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Recordings for class - Fall 2021 (Th4)

Luise Reichardt, Frühlingslied Luise Reichardt, Unruhiger Schlaf Steely Dan, " The Fez " Scott Joplin, The Augustan Waltz(es) Fred...

Tuesday, April 7, 2020

Das Rheingold and Toccata from L'Orfeo Layering

Richard Wagner's piece and Toccata both have layering involved throughout. The prelude starts off with a low brass instrument playing a sustained note, then higher brass instruments come in (maybe baritone or french horn?) and they layer with each other. After the low and medium brass layer, the strings come in while the brass instruments keep doing their thing. Then woodwinds come in. In just the first three minutes, there were four different layers of instruments that I heard. Just like Ras Rheingold, Toccata starts off with a low brass note sustain, just with some articulation. While both pieces have nice layers, Toccata's layering moves more quickly than Ras Rheingold. While low brass continues, high brass comes in with the melody. Another high brass part comes in as harmony to both low and high brass. It has similar articulation to the low brass layer, but harmonizes with the high brass melodic layer. After section A, a strummed instrument layers in section B. I really loved both pieces and I think that with these being more layered, they sound really really nice in my opinion.

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