The third movement of Peer Gynt Suite by Edvard Grieg is called Anitra’s Dance. At this point of the story, Peer has travelled to Morocco. He is taken in by a Bedouin chieftain who has a beautiful daughter called Anitra, and this is her dance.

First you are going to listen to the music while following the score. But before you do we need to look at a special symbol in the music that we haven’t seen in the previous two movements. So have a look at the bar line, separating the sixth and seventh bars in your score. This is a type of double bar with two dots in the spaces of the stave to the right of the double bar. This is a repeat mark and it signifies the start of a repeated section. Turn to the next page (or scroll down if you are doing this on your computer) and find bar 22. Remember that bar numbers can be found in a square box at the start of each system of music. At the end of bar 22 is another double bar line with repeat marks. This time notice that the repeat marks are on the left of the double bar line. This indicates that after playing bar 22 you go back to bar 7 and play this section again.

OK, let’s say we have played this section (we can call it section A) for the second time. Notice the two square brackets above the music with the numbers 1 and 2 in them. These are called first and second time bars (in Italian Prima Volta and Seconda Volta). Now we have arrived here for the second time, we do not play the first time bar but instead jump straight to the second time bar. Both first and second time bars are numbered as bar 22. This is why the next system starts at bar 28 not 29. You may have noticed that this new section of music (Section B) also starts with a double barline and repeat marks. Sure enough this whole section – quite a lot longer than section A – is repeated as well and again there is a first and second time version of bar 88 before the piece finally comes to a quiet conclusion.

Now you should be able to follow the score while listening to the sound file. Remember that there are two systems of music on each page.

Looking at the score in more detail

Now go back to the start of the movement and look at the instruments.

What instruments does Grieg write for in this movement?  What are their English names?

Which one is the odd one out and why?

Grieg asks his string players to play in different ways. 

What do the following Italian words mean?

Divisi

Pizzicato

Con sordini

Arco

Senza sordini

These videos might help you:

Mazurka

Grieg has chosen to write this dance as a Mazurka. The Mazurka and the Waltz were both dances in 3/4 time that were very popular in the 19^th century. The waltz is a dance that emphasises the first beat of the bar. This gives the music – and the dance – a spinning quality. The Mazurka emphases the second and/or the third beat while the first beat is give momentum by splitting into two notes. The following rhythms are typical Mazurka rhythm.