Le 1er juillet 2017
de 10h00 à 10h30
Le Patio (université de Strasbourg)
22 rue René Descartes, 67000 Strasbourg
amphithéâtre 6
Séance - Chopin, Mendelssohn, and Franck
Pré-acte / Acte
Auteur : Heewon Chung
This paper examines Chopin’s use of semitonal modulations as his distinctive compositional techniques of formal designs. Whereas Chopin’s chromatic harmony leading to modulations to remote tonal regions has been widely admired as prominent features of his style, semitonal relationships specifically have not been as fully examined so far. I claim that semitonal modulations not only raise tonal issues but also have formal functions involving a cadential progressions or a boundary of formal division. After defining the technique of semitonal modulation in the music of Chopin, I will explore how semitonal modulations play a crucial role in formal designs in two ways. First, semitonal modulations may dramatize the cadential progression. In the Waltz in Ab major, Op. 42 and the Fantasy Op. 49, they expand the last cadence and emphasize the resolution of tension, while they are used in an opposite musical context in the first movement of the Bb-Minor Sonata, Op. 35. Second, semitonal modulation may blur the boundary between two sections. The Mazurka in D Major, Op. 33, No. 2 and the Mazurka in C Minor, Op. 56, No. 3 are such examples where Chopin disguises a formal division of the two sections and give individuality to the pieces using the transformation between the semitone-related keys. A similar but more extended case occurs at the end of the developing episode in the Ballade in F Minor, Op. 52.
