I
In the first movement, the swelling arco contrabass melody from bar 7, teamed with the embellishing constant piano dynamic tremello quavers in the viole, provides an interesting textural effect, that highlights the dissonance of the melody nicely. It also sounds very much like both of these effects are happening within the one instrument, even though this would clearly be impossible.
This piece also features sporadic textural change – the interplay between arco, tremello and pizzicato playing is unpredictable, as with the exchange between dissonant sections and consonant sections. It is as I make this comment that I realize that within western musical convention, this statement is wrong. I’m not sure whether it is that so much atonalism and dissonance has been brought into music, that it makes it hard for me to determine exactly what is dissonant and what is not, or whether the fact that this movement explores so many variations of dissonance – within this piece we have a hierarchy of dissonance – ranging from “extremely dissonant and jarring”, to “more melodic and less dissonant than the rest” – all of this is technically dissonant, but the contrast in the “amounts” of dissonance leaves the slightly less dissonant sections to almost sound consonant in comparison. I suspect the answer is a combination of both, but at any rate, I found this piece very interesting to listen to, largely because of all these contrasts that have been made.
II
This movement explores more of the lyrical/melodic atonalism that I mentioned in my exploration of movement one. The dissonance that is created in this piece is strangely beautiful, rather than harsh to a listeners ears, and surprisingly, more predictable – it is certainly more singable, even despite the fact that Webern does not rely on the use of tonal centres to produce this expectation.
I think what also contributes to the smoother/lyrical finish of this piece, is that the parts are more spaced out. I think if you want to produce this effect when writing atonally, this is vital, as writing (particularly for string) within a close range highlights potential clashes between notes, whereas writing the parts across a span of 4 or more octaves eleviates the tension that is created when clashes occur. With the aural space between parts that Webern has created, the clashing is less noticeable, and the space also gives room for every individual part to “breathe” – that is, each instrument is able to explore its own melodic line, without the interruption of parts that are written close to it.
III
This movement is a extremely different to the previous two – it is driven by fast-paced quavers underneath a upper-melody that moves in minor second steps. Overall, this is not as dissonant as the previous two movements. It is more simplistic and predictable, as is very “pulse-driven”, and there is less of the previously mentioned “dissonance hierarchy” as well as not having as much as an interplay between textures. Having said this, I still thoroughly enjoyed this movement, and I think that for a lot of audiences, this would make a good interlude – it was an aural relief to hear something a little more predictable, when the majority of what has previously been heard has been less predictable, more dissonant and harder to place (not much pulse).
IV
This movement features a lot of extended technique, particularly the use of ponticello in the violin section as well as harmonics. The use of harmonics was interesting, as it was often used in conjunction with traditional arco playing – so essentially, an effect was produced whereby a strong melody was played arco in the lower strings, yet there was the added effect of having the airy quality of a held harmonic above this melody. The use of these extended techniques also highlighted the eerie dissonant quality of the music, contributing to what was already a murky texture (with the string parts being relatively close together) – the clash of textures (from bars 7-10 we see the simultaneous use of con sord, ponticello, pizzicato and arco playing) also highlights this mood.
V
The use of dissonance in this movement promotes a sense of sluggishness, as well as the slow tempo, which also promotes this feel. The lack of unity in the rhythmic material used, also promoted this uneasy feel – and it was hard to predict where this piece would go due to this lack of pulse. Once again, the constant changes in texture made this piece unpredictable, but unlike the other pieces, I found that being unable to predict where the piece would go an irritating quality, whereas in all the other movements, I found this to be a point of interest. Overall this, movement was too sporadic for my liking.
Alex
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