A Downland Suite is structured classically, revealing itself in the loose sonata form of the Prelude, the song-like Elegy, the Minuet, and a last movement which utilizes the Rondo. Tight thematic unity between movements gives the work its cohesion. The Elegy melody provides the kernel and the rising fourth interval is seminal. Ireland gives us our clue by repeating the Elegy theme in the last movement. In fact, the opening Rondo theme is virtually the Elegy (but played four times as fast) and the Minuet is the Elegy theme in inversion.
