Bartok The Eight Hungarian Peasant Songs Piano Impromptus Harmonic Technique Research

Bartok Bela (1881-1945) was a distinguished Hungarian composer, pianist,and folklorist of the twentieth-century. His musical creation is dividedinto four phases. The “Eight Pieces of Piano Impromptus on HungarianPeasant Songs” was created by him in the second phase, which was a workof comprehensive and bold explorations in harmonic language, based onHungarian folk music, with fusion of modern western compositionaltechniques, to create a distinctive musical work, and to form theBartok-style harmony theory and harmony features.He created the works with dissonant sounds like augmented fourth andminor second as fundamental factors which were not commonly used at thattime. The new harmonic color came into being with interval overlay, modaloverlay, making the harmonic language more distinctive. Horizontal andvertical expansion of the modal tonality in folk music resulted in modernmusic features, as well as consistent with the temperament of the folkmusic itself. These compositional techniques occupied a very importantposition in “Eight Pieces of Piano Impromptus on Hungarian PeasantSongs”. It successfully and perfectly combined folk music with modernharmonic techniques.This paper shows specific analysis and research of harmonic techniquesin “Eight Pieces of Piano Impromptus on Hungarian Peasant Songs” byBartok, trying to reveal some of the unique charm of the harmonic languageof the Bartok music creation, drawing on the successful experience of thecombination of folk music and modern harmonic techniques, with a highapplication value and practical significance on our music creation andresearch.