Man, I'm so glad to say I found and subscribed to your channel when you had less than 10 followers, because I think you might eventually be one of the main music analysis channels out there.
Amazing work, thank you so much for all the incredible information! Please consider analyzing the rest of Ravel's Miroirs, it's such an interesting and diverse work...
Nice analysis! One bird that you forgot to mention is the Cuckoo bird, which have a interval of 3rd that appear a lot in this piece. Louis-Claude Daquin also have a piece written from the inspiration of Cuckoo, and both Daquin and Ravel are French composer, so it is not impossible that Ravel might have taken influence from Daquin.
Thanks! You're correct that it is indeed possible for Ravel to have been considering the call of the cuckoo when implementing the falling 3rd motive in this piece. Given that members of Les Apaches (including Ravel himself via his comments to Vuillermoz) have cited Ravel's time in the forests of Fontainebleau as the inspiration for the bird calls in this piece, and that cuckoos aren't native to those forests, I omitted their call from my analysis.
What a great analysis. One of my favorite pieces of Ravel. Le Gibet and Nahandove would be great to watch to. I would love to hear a more harmonic analysis (I’m a jazz musician), with all the chord changes trough the entire piece. Great job Ps: I’ve never heard the “Octatonic” name for the diminished scale. That was new to me
Thank you! I may look at Le Gibet at some point. Interestingly, Barry Harris also took issue with calling the scales that alternate half and whole steps "diminished"
Absolutely fabulous Nick. Your understanding of the trees and the forest at the same time is grande!!! Of course only folks who are pretty deep into Ravel and this work in particular - and have more than a beginner’s knowledge of music lol can follow you. Knowing that you’re appealing to a tiny niche in the already tiny world of music geeks who can appreciate what you articulate here - and you keep going is grounds for a new species of Nobel freakin prize!! Wind ever and ever at your back 🙏🏽. Any chance you would do an analysis of Ravel’s Trois Poems de Stephane Mallarme ?
Thank you for the kind words, Jack! I'm pleased you were able to find something of interest in the analysis. The Trois Poems are exquisite pieces. I'll likely focus strictly on piano repertory for a bit, but you never know :)
Loved this breakdown. That F#13b9 is like a bread and butter chord in jazz. Super common in gospel too. I'm coming from jazz/gospel and learning classical and it's so cool to see the differences and similarities alike.
This video was wildly interesting, I liked how you looked at the motives and related them to actual birds!! Could you do an analysis of maritime by Jean Cras?
Thanks so much for this!!! I love the context at the beginning, and the breakdown of harmony and chords, your analysis is very detailed! Don't know if you're still reading comments, but if you are, could you pls analyse Chopin's waltz in E minor, Bach english suite no 2 prelude, Mozart sonata K332, or Whitlam Rag no 1 "It's time!" by Ian Munro??? Thanks again
I’m writing a paper on this piece for my music theory class, and I absolutely love your analysis! It’s been so helpful to me, and wow I get so excited about music theory when I watch these types of videos! 🥰
Wow... I really love your videos and I watch them multiple times. I am just wondering, how could you have the idea that he inspired by birds? Lots of analysis videos "just" cover the theories of harmony, rhythm and motivic development but there aren't many videos about the relation between those educational theories with nature. Do you know books or resources that I could read further about how nature effects music? Or at least could you give me resources that help me make analysis like yours (other than the "typical" education materials like rhythm, harmony, etc)? Anyway, thank you so much for sharing your knowledges free in youtube! Your themes are complex and helps me a lot ☺️ warm regards, Febi from Germany
Thank you, Febi! Generally speaking, analysts can benefit greatly from researching the biographical details of a composer's life at the time he/she was working on a given composition. Composers are usually highly attuned to the particular soundworld they are immersed in; if that world is rich with evocative sound sources, those sources can often seep in to the compositional process to some degree.
As a suggestion I think talking about Scriabin's Guirlandes (Op.73 No.1) could be really interesting. I don't think there is any analysis video of that piece on RU-vid.
What is the purpose of the initial slur? It is easily confused with a tie. And why the staccato mark on the second note of the figure if it is not to be played staccato? Maybe it should be played staccato -- like a glottal stop.
