Five score-reading activities to set you a-thinking about the music of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons.

1. Score-Reading Game

• Get into four teams:- Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter.
• Each team has a score of “their” concerto from The Four Seasons.
• Compete against each other and/or against the clock to find the following in your concerto.
• Make a note of the bar numbers when you find it, so your quizmaster can check later!
• I wonder what the prize will be for the fastest “finders”!

♦ At least eight repeated notes in the same part

♦ A trill

♦ A major or minor scale

♦ Tremolo or tremolo-like effect

♦ Triplets

♦ A duet or trio

♦ A pause

♦ Music in a minor key

♦ Music in triple or compound time

♦ A chromatic scale of six or more notes

♦ Two notes slurred together

♦ A pedal of six or more bars

♦ A dominant 7th chord

♦ A major arpeggio or broken chord

♦ Double stopping

♦ At least two beats of solo or monody

♦ A sequence

♦ Demisemiquavers

♦ A melody in thirds

♦ A figure in the continuo part

♦ A line of poetry

♦ The interval of some sort of 7th in consecutive notes

♦ A dotted rhythm

♦ Melody and accompaniment texture

♦ A C clef

♦ An Italian word meaning “everybody play”

♦ Two different tempo indications

♦ An editor’s suggestion *
* There may be none, depending upon the edition you’re using.

2. Which Movement…..?….

• …has these musical happenings?

♦ ends with a chord of F minor

♦ has a general pause in the fifth bar

♦ ends with a 2 1/2 bar phrase repeated one octave lower

♦ has a descending scale in 3rds in bars 4 and 8

♦ begins with an anacrusis

♦ begins with a tonic and dominant pedal

♦ alternates between 4/4 and 3/8 time signatures

♦ has only quavers for the first eleven bars

♦ has a rhythmic ostinato all the way through

♦ has pizzicato

♦ alternates between Presto and Adagio

♦ is only 45 bars long

3. First Page Frills

• Find each of these musical thrills on any of the first pages of the four seasons.

♦ A sign which means ” have a rest now for the length of a crotchet”

♦ A time signature which means four crotchet beats in every bar

♦ A key signature of E major

♦ A sign which means “there are no notes in this bar”.

♦ Semi-staccato.

♦ A word meaning “winter” in a language other than English.

♦ The composer’s name.

♦ Numbers to help the keyboard player.

♦ A C7 chord.

♦ An anacrusis.

♦ An editor’s suggestion.

♦ Music in F major.

♦ An augmented 2nd, notes played consecutively.

♦ Music repeated an octave lower.

♦ 9 E’s in a row.

♦ Music repeated at a different volume.

♦ The publisher’s name.

♦ A D7 chord.

♦ A diminished 7th chord.

♦ A phrase meaning “lively but not too fast”.

♦ A sign which means “play this note for a little longer than normal”.

♦ A 4-note bassline motif in two separate pieces which is the same except that it’s in a different key.

4. Error Spotting

• Spot the mistakes in the notation of this theme from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons.
• If you can print this page off, circle all mistakes, then copy out a correct version of the theme on the empty staves underneath.
• Where in the work is the theme from?
• The answers are here!

5. Red Theory Herrings

• Match these musical terms with their definitions.
• They’ll all be useful to you when you begin to study The Four Seasons in more depth.
• Be careful though – there are lots of red herrings.
• Think of musical terms which go with the red herring definitions.

• The answers to this one are here!