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Comparing Vivaldi's Concerto For Four Violins And Orchestra In B Minor

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Project 5
Vivaldi-Concerto for Four Violins and Orchestra in B Minor
Vivaldi’s Concerto for Four Violins and Orchestra in B Minor bears some similarities and some differences to his work “Winter” from The Four Seasons. The most prominent of these similarities relates to the speed of the movements. The typical concerto from the Baroque period had three movements. These movements often alternated their tempo: the first was fast, the second slow, and the third fast again.
In “Winter,” Vivaldi utilizes this pattern. If one listens to the first minute or so Vivaldi’s second movement in that work, then listens to the anything beyond the first 30 or so seconds of the first movement or past the first 45 seconds of the third movement, the contrast is obvious. Vivaldi’s second movement in “Winter” is by far the slowest of the three movements.
This Concerto for Four Violins follows this same pattern. The first thirty seconds, for example, of the opening movement (0:00-0:30) are replete with up tempo music, as are the opening thirty seconds of the third and final movement (6:17-6:47 on the YouTube video). By contrast, the beginning thirty seconds of the second movement (3:50-4:20 on the video) are noticeably slower than their counterparts in the other movements. This characteristic …show more content…

The dissonance and being difficult to follow the music can be heard throughout this section, but especially in the third and fourth scenes (13:47-16:29 and 16:52-21:00, respectively). This music sounds “off” somehow because of its clashing chords and being devoid of a pattern. Indeed, attempting to tap or hum along to the music in these sections proves impossible. (It should be noted, however, that the orchestral transitions, specifically the one from 12:43-13:47 do feature some patterns. These are the main difference between this work and

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