# Are there any multi-movement pieces where each movement remains major or remains minor?



## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

And do you prefer this or rather enjoy the contrast between movements?


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## EvaBaron (Jan 3, 2022)

Schubert’s 14th string quartet is all minor


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

Baroque suites often have all movements in the same (main) key. Concertos and sonatas frequently have a different key for a middle movement (and often a minor/major contrast).
It also occurs in the classical era but usually at least one movement is in a different key although it often is not a minor key in major key works but most frequently subdominant or dominant.

Two movement classical pieces are always in the same key (like Haydn's g minor piano sonata or Beethoven's op.49/2) or e.g. e minor - E major (like Beethoven's sonatas op.49/1, 90 and 111). There are very few pieces with > 2 mvmts in the classical and romantic era without a movement in a different key. (There is Mozart's wind concertante (all E flat) that might not be authentic and a few early/middle Haydn symphonies. E.g. #49 with all movements in f minor; the rare symphonies starting with a slow movement tend to have all in one key because the slow movement is usually the one with a different key which is impossible if it is first ) 
It is also very rare to have all movements in minor. The best known piece might be the Death and Maiden already mentioned (but the slow movement is g minor, so they are not all in the same key), then a few by Haydn and also a g minor symphony by Joh. Chr. Bach. One will certainly find a few more but not many
In the 19th century there are far more minor key works but they will almost always have a movement in the major for contrast. 
Brahms' first cello sonata e minor has also all movements in the minor although a different key in the middle movement but I cannot think of another piece right now.

I usually find more contrasts more entertaining but there are obviously great baroque suites with all movements in the same key and later when the minor mode is more obviously "dark" (in the baroque it is often rather "neutral", very few people will hear e.g. Bach's b minor flute ouverture suite as "tragic" because it's overall quite playful), so no movement in major like in Schubert D 810 will create a particular atmosphere (and highlight the few sections in major within the movements)


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## bagpipers (Jun 29, 2013)

Many pieces all major ,it's common one does not think of it and like EvaBaron said Death & the Maiden quartet a rare all minor.
Many pieces start minor and finish major also but starting major and ending minor ,very rare,Mendelssohn did it in the "Scotch"


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_written_in_all_major_and/or_minor_keys


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## mbhaub (Dec 2, 2016)

Prokofieff Classical Symphony all major.


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## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

Kreisler jr said:


> and later when the minor mode is more obviously "dark" (in the baroque it is often rather "neutral"


I've never realized that. Very interesting


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Kreisler jr said:


> later when the minor mode is more obviously "dark" (in the baroque it is often rather "neutral", very few people will hear e.g. Bach's b minor flute ouverture suite as "tragic" because it's overall quite playful),


Not quite sure what you mean by that. Howabout Haydn Op.33 No.1?


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

Someone mentioned a statistic that in the baroque time almost half of the pieces are in a minor key (as main key) whereas in the late 18th century (Haydn, Mozart etc.) it's only about 10-15%. A rough indicator are collections of similar works; Bach's keyboard suites are usually 3/6 minor, Haydn quartets usually 1/6 (and it's fewer in Haydn's and Mozart's symphonies). Minor as main key becomes a bit more special, simply because it is rare.
And while very serious and tragic pieces in the baroque are usually in the minor, there are many that are not. Of course, there are also some playful and picturesque minor pieces in Viennese classicism (such as Mozart's Alla turca that nevertheless is not undramatic and a strong contrast after the first two movements of this sonata) but usually the minor mode is more "loaded" after the baroque period.
Haydn's op. 33/1 and some others I'd put in betwen; they are not as dark as e.g. Mozart's g minor quintet but neither as neutral/playful as e.g. Bach's b minor flute/orchestral suite or French suite. Within the mostly "comic" opus 33 #1 is the most dramatic piece, I'd say.

Or to turn back to the original question: An all minor suite in the baroque does not mean it's a particularly "dark" or dramatic piece, an all minor symphony or sonata at least in the late classical period would be rare and probably very emotional/dark/dramatic. In any case this is true for the few pieces that come to mind such as Haydn's #49 or Schubert's D 810.


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## bagpipers (Jun 29, 2013)

level82rat said:


> I've never realized that. Very interesting


A lot of it is the type of minor scale used,in the Baroque they liked the 'melodic minor scale' which is neutral and wishy washy,the natural minor scale in darker and the harmonic minor scale kind of Brahmsy Gyspy sort of.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

bagpipers said:


> Many pieces all major ,it's common one does not think of it and like EvaBaron said Death & the Maiden quartet a rare all minor.
> Many pieces start minor and finish major also but *starting major and ending minor ,very rare,Mendelssohn did it in the "Scotch"*
> 
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_written_in_all_major_and/or_minor_keys


You're thinking of the Italian (4th). The Third is in A minor; the coda of its finale is in A major.


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## bagpipers (Jun 29, 2013)

EdwardBast said:


> You're thinking of the Italian (4th). The Third is in A minor; the coda of its finale is in A major.


I'm sorry ,your right it is the 4th


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

Kreisler jr said:


> Someone mentioned a statistic that in the baroque time almost half of the pieces are in a minor key (as main key) whereas in the late 18th century (Haydn, Mozart etc.) it's only about 10-15%. A rough indicator are collections of similar works; Bach's keyboard suites are usually 3/6 minor, Haydn quartets usually 1/6 (and it's fewer in Haydn's and Mozart's symphonies). Minor as main key becomes a bit more special, simply because it is rare.


What (major/minor) key a work or movement is in is a vague description of what effects/feelings it creates because it tells nothing of how chromaticism or dissonance is utilized, to what effect. A work can be in a major key (as its home key) and be in its parallel minor most of the time; how would we know how borrowed chords, chromatic chords, non-chord tones are utilized, in what context, or how it modulates, just by looking at the key of the work? For example, most movements of M. Haydn's (I remember level82rat showing interest in his catholic music) Missa sti Joannis Nepomuceni are in C major, but the work mostly sounds dark and brooding with a sense of yearning.


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## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> For example, most movements of M. Haydn's (I remember level82rat showing interest in his catholic music) Missa sti Joannis Nepomuceni are in C major, but the work mostly sounds dark and brooding with a sense of yearning.


Good memory hammer. I'll have to give that mass a shot; don't think I've ever heard it


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## hammeredklavier (Feb 18, 2018)

level82rat said:


> hammer


also look at this singspiel aria from 1793. It's in B flat major as its home key, but frequently stays in B flat minor and VI7 harmony (although it's more like a VI with a missing 5th, and the 7th as a non-chord tone, in the 18th century style), has a Neapolitan 6th chord prolonged for bars. At around the midpoint, it modulates to C major, and then to A flat, and then to A minor and then to C minor, before coming back home. This post, which I recently posted in another thread, examines its progression from A flat to A minor-


hammeredklavier said:


> the measures inside the box: by the shift, [Cb, Ab, Eb]—[B, G#, E], the altered, A flat minor triad, i6 (G sharp minor, enharmonically) leads to V64 of A minor, acting as a transition between the section in A flat and the one in A minor-


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## level82rat (Jun 20, 2019)

hammeredklavier said:


> also look at this singspiel aria from 1793. It's in B flat major as its home key, but frequently stays in B flat minor, frequently has VI7 harmony (although it's more like a VI with a missing 5th, and the 7th as a non-chord tone, in the 18th century style), has a Neapolitan 6th chord prolonged for a bar. At around the midpoint, it modulates to C major, and then to A flat, and then to A minor and then to C minor, before coming back home. This post, which I recently posted in another thread, examines its progression from A flat to A minor-


That section you highlight is incredible. Sounds ahead of its century


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

Shostakovich String Quartet 7. Three movements, F# minor, D minor, F# minor.

I only remembered this because I just bought the Fitzwilliam Quartet's complete quartets box set in a local thrift store for $2.50, unopened, and was listening to the Sixth and Seventh while cooking. The Seventh is short, dark, and bleak.


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