Galicia PAU Music Analysis II / Análisis Musical II 2º Bachillerato CIUG

You work from provided scores or fragments and answer open questions: harmonic analysis with chords, cadences and modulations; formal segmentation with phrase and section labels; description of texture, melody and rhythm; stylistic and historical identification; and a structured written commentary. Expect to justify your labels rather than just name them.

Those details are set each year by the CIUG and published in the official convocatoria and model papers on its website. Check the current document for your sitting rather than relying on older students' memories, because the structure and timing can change between years.

It is demanding if your score-reading is slow, because everything depends on hearing and labelling what you see quickly. Students with conservatorio training often find it manageable; strong students without it can still do well by drilling cadences, phrase types and form schemas until recognition is automatic.

Retake rules belong to the official regulations, so confirm them in the CIUG convocatoria. As a general principle, admission marks can be improved in later sittings, but the specific conditions, deadlines and any limits are defined officially and should be checked directly.

Usually you are asked to place the music in a period, genre and style and to justify that judgement with features from the score. Naming a specific composer is less important than showing the evidence: instrumentation, texture, harmonic language, cadential patterns and formal design.

Start with harmony and cadences, since they underpin everything else. Then move to phrase structure and small forms, then sonata, rondo and variation. Add texture and melodic analysis alongside, and finish with stylistic contextualisation and timed commentary writing, which integrates all the earlier skills.

Vague labels without justification, misreading the key at a cadence, confusing phrase and period, and writing long descriptive prose that never names a single technical term. Also common: ignoring the bass line, and running out of time because the commentary was left until the end.

Use a clear structure: context and genre, then form with bar numbers, then harmony and cadences, then texture, melody and rhythm, and a short conclusion on style. Name terms precisely, refer to bar numbers as evidence, and keep sentences short so the argument stays easy to follow.

Public-domain scores from IMSLP and out-of-copyright anthologies work well: short Baroque dances, Classical sonata movements and Romantic character pieces. Analyse them with a pencil, mark cadences and sections, then write a timed commentary and compare it against a textbook description of the form.