The texture of this peice is hoophonic-one main melody and acconmpiment.
Uses alborate realisation
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Meldoy
the main melody is sung by a soprano
the word setting is mainly selabic
word painting is used
moves in steps
uses lots of ornaments
decending sequneces
rests are used in melodic phrases
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word painting
Mostly minor key
eternal-long melisma
The drop is decending sequence.
The phrase free the dead is set to a triupmphant sceton of of g major
the word wondering is melsemantic
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Harmony
The accomimant is orivied by a ground bass plaued by the bass viol and the left han of the harpsy chord.
chords are diatonic
There are perfect cadences throughout the piece (as the ground bass ends with a V chord, then repeats again with a I chord)
There are a couple of dissonances used for word painting, such as the word "pains"
Another type of dissonance used is a "false relation", like in bar 1 with the ground bass playing F sharp while the right hand plays F natural.
Suspensions are used very occasionally. For example, there is a 4–3 suspension in bar 3 beat 4 1⁄2 in the harpsichord part.
The right hand of the harpsichord plays an elaborate realisation, which has been interpreted from the original figured bass
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Ground bass
The ground bass is a 3 bar loop
It consists entirely of
quaver rhythms
It has a rising pattern
The first 4 sets of 4 quavers use an ascending sequence, starting one note higher each time At the end of the ground bass there is a fall of an octave
It uses intervals of semitones
After 4 and a half repeats of the ground bass it begins to modulate into different keys.
In the final A section (bar 29) it returns to the repeating pattern from the start of the piece.
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Instruments
This piece uses a soprano singer, harpsichord and bass viol.
The harpsichord and bass viol act as the basso continuo, providing accompaniment for the singer.
The left hand of the harpsichord and the bass viol play the ground bass—a repeating bass pattern that acts as an ac companimen
The right hand plays a realistaion
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Tempo and dynamics
THERE ARE NO TEMMPO OR DYNAMIC MARKINGS.
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Tonality
The main tonality for the piece is A minor
This reflects the sombre, sad nature of the lyrics
During the middle (B) section the piece modulatesthrough several related keys—E major (the dominant key—bar 15 & 28), G major in the middle of bar 18, C major (relative major—in bar 22), A major (the tonicmajor—middle of bar 23) and finally back to A minor in bar 29
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