La Folía (Spanish), orFollies (English), also known asfolies d'Espagne (French),La Follia (Italian), andFolia (Portuguese), is one of the oldest remembered Europeanmusical themes, or primary material, generallymelodic, of acomposition, on record. The theme exists in two versions, referred to asearly andlatefolias, the earlier being faster.

Due to its musical form, style and etymology of the name, it has been suggested that the melody arose as a dance in the mid or late fifteenth century throughout theIberian Peninsula, either inPortugal or in the area of the oldKingdom of León, or maybe in theKingdom of Valencia.

The epithet "Folia" has several meanings in music.

Classical music features both "early Folia", which can take different shapes, and the better-known "later Folia" (also known as "Follia" with double l inItaly, "Folies d'Espagne" inFrance, and "Faronel [fr]'sGround" inEngland). Recent research suggests that the origin of the folia framework lies in the application of a specific compositional and improvisational method to simple melodies in minor mode. Thus, the essence of the "early Folia" was not a specific theme or a fixed sequence of chords but rather a compositional-improvisational process which could generate these sequences of chords.^[3] The "later Folia" is a standardchord progression (i-V-i-VII / III-VII-[i or VI]-V / i-V-i-VII / III-VII-[i or VI7]-V[4-3sus]-i) and usually features a standard or "stock"melody line, a slowsarabande in triple meter, as its initial theme. This theme generally appears at the start and end of a given "folia" composition, serving as "bookends" for a set of variations within which both the melodic line and even the meter may vary. In turn, written sets of variations on the "later Folia" may contain sections consisting of more freely structured music, even in the semblance of partial or pureimprovisation (a practice which might be compared in structural concept, if very different in musical material, to the performance intwelve-bar blues and other standard chord progressions that became common in the twentieth century.)

Several sources report thatJean-Baptiste Lully was the first composer to formalize the standard chord progression and melodic line.^[4][5] Other sources note that the chord progression eventually associated with the "later Folia" appeared in musical sources almost a century before the first documented use of the "Folia" name. The progression emerged between the end of the 15th century and the beginning of the 16th century in vocal repertory found in both Italian ("Canzoniere di Montecassino", "Canzoniere di Perugia" and in thefrottola repertoire) and Spanish sources (mainly in the "Cancionero Musical de Palacio" and, some years later, in theensaladas repertoire).

The framework of the "Later Folia", in the key of Gminor, the key that is often used for the "later Folia"; one chord per bar except for the cadential penultimate bar.

The basic 16-bar chord progression:^[1]

Over the course of three centuries, more than 150 composers have used it in their works. The first publications of this theme date from the middle of the 16th century, but it is probably much older. Plays of therenaissance theatre in Portugal, including works byGil Vicente, mention the folia as a dance performed by shepherds or peasants. The possible Portuguese origin was attributed by the 1577 treatiseDe musica libri septem byFrancisco de Salinas;^[8] however, one of the oldest folías is that of "Rodrigo Martínez", by an anonymous author, already registered in theCancionero de Palacio (1470-1500) in Spain, which includes multiple songs and themes from the time ofthe Catholic Monarchs.

Jean-Baptiste Lully, along withPhilidorl'aîné^[1] in 1672,Arcangelo Corelli in 1700,Marin Marais in 1701,Alessandro Scarlatti in 1710,Antonio Vivaldi in hisOpus 1 No. 12 of 1705,Francesco Geminiani in his Concerto Grosso No. 12 (which was, in fact, part of a collection of direct transcriptions of Corelli's violin sonatas),George Frideric Handel in the Sarabande of his Keyboard Suite in D minor HWV 437 of 1727 (also two earlier Chaconnes^[9]), andJohann Sebastian Bach in hisPeasants' Cantata of 1742 are considered to highlight this "later" folia repeating theme in a brilliant way.C. P. E. Bach composed a set of 12 variations for keyboard on the tune (H.263).Antonio Salieri's 26 Variations on La Folia, for orchestra, written towards the end of his career, is one of his finest works.Henry Purcell, in:The Fairy-Queen, first played in 1692, included a tune with resemblances to the Francesco Geminiani/Arcangelo Corelli: Concerto Grosso n 12; the 12 Corelli concerts were published in 1714, although a 1681 reference exists fromGeorg Muffat about having heard the compositions of this "Italian Violin Orpheus" "with extreme pleasure and full of admiration."

In the 19th century, the Act I ballet ofLes Abencérages (1813) byLuigi Cherubini is based on the Folia,Franz Liszt included a version of the Folia in hisRhapsodie Espagnole, andLudwig van Beethoven quoted it briefly in the second movement of hisFifth Symphony.Alfredo Casella used the theme as the basis for hisVariations sur une Chaconne.

La Folia once again regained composers' interest during the 1930s withSergei Rachmaninov in hisVariations on a theme by Corelli in 1931 andManuel María Ponce and hisVariations on "Spanish Folia" andFugue for guitar.

La Folia

Without variations (290KB)

---

Problems playing this file? Seemedia help.

The Folia melody has also influencedScandinavian folk music. It is said^[who?] that around half of the old Swedish tunes are based on La Folia. It is possible to recognize a common structure in multiple Swedish folk tunes, and it is similar to the Folia structure. Old folk tunes (19th century or older) which do not have this structure often come from parts of Sweden with little influences from upper classes or other countries.^{[dubious –discuss]} "Sinclairvisan" is set to the tune, as is "Välment sorgesyn", no. 5b fromCarl Michael Bellman'sSongs of Fredman.^[10]

The final section ofForce Majeure by the electronic music groupTangerine Dream is built upon the later La Follia progression, and is specifically referenced in the fifth track from their 2014 workJosephine The Mouse Singer, titled "Arcangelo Corelli's La Folia." It is also used in theTaizé chant "Laudate Dominum."^[11] The main theme ofVangelis'Conquest of Paradise resembles the rhythmic paradigm of la folia intentionally. The chord progression is also used in the Britney Spears song,Oops!... I Did It Again, 2000. The Folia is used extensively inMax Richter's 2017 albumThree Worlds: Music from Woolf Works.^[12]

• Bergamesca
• Moresca
• Passamezzo antico
• Romanesca

• La Folia - A Musical Cathedral
• La Folia (1490–1701) - Jordi Savall et al. - Alia Vox 9805[1]
• Altre Follie (1500–1750), Hespèrion XXI, Jordi Savall - Alia Vox 9844[2]
• El Nuevo Mundo - Folias Criollas, Tembembe Ensamble Continuo, La Capella Reial de Catalunya, Hespèrion XXI, dir. Jordi Savall - Alia Vox AVSA9876[3]
• Possible origins of the Folía of the Canary Islands (in Spanish)
• A list of musical scores based on the Folia from the Petrucci Music Library
• John A. Rice, "La folia in Late Eighteenth- and Early Nineteenth-Century Vienna"

• Variations
• Anonymous musical compositions
• Compositions with a spurious or doubtful attribution
• Minor-key chord progressions

• Pages using the Phonos extension
• Webarchive template wayback links
• Articles with short description
• Short description matches Wikidata
• Articles with hAudio microformats
• All articles with specifically marked weasel-worded phrases
• Articles with specifically marked weasel-worded phrases from January 2011
• All accuracy disputes
• Articles with disputed statements from April 2014