The passacaglia, and its close relation, the chaconne, were originally both dance forms and appear to have developed from the repeated chord sequences used by lutenists/guitarists as a basis for composition/improvisation (a process very similar to that of the twelve-bar blues in the twentieth century).

The exact difference between the passacaglia and the chaconne is still a matter of fairly heated musicological debate. Both genres have very similar characteristics, and composers appear, from time to time, to have used the names indiscriminately. There does, however, seem to be some agreement that a distinguishing feature of the passacaglia is its recognisable repeated bass figure. Examples of the use of the passacaglia/chaconne are Bach’s Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor (BWV582) for organ, the Crucifixus from his Mass in B minor, the finale of Brahms’ Fourth Symphony, Webern’s Op. 1 and the last movement of Britten’s Violin Concerto.

The present piece consists of a theme and twenty-four variations that are embedded in two preludes and two postludes (which are, themselves, variants), giving twenty-eight variations in all. The shape is reasonably clear with sections (and, often, individual variations within them) well delineated.

While the work does not really attempt to follow any story, the score is headed with a quotation from Donne’s Holy Sonnets: ‘At the round earth’s imagined corners, blow your trumpets angels…’ and is concerned with the angel fanfares, the tuba mirum, announcing the Last Judgement.

The solo horn fanfare, with which the work opens, begins quietly and in nocturnal mood, becomes more agitated and then sinks back on itself. The other instruments enter softly, moving the tonality down from F to E. There follow two fanfares (Prelude 2) both answered by a sonorous E major cadence and leading, after a brief transition, to…

The following seven variations form the first section of the piece. In these the theme is set against several counter-melodies until a series of crescendos (variation 5) leads to the harsh, repeated note fanfares and still, quiet chords of variation 6. Variation 7 restates the theme (distributed amongst all five instruments against a fixed chord) and is followed by…

Tuba cadenza (variation 8): the transition from the slower opening to the central Allegro con brio. The tuba decorates the theme and uses its final intervals of fourths to accelerate the music into the following Allegro.

Trombone cadenza (variation 16): the transition from the Allegro to the final Andante sostenuto. The trombone takes the semi-tones of the theme and plays them as slow slides decorated by ‘lip-glissandi’ (across the harmonic series). It, too, uses the falling fourths of the end of the theme, playing them as muted glissandi. and, finally, marked urlando (shouting), it hammers out the repeated note fanfare.

The chorale, eventually, runs its course and comes to rest on a triad of E major and the two trumpets transform the material of Prelude 2 into a repeated fanfare/cadenza that is answered once more by a sonorous E major cadence.

The return of Prelude 1 is marked by repeated chords of C minor in the other instruments while the solo horn plays the opening material in retrograde (the musical equivalent of playing a film or video backwards). The chords die away as the horn winds (or re-winds) everything back to its beginning, adding one note: E.

C.W.