Samuel Barber Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

The inverse pedal point in music

Van Halen, Chopin, Johnny Cash, Samuel Barber

Jaquandor, as is his tradition, was playing his Your Daily Dose of Christmas. One post highlighted the oratorio L’Enfance du Christ by Hector Berlioz. I had not heard that work.

Well, there is one exception. The Shepherd’s Farewell is one of my all-time favorite pieces of music. And the best moment is when the soprano note remains on the same note, but the rest of the chord below it changes, at about 1:00, 2:20, and 3:45 here. I find it utterly exquisite. Does that have a musical name?

As it turns out, it does. “That is called an ‘inverse pedal point’! A pedal point happens when the bass tone holds while everything above it shifts; an inversion occurs when the same thing is done with a voice other than the bass. Music! :)”

Now, I was familiar with the pedal point, even if I didn’t know what it was called. Singing bass in a church choir, we often sustained our notes while the other sections moved. This guy can explain better than I.

And here are some examples. It appears Jump by Van Halen is a popular choice. As I suspected, the drone of the bagpipe is a pedal point.

“When a pedal point occurs in a voice other than the bass, it is usually referred to as an inverted pedal point. Pedal points are usually on either the tonic or the dominant (fifth note of the scale) tones.” Think of the version of Hurt by Johnny Cash, starting at 0:52.

Amen

Final cadences, such as the Amen at the end of a church hymn, often involve the sopranos singing the tonic note twice, while the other parts move. Listen to the Barber Adagio for Strings, specifically around 5:30, and in general about 2/3s of the way through a recording. It ALWAYS devastates me.

Another favorite piece of music with a pedal point is the Raindrop Prelude, Op.28 No.15 by Chopin. This video is useful because it comes with a score. As Paul Barton plays the FEURICH piano, note that there’s a pedal point almost from the very beginning in the bass line. But notice how, at 2 minutes in, at the key change, the continual note is now at the top, first in the bass clef, then the treble. Then the repeated note is somewhere in the middle before the piece reverts to the original key.

If you want to play music at my funeral, I’d suggest the Barber adagio or Raindrop Prelude by Chopin. Or preferably both, though I probably won’t have much of a say in the decision.

Adagio for Strings – Samuel Barber

a movement of the String Quartet No. 1, Opus 11 (1936)

samuel barber It’s Lent. I’m not singing in church because COVID. And it makes me quite sad.

Now Lenten music tends to be melancholy, but it’s a good kind of sad, a reflective type of sad. For instance, give me a good requiem any time, but especially between Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.

The Adagio for Strings began as a movement of the String Quartet No. 1, Opus 11 (1936) by Samuel Barber (1910-1981). It was so effective that it was spun off on its own. Is there anything sadder than Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings? I don’t think so, But, with some reimagining, I could be wrong.

It was broadcast over the radio at the announcement of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s death, and on television at the announcement of John F. Kennedy’s. Albert Einstein and Princess Grace of Monaco’s funerals featured the theme. It was performed at Last Night of the Proms in 2001 at the Royal Albert Hall to commemorate the victims of the September 11 attacks, and in Trafalgar Square following the terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo.

Listen

And it is such an adaptable piece, which has been arranged for solo organ, clarinet choir, woodwind band, and, as Agnus Dei, for chorus with optional organ or piano accompaniment, among others. It’s been used in everything from the movie Platoon to The Simpsons television show.

So, if it can also be modified to be dance music, I reckon that’s the strength of the composition. In most any iteration, as someone wrote, “There is a depth in such music that reaches deep down in human soul.”

Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

Eos Sextet – Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ. Not a string to be found.

Choral version of Agnus Dei sung to the theme. Performed by The Choir of Trinity College, Cambridge, UK.

Dover Quartet. Usually, it’s the final cadence of a piece that gets to me. But for the Adagio, it’s about 3/4 of the way through. In this iteration, between 5:30 and 6:00.

Lenten music Friday: Barber Adagio

Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” would be played at the state funerals of both Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy.

Thomas Larson called Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” “the saddest music ever written,” and he may be right.

NPR describes the premiere performance on 5 November 1938 with conductor Arturo Toscanini leading the NBC Symphony Orchestra, broadcast to millions of radio listeners.

From This Day in History:

Adagio for Strings had begun not as a freestanding piece, but as one movement of Barber’s 1936 String Quartet No. 1, Opus 11. When that movement provoked a mid-composition standing ovation at its premiere performance, Barber decided to create the orchestral adaptation that he would soon send to Toscanini.

In later years, the piece would be played at the state funerals of both Franklin Delano Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy, taking its place as what one observer has called “the semi-official music of mourning.”

It is an adaptable piece, which has been arranged for solo organ, clarinet choir, woodwind band, and, as Agnus Dei, for chorus with optional organ or piano accompaniment, among others.

9/11 tribute. Leonard Slatkin, conductor. LAST NIGHT OF THE PROMS AT THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL IN ENGLAND – 2001.

September 11: 10th-anniversary memorial concert, Steven Schneider, organist. St. James’ Episcopal Church, Marietta, GA.