# Classical Music does Folk Music



## Polednice (Sep 13, 2009)

Any favourites? I'm specifically thinking of enlarged but fairly direct arrangements, as Grainger often did, rather than music loosely influenced by folk themes.


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## jalex (Aug 21, 2011)




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## Llyranor (Dec 20, 2010)

I quite like Vaughan Williams' Fantasia on Greensleeves:





A lot of composers tried their hands on La Folia (mostly variations on the theme, I believe). Here's a few I know/like:





Vivaldi as a Trio Sonata





Corelli as a Violin Sonata





Geminiani as a Concerto Grosso (based on Corelli's)


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## Klavierspieler (Jul 16, 2011)




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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Several of Bartók's early piano works are either nearly direct-from-the-countryside or minimally Bartókized. Some of them are modified enough that he expressed the hope that the peasants he got the music from wouldn't hear his versions; maybe because he hoped to visit them again.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

You would think the great composers could write their own melodies. But noooooooo, they steal from the common folk!


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

starthrower said:


> You would think the great composers could write their own melodies. But noooooooo, they steal from the common folk!




Yeah! In Bartók's case the survey experience may have provided the impetus to make him a Magyar patriot - long after that stance had any national significance. At least as he matured he modified the peasant Magyar music by taking its influences to his 'other place', and there altering them nearly beyond recognition. Regarding 'extracting the essence', he practiced what is known in vodka circles as triple distillation.


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