Talk:Allegro barbaro (Bartók)

"Analysis"?
The "analysis" section of this article is mostly humbug, as even a cursory examination of the music will show. For example:

Re: "Allegro barbaro is in ternary form, which means that there are two distinct themes, but one is presented twice."

In fact, both the opening theme and the theme that immediately follows it return in the piece. The opening theme returns first with a different, more tame harmonization (and without the bi-modality of its first appearance.)

Re: "Allegro barbaro melodic material is mostly based on the pentatonic scale..."

The only pentatonicism in the entire piece occurs in the opening theme (and its reappearance), and even there a complete (anhemitonic) pentatonic scale never occurs--without extra tones from the diatonic scale.

Re: "...while the underlying harmonies are chromatic."

The "underlying harmonies" are often tonally at odds with the melody, which is to say that there is both bi-modality and bi-tonality in the piece, but they generally aren't chromatic in and of themselves. The chords are nearly all simple tertian triads: minor, major, augmented, and diminished chords with a some major seventh and minor seventh chords in the middle section, and within a phrase apart from the melody they generally imply a non-chromatic tonality or modality. TheScotch (talk) 09:50, 30 August 2015 (UTC)