Ravel’s Blues?
Posted in General on Sep 23rd, 2011
The second movement of Ravel’s Second Violin Sonata is called “Blues.” The sonata, written between 1923-27, is Ravel’s final chamber work. The blues serves as a light transition between the first movement, an Allegretto, and a virtuosic, extraordinarily difficult third movement, which Ravel called Perpetuum Mobile. A lot of themes from the first movement recur in the third movement. But because Ravel wanted contrast, he added a second movement, which is not related thematically to either the first or the third movements.
