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General characteristics of melodies in the Classical period

• Melodies were diatonic with the occasional chromaticism
• Phrase lengths were even - usually four or eight bars long.
• Balanced phrases - a question phrase was answered by a phrase of a similar length and rhythm.
• A lot of Josef Haydn’s melodies were monothematic, ie melodies that evolved and developed out of a short musical idea.
• Appoggiaturas were commonly used in Classical melodies, especially those written by Mozart.
• Passing notes were frequently used to decorate melodies.

Examples

Balanced phrases

Question and answer phrases are also known as antecedent and consequent phrases. They can be heard in the opening of the first movement from Mozart’s Symphony No. 40.

The opening rising bar and a half is answered with the same rhythm, but it falls instead. This way of balancing question and answer phrases is typical of Classical composers.

In the second movement of Haydn’s Symphony No. 101 ‘The Clock’, the first phrase is four bars long and ends with a rising scale (with a chromatic passing note)’. This is ‘answered’ by a similar phrase that is extended by a bar and closes on the tonic. Again, this is typical writing of the period.

Appoggiaturas

Appoggiaturas is used as a dissonance in Classical melodies. To decorate the melody (and harmony) the composer would use an appoggiatura to sound a note outside the chord, which would then fall or rise by step to a note within the chord. The score below shows an appoggiatura from the second movement of Mozart’s Concerto No. 3 for violin. The pink circles show an appoggiatura - the dissonance falls to a consonance.

Find out more about appoggiaturas and acciaccaturas in this video:

Acciaccaturas

An acciaccatura is played as quickly as possible before the note that follows it. It is sometimes called a crushed note.