G minor
G minor is a minor scale based on G, consisting of the pitches G, A, B♭, C, D, E♭, and F. Its key signature has two flats. Its relative major is B-flat major and its parallel major is G major.
Relative key | B-flat major |
---|---|
Parallel key | G major |
Dominant key | D minor |
Subdominant | C minor |
Component pitches | |
G, A, B♭, C, D, E♭, F |
The G natural minor scale is:
Changes needed for the melodic and harmonic versions of the scale are written in with accidentals as necessary. The G harmonic minor and melodic minor scales are:
Mozart's use of G minor
G minor has been considered the key through which Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart best expressed sadness and tragedy,[1] and many of his minor key works are in G minor, such as the Piano Quartet No. 1 and the String Quintet in G minor. Though Mozart touched on various minor keys in his symphonies, G minor is the only minor key he used as a main key for his numbered symphonies (No. 25, and the famous No. 40). In the Classical period, symphonies in G minor almost always used four horns, two in G and two in B♭ alto.[2] Another convention of G minor symphonies observed in Mozart's No. 25 and Mozart's No. 40 was the choice of E-flat major, the subdominant of the relative major B♭, for the slow movement, with other examples including Joseph Haydn's No. 39 and Johann Baptist Wanhal's G-minor symphony from before 1771.[3]
Notable works in G minor
- Arcangelo Corelli
- Henry Purcell
- "Dido's Lament" from Dido and Aeneas
- Johann Sebastian Bach
- Joseph Haydn
- Charles-Valentin Alkan
- Scherzo diabolico, Op. 39, No. 3
- 49 Esquisses, Op. 63, no. 6 "Les cloches"
- 49 Esquisses, Op. 63, no. 26 "Petit air, Genre ancien"
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Felix Mendelssohn
- Frédéric Chopin
- Franz Liszt
- Johannes Brahms
- Camille Saint-Saëns
- Max Bruch
- Violin Concerto No. 1, Op. 26
- Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
- Antonín Dvořák
- Gabriel Fauré
- Sicilienne, Op. 78
- Claude Debussy
- String Quartet, Op. 10
- Isaac Albéniz
- Ralph Vaughan Williams
- Sergei Rachmaninoff
- Sergei Prokofiev
- Antonio Vivaldi
- Concerto for violin, strings, and continuo (RV 315), Op. 8 No. 2, "Summer" from Le quattro stagioni, in Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione
See also
References
- Hellmut Federhofer, foreword to the Bärenreiter Urtext edition of Mozart's Piano Quartet in G minor. "G-Moll war für Mozart zeitlebens die Schicksaltonart, die ihm für den Ausdruck des Schmerzes und der Tragik am geeignetsten erschien." ("G minor was, for Mozart, the most suitable fate-key throughout his life for the expression of pain and tragedy.")
- H. C. Robbins Landon, Mozart and Vienna. New York: Schirmer Books (1991): 48. "Writing for four horns was a regular part of the Sturm und Drang G minor equipment." Robbins Landon also notes that Mozart's No. 40 was first intended to have four horns.
- James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata Theory (Oxford University Press: 2006) p. 328