ALTO CLARINET & PIANO
Score: 6 pages, solo part: 2 pages, piano part: 3 pages., Duration 3' 11 at half note = 60. 51 measures. One of Elton John's greatest songs, this mega-hit is suitable for performance in church, nightclub, or recital hall. This song contains many advanced songwriting techniques and shows a complete mastery of advanced tonal harmony and voice leading. The verses are syllabic and arranged in 8 regular phrases. The last phrase is elided with a contrasting melismatic bridge that suddenly and expectantly modulates to the lowered mediant, causing a foreign chromatic mediant relation. (F major to Ab major). Further drama is evoked by the voice-leading where an ascending leap of a minor 9th signals the beginning of the bridge. The bridge then modulates back to the original key for the refrain, which, like the verses is arranged in 8 regular phrases and elides once again into a final version of the bridge which functions this time as a coda.