Profile IV: Development I, sequential development

Each profile will highlight a specific problem of composition for orchestra. This profile deals with the sequential development of at least two contrasting thematic ideas from earlier sections.

General considerations:

1. Development always involves the creation of new identities from the preexisting material through fragmentation, contrapuntal manipulation, some kind of compression, and often in reordering the pitch material.

2. Another important consideration is the separate development of specific parameters of the material; For example, only a harmonic sequence will be moved around, partitioned, or expanded (by intervallic adjustments).

3. Development will have characteristic timbral and registral oppositions to highlight the breakdown of thematic or contour identities.

4. The closing material in a sonata exposition or the cadential material at the end of a stable section which precedes development will often be the most important cohhesive element in the developmental process. As a result two things may occur: the order of material presented in development will be reversed, or these important bits will be allowed to become secondary to a new foreground which appears in development.

5. Sequential development need not occur just in one place (as in a traditional Classical sonata movement), but could consist as episodes or compressed, cumulative dramatic events which completely redefine the tonal hierarchy by juxtaposition. The Mahler example is prime to this process.

  • 1. Berlioz, Symphonie Fantastique, Movement I:(PP. 12-20).
    Development begins IF (idee fixe) in lower strings and with thematic material alternating between woodwinds and strings from meas. 191.
    Everything breaks down from Reh. 10 with chromatic conjunct runs in strings vs. sustained wind chords. This kind of fragmentation serves the purpose of eliminating the completeness of thematic identity. The energy is created by harmonic means (a similar device in the Brahms example to be discussed later at P. 14 of that score).
    After the G.P. before Reh 11 (end of P. 14), the upbeat of the IF is intervallically modified against the IF complete in the winds (meas. 236-276). BY P. 17, system 2 the chromatic instability slows down.
    Meas. 302-308 is a compression of alternating chords and eighth-note paired material.
    The IF is taken up again at reh. 14 and the winds use the head of the idea (dotted half plus eighth-note pair to agogic accent) from meas. 317. It forms the cadential tutti at meas. 323-326.
  • 2. Brahms, Symphony No. 1, Movement I: after second ending (PP. 11-17).
    Closing material (triplet eighths to dotted quarter) rises to foreground throughout this section with the fragmentation of that idea to overlapping triplets. Here a rhythmic compression generates new dissonance. P. 11 the second ending: upward arpeggiated material in the strings is really the second part of the exposition first theme. By splitting this gesture off, Brahms reduces it to a solid harmonic entity, an essential factor in the harmonic sequences that begin three measures after Reh. G.
    Comparing these chorale-like passages, the process of intervallic modification, particularly in the uppermost voice generates the succession of tonal instabilities.
    From meas. 246 the passage is reduced to three chords, based on a primary pitch with its upper neighbor in the middle.
    Notice the pervasive triplet plus quarter (or dotted quarter) punctuations in the background, starting at meas. 251 and saturating the texture. It is also the preparation of the reprise at Reh. K.
    Prior to that section there is an extended retransiton, a good lesson in how to make the harmony static over a pedal and produce textural variety.
  • 3. Mahler Symphony No. 5, Movement I: (PP. 18-28).
    This develpment has the dramatic effect of a kind of delirium, accentuated by the contrast with the earlier, extended dead march. Development here is a different kind of music.
    Mahler uses the solo trumpet, so exposed in the opening of the piece, to introduce new material at Reh. 7 (beginning of the recording). The texture is remarkable for the closely spaced chords in the trombones, using syncopated accents against the trumpet.
    Bassoons, contrabassoon, and lower strings march along in half notes, later to be fragmented ot Reh. 8. This figure gets transferred to the lower brass. Also there is a timbre modulation of the syncopation to the six horns (Reh. 8).
    All the while, a series of obbligatos, starting with the violins at Reh. 7 enrich the harmony.
    Throughout this development there is a great deal of rhythmic variety within the measure (look at the violins on PP. 19-20).
    Critical to the dramatic development is the texture change as meas. 181, since from the previous upbeat, the trumpet is reprising the figure from the opening of the piece. However, the concert C# is globally shifted to a C natural, an important tonal shift when the harmonic identity of the idea is modified at meas. 183 (C-Db-C concert pitches in trumpet).
    Notice, also how the weight of this passage is controlled, both registrally and timbrally, as evidenced by the use of three desks of divisi cellos from meas. 181. Even though they are not foreground, their entrance is highlighted by violin 2 dropping out for two and one-half measures.
    The compressions, juxtapositions and reorderings reach a fever pitch from here to the end of the example, and the tutti at Reh. 10 reaches the ulitmate in pitch density and asymmetric rhythmic divisions. However, even within this choreographed chaos there is a temporary thinning of the texture at the a tempo (meas. 221).
    P. 28 restores the C# (Db) of the solo trumpet as a traditional recap (the key signature finally reverts at Reh. 11). Since the proportions of this movement are so skewed by the dead march at the opening, all the proportional devices of sonata are radically redefined.

    • Updated and corrected May 8, 2004.