Tonality and Expression in Two Choral-Orchestral Works by Joaquín Rodrigo

Abstract

Although simple in means and modest in both forces and proportions, the choral?orchestral works of Joaquín Rodrigo charm the listener with a distinctive and subtle approach to harmony and tonality. This study is an introduction to the harmonic and tonal language of Joachín Rodrigo as shown in Música para un Códice Salmantino (1953), the earliest of Rodrigo’s choral-orchestral works, and Cántico de San Francisco de Asís (1982), his last. A comparison of the two works can give insight into the evolution of this composer’s style over three decades. Each work was analyzed in detail to build a catalog of compositional devices and their expressive and formal significance. The two catalogs were then compared to answer the question: do the differences show an evolution in Rodrigo’s compositional style? The comparison reveals that the compositional language of the earlier work has been retooled, with the addition of a few new techniques, to serve the needs of a very different text, and that the main difference between the two settings is not a difference of technique, but of expressive stance.