Contrasts is a three movement work nearly three times the duration of the original request. The music is an amalgam of abstracted Hungarian folk music combined with Rumanian dance melodies, Bulgarian and Greek meters, and a highly personalized, first-class command of 20th century compositional techniques. The second movement was omitted from the first performance. Apparently, Bartók was trying to adhere strictly to the original commission for two movements. However, internal evidence convincingly suggests that the middle movement was conceived along with the other two.
Verbunkos, the first movement, is based on a dance, and characterized by a bouncy rhythmic figure (dotted eight-sixteenth) and passages that alternate between slow determination and medium agitation. The second movement, Piheno (relaxation), is purely atmospheric. Its lack of a strong pulse stands in contrast to the driving beats in both the outer movements. The final movement, Sebes (fast dance), is a frenzied dash, whose only detour is an off-balance, but still quick-moving section in the uncommon meter (8 + 5) / 8. The beginning of the final movement calls for the use of a violin with several of its strings tuned differently (scordatura). This yields a courser, rougher sound that suggests the playing of a folk musician. The clarinet part requires the use of both B-flat and A clarinets, which is done to more easily facilitate technical passages in different key signatures. While the first movement is scored for A clarinet, some players prefer to play it on B-flat clarinet. The transposition makes certain technical passages easier to play. However, there are several low Es in the movement, which the B-flat clarinet can't play, thus the transposition is somewhat problematic musically.
