Tonality and structure: identifying major, minor, modal and atonal tonality, key relationships and modulation, and recognising musical structures (binary, ternary, rondo, sonata, variations, verse-chorus, head-solos-head, strophic, through-composed), applied to listening extracts in any style.

What this dot point is asking

This dot point gives you the analytical language for tonality and structure that the WJEC Appraising exam uses across every style. It asks you to identify the tonality (major, minor, modal or atonal), describe key relationships and modulation, and recognise the musical structures (binary, ternary, rondo, sonata, variations, verse-chorus, head-solos-head, strophic, through-composed) of listening extracts.

The answer

Tonality: major, minor, modal, atonal

Identifying the tonality places the style at once: functional major or minor in Classical and pop, modal in folk and impressionism, atonal or post-tonal in much contemporary music.

Key relationships and modulation

Recognising structure

The common structures to recognise are: binary (AB), two contrasting sections; ternary (ABA), a statement, contrast and return; rondo (ABACA), a recurring main theme alternating with episodes; theme and variations, a theme repeated with changes; sonata form (exposition, development, recapitulation), the design of the symphony set works; verse-chorus, the pop and musical-theatre song form; head-solos-head, the jazz form; strophic, the same music for each verse; and through-composed, continuously new material with no large repeats. You identify a form by listening for returning material (a return signals ternary, rondo or recapitulation) and contrasting material (a contrast signals a B section, episode or verse).

Reading the signposts

Sections are marked by signposts: cadences and key changes close and open sections; repeats and reprises signal returns; and contrasts of melody, texture, dynamics and instrumentation define new sections. In the exam, name the structure and justify it with located evidence (for example, "the opening theme returns after a contrasting middle section, so this is ternary, ABA").

Examples in context

Model paragraph (identifying tonality and structure). A confident answer reads the music's plan from its signposts. Suppose an extract opens with a clear, bright theme that cadences firmly in a major key, moves to a contrasting central passage in a related minor key with new material and a different texture, and then brings the opening theme back in the home key. The return of the opening after a contrast tells you this is ternary form, ABA, and the key scheme supports it: the home major key, a move to the relative or another related minor for the middle, and a return to the tonic, each confirmed by a cadence. Had the same opening theme kept coming back between several different episodes, it would be a rondo; had it been a verse and a repeated catchy chorus, it would be verse-chorus. Naming the form and citing the returns, contrasts and key changes that mark the sections is what the marker rewards.

Try this

Q1. What is the difference between ternary and rondo form? [2 marks]

• Cue. Ternary is ABA (one return); rondo is ABACA, with the main theme returning several times between episodes.

Q2. To which keys does music usually modulate, and how is the new key confirmed? [2 marks]

• Cue. To closely related keys (dominant, subdominant, relative), confirmed by a cadence in the new key.

Q3. Explain how tonality is established and changed, with reference to major, minor, modal and atonal music. [10 marks]

• What the marker wants. That a key is set up by its scale, chords and cadences around a tonic, changed by modulation to a related key (confirmed by a cadence), and that modal music is built on a mode and atonal music has no key centre, with the systems named and distinguished.