Passacaglia and Chaconne

Variations over a repeated bass or harmonic frame, with textures changing above.

Related

BaroquePassacagliaChaconneOrgan

Passacaglia and chaconne are variation forms built on a repeated bass or harmonic frame, with new textures above.

Origins and dating

Both grew from Spanish and Italian dances and entered keyboard and string music in the baroque era. Bach's Passacaglia in C minor BWV 582 and the Chaconne from the Partita in D minor BWV 1004 are peaks of the form. Brahms, Reger, Shostakovich and Copland revived it in the twentieth century.

Listening features

Catch the bass first. A phrase of four or eight bars returns, each time landing on the same point. The chaconne more often repeats a harmonic progression, while the passacaglia stresses a bass melody. Upper parts thicken from line to chords and from low to high register. Variations run without pauses, and texture and register mark the sections. Count the repetitions and the architecture becomes audible.

Figures

Bach wrote the two summit works, Handel a Chaconne in G major, Brahms used one in his Fourth Symphony finale, and Reger and Shostakovich carried the form forward.

Lineage

It grows from Spanish dance and baroque variation and leads to romantic character variation, neoclassicism and film scoring.

Misconceptions

The names are often confused, but the passacaglia leans on a bass theme and the chaconne on a harmonic frame. Nor are they studies, since their scale can be vast.

Sources

• The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2nd ed., entry Passacaglia — definitions and chronology checked, not quoted
• Richard Taruskin, The Oxford History of Western Music, Vol. 2 (Oxford University Press, 2005) — baroque variation context checked, not quoted

Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.