Score Reading and Analysis
Score Reading and Analysis
This domain asks you to read a full or condensed score at sight: clefs, transposing instruments, score order, and a quick harmonic reduction with cadences marked. It is the paper where a single direction error - transposing the wrong way - costs the largest number of marks.
Clefs and octaves
- Alto clef places middle C on the third line (viola); tenor clef on the fourth line (cello, bassoon, upper trombone); soprano clef on the first line (historical).
- Octave transposers: piccolo sounds an octave above written; double bass, contrabassoon and guitar sound an octave below; the tenor voice is written an octave above sounding pitch.
Transposing instruments
Read the instrument's name as an instruction: a B♭ clarinet's written C sounds B♭, a major 2nd lower. Written pitch is what the player fingers; sounding pitch is what the audience hears.
- B♭ clarinet, B♭ trumpet: down a major 2nd (bass clarinet also an octave lower).
- A clarinet: down a minor 3rd. E♭ alto saxophone: down a major 6th. F horn and cor anglais: down a perfect 5th.
Score order (standard orchestral)
Woodwind (piccolo, flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons), brass (horns, trumpets, trombones, tuba), percussion, harp/keyboard, voices, strings (violin I, violin II, viola, cello, double bass). Short scores condense the winds onto two or three staves.
Worked example
A chord is written as C4 in the B♭ clarinet, C4 in the horn in F and C3 in the double bass. Clarinet: down a major 2nd gives B♭3. Horn: down a perfect 5th gives F3. Double bass: down an octave gives C2. The sounding chord is therefore B♭–F–C, a second-inversion sonority in B♭, not the C major the page appears to show. Transpose before labelling the harmony, never after.
Traps that cost marks
- Transposing in the wrong direction: down when reading the score, up when writing parts for a B♭ instrument.
- Applying the transposition twice because the instrument's key signature already reflects it - the written signature is part of the written pitch.
- Reading alto clef as treble and being a third out throughout.
- Forgetting that horn parts often omit the written key signature, with accidentals supplied instead.