The expressive possibilities of the whole-tone scale

In music theory, a whole tone scale is a scale in which the distances between adjacent steps are a whole tone.

Its presence in the musical fabric of the work is easily recognizable, thanks to the pronounced mysterious, ghostly, cold, frozen nature of the sound. Most often, the figurative world with which the use of such a range is associated is a fairy tale, fantasy.

“Chernomor’s Gamma” in Russian musical classics

The whole tone scale was widely used in the works of Russian composers of the 19th century. In the history of Russian music, another name was assigned to the whole-tone scale – “Gamma Chernomor”, since it was first performed in the opera by M.I. Glinka “Ruslan and Lyudmila” as a characterization of the evil dwarf.

In the scene of the abduction of the main character of the opera, a whole-tone scale slowly and menacingly passes through the orchestra, denoting the mysterious presence of the long-bearded wizard Chernomor, whose false power has not yet been exposed. The effect of the sound of the scale is enhanced by the subsequent scene, in which the composer skillfully showed how, shocked by the miracle that had occurred, the participants of the wedding feast gradually emerge from the strange stupor that had gripped them.

Opera “Ruslan and Lyudmila”, scene of Lyudmila’s kidnapping

A.S. Dargomyzhsky heard in the bizarre sound of this scale the heavy tread of the statue of the Commander (opera “The Stone Guest”). P.I. Tchaikovsky decided that he couldn’t find a better musical expressive means than the whole-tone scale to characterize the ominous ghost of the Countess who appeared to Herman in the 5th scene of the opera “The Queen of Spades.”

A.P. Borodin includes a whole-tone scale in the accompaniment of the romance “The Sleeping Princess,” painting a night picture of a fairy-tale forest where a beautiful princess sleeps in a magical sleep, and in the wilds of which one can hear the laughter of its fantastic inhabitants – goblin and witches. The whole-tone scale is heard once again at the piano when the text of the romance mentions a mighty hero who will one day dispel the spell of witchcraft and awaken the sleeping princess.

Romance “The Sleeping Princess”

Metamorphoses of the whole-tone scale

The expressive possibilities of the whole-tone scale are not limited to the creation of terrifying images in musical works. W. Mozart has another, unique example of its use. Wanting to create a humorous effect, the composer depicts in the third part of his work “A Musical Joke” an incompetent violinist who gets confused in the text and suddenly plays a whole-tone scale that does not fit into the musical context at all.

The landscape prelude by C. Debussy “Sails” is an interesting example of how the whole-tone scale became the basis for the modal organization of a musical piece. Practically, the entire musical composition of the prelude is based on the scale b-c-d-e-fis-gis with the central tone b, which here serves as a foundation. Thanks to this artistic solution, Debussy managed to create the finest musical fabric, giving rise to an elusive and mysterious image. The imagination imagines some ghostly sails that flashed somewhere far away on the sea horizon, or maybe they were seen in a dream or were the fruit of romantic dreams.

Prelude “Sails”