Stravinsky, The Rite of Spring, Rehearsal Numbers 16-18
Rehearsal Numbers 16 and 17
Piccolo's in the register they are in have a super squeaky sound to it, and Stravinsky writes a C7 that pops out of the mix really easily due to the register compared to the rest of their melody, and the higher transposition of the Piccolo. You have two piccolo's kind of fighting each other for the same space, but doing slightly different ostinato-like melodies
The French horn is in con sordino with a low relative intensity. The trumpet in D is written Senza Sordino but has a high relative intensity. There are four trumpets in C all played con sordino in a highly linear voicing.
Clarinets are more felt than heard as they double the rhythm of the brass in this section with a linear style arpeggio.
You really only hear the trumpet in D due to it's not having any mute but having a high relative intensity. The other melodies are more supportive, but also incredibly unsettling to listen to in the background.
The Oboes are barely heard but more felt, they create a sustained tone.
Bassoons create sustained town via a trill, which is one of McKay's tricks: motion as sustained sound. Also Stravinsky seems to love the dovetailed woodwinds, and I've seen him do this often, even in Petruška.
Clarinet's double the horns with arpeggios, but also play this fancy flutter tongue that's downward figure with the flutes. It's interesting to note that he writes flutter tongue but he also marks these passages as staccato with a massively fast 16th note polyrhythm. Fucked! Viola is heard under this mess with a repeating ostinato figure.
Perhaps the right of spring could be analyzed like this?
Competing simultaneous ostinatos with strange percussive effects, but within a traditional homophonic texture in that a sustained sound always unifies and balances the orchestration.
The cello and bass ostinato versus the Viola ostinato versus the violin I pizzicato ostinato vs the English Horn ostinato. This creates the pulse of the homophonic texture.
The oboe is more sustained sound. Bassoon creates sustained tone via a trill. These two instruments creates the sustained sound of a homophonic texture.
Piccolo, flute, clarinet Piccolo, French horn, trumpet in D, trumpet and C, violin two pizzicato doing more percussive and textural effects overall while the ostinatos are raging beneath all of this. Melody and pulse of a homophonic texture.
Rhythmic ostinatos in The Rite of Spring are kind of like an undertow, the sustained sounds are like a beautiful ocean far off in the distance, while everything else that's happening above it, the strange percussive effects and textures that you hear in the woodwinds brass and percussion sections are like the waves crashing down on one's head, begging to annihilate.
Fuuuuuuuuck.