The Green caldron - University Library

18 The Green Caldron
The suite begins with an overture, the longest movement of the work by-
far. The French began their suites with an overture, and the Itahan style
also included this form of introductory movement. The two overture forms,
however, developed along greatly different lines. While the Italian overture,
standardized by A. Scarlatti (1659-1725), was fast-slow-fast, the French
style as exemplified in overtures by Lully was characterized by a slow intro-
duction followed by a fast section and an ending with a massive restatement
of the slow introduction. Bach's overture follows LuUy's pattern exactly. In
addition, the very essence of the music is similar to the French style. The
slow introduction is very grave and dignified, having as its basic rhythm a
succession of dotted-eighth and sixteenth notes accented by the trumpets.
Lully used this same rhytlim again and again in his overtures. The French
overture also contained a fugal fast movement. Bach was master of the fugue,^
and again his overture follows the French pattern. The movement closes with
a grand restatement of the opening slow theme.
The overture is apparently quite French in character. Bach, however,
does not allow it to be completely so. The fugal fast section is not a fugue in
the strict sense but a fugal form of the concerto, an Italian concept popularized
by Corelli (1653-1713). This form was characterized by a solo instrument
suported by light chords playing alternately with the full orchestra and had
as its basic aesthetic value the contrast between loud and soft. Bach's fast
section has extended passages for the solo violin as well as loud passages for
the whole orchestra and thus is of the concerto form as well as the fugal form.
In his overture alone, therefore, Bach has created a union of French and
Italian styles.
Bach does not adhere strictly to the pattern of the French suite after his
overture, for the next movement is not a dance-tune at all. Called an air by
Bach, this beautiful movement is well known as the Air on the G String, a
transposition from the original key of D major. In this short piece Bach
has captured the spirit of the be! canto (beautiful singing) style of instrumental
writing, that is, the Italian style.
Beginning about 1580 a group of musicians, poets, and philosophers met
at the home of Giovanni Bardi, count of Vernio, in Florence.^ They had become
greatly dissatisfied with the excessive use of polyphony or counterpoint,
a form of composition characterized by many separate but harmonizing
melodies played at the same time. Multiplicity of melodies was often taken
to extremes, such as in the Festival Mass by Benevoli (circa 1628) which
had fifty-three separate parts on the printed page.' Bardi's friends wished
to prompt a return to the idealized style of Greek music. According to
Plato, music and rhythm must fit the words and succeed in heightening the
emotional effect.^ The Italians, therefore, thought that a single voice was
better able to convey personal emotions. Polyphony was useful only to evoke
such emotions as awe or exultation, for these are more group emotions than