Just like in the Elizabethans.  Every section is repeated,
and then you go on to something else.

Just like in Bach.  Just like in the German, French, English, and Italian
music of Bach's own day, and before, and after: Scheidt, Froberger,
Buxtehude, Bohm, Fischer, Handel, the Couperins, Rameau, Purcell, Blow,
Frescobaldi, Picchi, Ferrini, Scarlatti, etc, etc, etc.  Every section is
conventionally repeated (sometimes with written-out ornaments, sometimes
with improvised ornaments, sometimes plain, whatever...but repeated),
irrespective of harmonic "progress."

-----

What does this say about Gould?  He imposed a modern (and Gouldian) idea
about how compositions could be "improved" if they don't get to modulate
home any more times than they have to.  This isn't playing the music on
its own terms.  It's playing a commentary about the music, as if the music
itself isn't good enough as it stands.  The music in AABB form had to be
changed to AB or AAB because it wasn't good enough with harmonic rifts in
it at the repeat of B.

If Glenn Gould was "right" that music should be trimmed back to AAB, then
*everybody* else was "wrong" in the way they composed the music.

It's revisionism.

It's interesting as *a* way to play the music.  Gould is always
interesting.  He's also misleading for listeners who get to know the music
*only* through his performances, rather than hearing it the more
conventional way.


>
>I can't see why it is needed to repeat the end two times with no changes
>as the MP3.com gal does. She doesn't use ornamentation at all - maybe
>those embelishments are not by Bach but rather by Egon Petri and her
>teacher told her they weren't authentic :)

That, or just not understanding the music.  :)

>
>Leonhardt's approach is probably the most correct of all (probably JSB
>indicated so himself) but I simply regard his performance as one work
>repeated twice in a row, like "did you like my sarabande? it has ended so
>here I go with another version of it!".

Leonhardt's frequently been quirky about repeats, too, playing AB instead
of AABB in many of his recordings.  Some of it is explicable by saying he
was recording for the limited length of LP sides, and some of it is not.
At least, as I mentioned yesterday, it's *less* of a distortion than AAB
is.  The music stays balanced in that we get to hear each section the same
number of times as the others.


Bradley Lehman, Dayton VA
home: http://i.am/bpl  or  http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl
CD's: http://listen.to/bpl or http://www.mp3.com/bpl

"Music must cause fire to flare up from the spirit - and not only sparks
from the clavier...." - Alfred Cortot