All the runs and scales which accompany the brass at the beginning of Emerging Dances begin with exactly the same pattern of intervals. Can you hear them?
Each run begins with four notes which are exactly a whole tone apart from each other.
The Explorer close-up below focuses on these opening runs and scales.
Try clicking ‘Focus on part’ for Violin 1 to focus on just that part. Can you hear how the first four notes of this run sound the same as the four notes in the piano clip, but much faster?
Try the same with the Oboe. This run starts lower than the run of the first violin, but the intervals are exactly the same. Can you hear how the pattern of whole tones is the same at the beginning of both runs?
The runs of the Piccolo and Violin2 are organized in the same way. Listen to how the pattern of whole tones is used to start both these runs.
This pattern of whole tones, as used in Emerging Dances, originates from the common pentatonic scale.
Here’s how …
Pentatonic scale
Here’s the full pentatonic scale.
First 3 notes
And then the first three notes, up and down:
3 notes and a 4th
And then the first three notes with an extra fourth note added at the end:
David Horne uses the various features of the pentatonic scale as one of the main ways of organizing the notes in Emerging Dances. So it’s no surprise that this same pattern of whole tones is used in accompanying runs all the way through Emerging Dances.
