Describe the use of harmony and tonality to express a non-musical subject in Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons. Use detailed examples from at the movement 'Spring', whilst making comparisons with other movements.

The opening of the Spring concerto depicts the arrival of this joyous season through the bright key of E major. The basso continuo plays a tonic pedal to reinforce tonic and dominant harmony, typical of the Baroque concerto. As the principle violin plays a solo section to depict the birds greeting spring in episode one at bar 14, Vivaldi uses static harmony in E major to create the sense that everything has stopped to listen to spring's arrival. This static harmony is a compositional technique that is also used in the opening movement of Autumn, where the static harmony is based around the key F major; the key of the hunting horn. The composer reinforces the tonic and dominant harmony in the opening of this movement, alongside a motif formed by perfect fifths to depicts the hunters going out at daybreak with their horns, guns and dogs.

In the third episode of Spring the composer modulates from the dominant key of B major, (introduced in the second episode) to the more ominous key of C sharp minor to depict the approaching storm. Vivaldi considered the key of C sharp minor to be highly expressive, and uses it again in his middle movement to depict the sleeping shepherd, and in the final movement of Spring, at bar 20. In bars 45 and 46 of the first movement of Spring the fast ascending scales are used to depict the lighting, and from bar 47 to 55 Vivaldi supports the dramatic material and the strong statement of C sharp minor through the use of arpeggios in the principle violin. As the storm subsides a chromatic solo can be heard from the principle violin against a C sharp minor tonic pedal in the basso continuo, this represents the return of the birds as the storm calms. This is depicted by a solo by the principle violin, which uses virtuosic intervallic leaps of major 7ths from the tonic to the leading note (E to D sharp) in bar 74 and 75. Similarly the composer uses minor keys to depict the shepherd boy’s fear of approaching storm in the third movement Spring. Here, the composer uses the key of D minor followed by a return to G sharp minor in bar 153 to represent the storm.