Albeniz "Iberian" Musical Form Structure Analysis

Iberia suite is the pinnacle work composed by Isaacs Albeniz (Isaac Albeniz1),who is well-known as a Spanish composer and pianist. This work not only won asignificant status for Albeniz in the Spanish music history, but also left a wonderfulSpanish style masterpiece for the world. Iberia suite consists of12pieces of titledworks, every piece of the works is based on the theme of Spanish music elements,meanwhile, is conceived and composed utilizing western composing techniques. In thispaper, Iberian suite, as the research object, would be discussed and analyzed from thefollowing four aspects:The first chapter: the introduction. There are there parts to introduce this, one isthe purpose and meaning of this research; Secondly, the scope and methods of thispaper studies; finally,the overview of the present study about the subject. Through thediscussion of the three aspects to provide the basis for the research in this paper.The second chapter:The introduction of Albeniz and his piano music composition.There are two aspects about the introduction, namely Albeniz’s lifetime and the creationbackground of "Iberian" suite. This chapter sketches the composer’s lifetime, threeimportant periods of his music composition, the formation of his music style and thecharacteristics of his works. All above content presents an overview for acquainting thecomposer and his music style.The third chapter: The musical structure of Albeniz’s12pieces piano suite. Thereare particular analysis consist of four parts, namely3pieces of Ternary Form,5piecesof Sonata Form,3pieces of Disorderly Free Form and one piece of Variations on aTheme by Double Type. The analysis focuses on musical form structure, meanwhileanalyzes the works’ theme, harmony and tonality arrangement. This chapter is the coreof this paper, including the division of formal structure, the development of theme, theapplication of harmony language and the analysis of the mode tonality, etc. It preciselyanalyzes the whole wor k in microcosm.The fourth chapter: The musical form structure characteristics of Iberia suite. Thethird chapter is the review of the structure of the work’ musical form. Compared withtraditional musical form, this chapter shows Iberia suite’s innovation and unique,summarize and sublimate the whole paper.This paper aims at analyzing Albeniz’s "Iberian" suite in terms of themedevelopment, harmony, mode and tonality, and emphasizes the musical form structure.Through this paper we can understand Albeniz’s composing techniques about the integration of ethnic elements and western techniques, and summarize the musicalstructure characteristics in his creation techniques.