Sonata form

“ A sonata is a composition in several movements, usually four, and follows a clearly outlined, in fact, an almost rigid form, not to say formula. It attained its highest development during the classical period and left its impress upon all the larger compositions of that time, for a symphony is nothing more than a sonata composed for orchestra, instead of for the pianoforte, and trios, quartets, and other pieces of chamber music of the classical period are sonatas for the corresponding combination of instruments. ”

“ He still has his old pleasure in the agreeable succession of tones; but this pleasure is intensified, subtilised, by another—the pleasure of detecting the theme in the disguises it assumes. This primitive man has made the first step towards sonata form; he is assisting at the birth of absolute music. From this root there grows up all our pure delight in agreeable tunes for their own sake, in the embroidery of them, in the juggling with them; in a word, all our delight in absolute music. ”

“ Considered merely as examples of fugue structure, Bach's compositions are not greater than those of a hundred kapellmeisters of his time: they owe their greatness to the purity of their themes, and to the unapproachable perfection of their harmony. But lay aside all questions of melody and harmony, everything, in short, which can be [46] classed under the head of style, and Beethoven's sonatas will still remain supreme in virtue of their structure. Fugue form is an artificial thing which a man can learn: sonata form is a living thing which a man must feel. ”

“ And it is probable that the final condition of an art will always tend to approximate to such an idea. In the same way it cannot be doubted that the sonata form, with its subtle balance between independence of form and interdependence of contrast, is far too artificial to be such a final form of instrumental music as would commend itself in the,abstract to ordinary common sense. ”

“ In it the piano receives better treatment than the other instruments; there are many virtuoso passages, but again key changes are not frequent or disparate enough to avoid a monotone. Chopin's imagination refuses to become excited when working in the open spaces of the sonata form. Like creatures that remain drab of hue in unsympathetic or dangerous environment, his music is transformed to a bewildering bouquet of color when he breathes native air. Compare the wildly modulating Chopin of the ballades to the tame-pacing Chopin of the sonatas, trio and concertos! ”

“ The Sonata movement with him still admits of all tempi. In the third of the “Kenner und Liebhaber” Sonatas the peculiar sonata-form is not on the whole adhered to, but allegretto, andante, cantabile, follow each other in free fashion. On the other hand, in the following piece, the first and the last movements both show the sonata-form; but in the first of the “Württembergers” only the last movement has the stricter sonata-style. The third sonata of Volume II. of the “Kenner und Liebhaber” is actually written in a single movement. ”

“ In the earlier development of the sonata-form it was soon found that when the first part of the movement closed on the dominant, or—in the case of a movement in a minor key—on the relative major, it was convenient to make the transition back to the tonic, or to the opening subject, by means of some short and obvious figure, which without disturbing the rhythm of the music should prepare for the return to the beginning. ”

“ One cannot choose one movement from the others as being more beautiful either in spirit or workmanship; [Pg 148] and the three together compose one of the flawless sonatas of pianoforte literature.
The more familiar sonata in A major is more irregular. It has, by the way, no movement in the triplex form. The first is an air and variations. It has long been a favorite with amateur and connoisseur alike. The naïve beauty of the air is irresistible. ”

“ I need hardly say to any musician that I am not speaking of technical form, either of harmonic progression or of the cast of a composition, as for example the sonata form, the symphonic form, the dramatic form, but of the form of intrinsic absolute value which appeals to the general craving for and appreciation of beauty. This beauty of form cannot be disregarded in any art without failure to attain the highest place in the world's estimation, no matter how marvellous and admirable the powers displayed in another direction. ”

“ Genuine beauty in subjects may go far to atone for deficiency and irrelevancy in the development, but at best it is only a partial atonement, and those only are genuine masterpieces in which the form, be it ever so original, is just as clear and convincing in the end as the ideas of which it is the outcome.
The whole process of the development of the Sonata as an art-form, from its crudest beginnings to its highest culmination, took nearly two hundred years ”

“ The growth of sonata-form in the eighteenth century was determined not by the arbitrary desires of individuals here and there, but by a deep underlying logic—a logic of the emotions—that ran unconsciously through them and through their hearers. ”

“ It was brought to perfection when the modern sonata was still in its infancy, and before those ideas of key and of the relations of harmonies which lie at the root of sonata-form had become tangible realities to men's minds. In some respects the complete plan has the aspect of formalism and rigidity. The uniformity of key is sometimes taken exception to, and the sameness of structural principle in each movement is also undoubtedly somewhat of a drawback ”

“ Later symphony writers whose works are at present being performed include Schumann, Tschaikowsky, and Dvořák.
The word symphony was formerly used synonymously with ritornelle, both words being applied to instrumental interludes between parts of vocal works, but this usage has now entirely disappeared.
157. Sonata-form (sometimes called sonata-allegro) is a plan for the construction of instrumental music (sonatas, quartets, symphonies, etc.) , in which three rather definite divisions always occur, the third division being a more or less literal repetition of the first. ”

“ The Sonata-Form—often, to be sure, with free modifications—predominates in all the large instrumental compositions of the Classic, Romantic and Modern Composers, notably of such men as Beethoven, Schumann, Brahms, César Franck, Tchaikowsky, d'Indy and Sibelius. Anyone unable readily to follow movements in this form, if he thinks he is receiving the complete message of the music, is his own dupe. It would be as logical to expect to enjoy the beauties of architecture without perceiving the difference between a nave and a bowling-alley. ”

“ A sonata by the German Rolle (1718–1785) is valuable in that it shows a very decided second theme in the first period, thus tending toward the development of the original simple dance form into the more complex sonata form. The adagio, however, still has the sarabande characteristics, and foreshadows many things. It contains many words that later were shaped into great poems by others. “The Erlking” of Schubert is especially hinted at, just as the first movement was prophetic of Beethoven. In the last movement we have the gigue rhythm again. ”

“ Here, though one still finds a classical ideal of form, there are bold, clashing harmonies, and endless complexities of rhythm. The scoring is tremendous, the effect big as an orchestra. The sonata is in three movements, all of which represent the development of one central idea. The first movement, which is preceded by a long and fiery introduction, is made up of a series of variations on this central idea. A subsidiary idea, which, as in the ‘Symphonic Variations’ of Franck, was suggested in the introduction, is woven into the music here and there. ”

“ The complete sonata-form, like the Trilogies or Tetralogies of the classical drama, is a complex organism of which each part is itself organic, a corporate body composed of separate but interdependent members. Hence we should naturally expect that in the earliest examples there would be a comparative homogeneity of melodic style and key system, and that this homogeneity would be gradually differentiated as the form advanced towards perfection. ”

“ The genius of Johann Sebastian Bach gained the victory over form, and, in fact, exhausted fugue-form. It is in the clever, but dry fugues of some of his contemporaries and, especially, successors, that one can feel the absolute necessity for a new departure. This Adagio is, as it were, a delicate remembrance, and one not unmixed with sadness, of the composer's immortal parent.
The light, lively final movements need no description. All the music of these sonatas is written in two or three parts or voices; occasionally there are chord passages in which for the moment the number is increased. ”

“ And from this subconscious viewpoint, he inclines perhaps more to the thinking about than thinking in music. If he could go into some other line of business for a year or so perhaps his perspective would be more naturally normal. The unity of a sonata movement has long been associated with its form, and to a greater extent than is necessary. A first theme, a development, a second in a related key and its development, the free fantasia, the recapitulation, and so on, and over again. ”

“ A sonata written for an orchestra is a symphony. The nature of the interpreting medium naturally determines the exposition of the form, but all the essential attributes can be learned from a study of the symphony, which because of the dignity and eloquence of its apparatus admits of a wider scope than its allies, and must be accepted as the highest type, not merely of the sonata, but of the instrumental art. ”

“ There are movements and even groups of them which are of the supremest beauty, but hardly any one sonata which is completely satisfactory throughout. His treatment of form is often daring even to rashness, and yet from the point of view of principle offers but little to remark, though in detail some perfectly magical feats of harmonic progression and strokes of modulation have had a good deal of influence upon great composers of later times. ”

“ Hence it will not be properly appreciated except by those who observe the leading ideas as they enter and recall them when they turn up again in the course of the treatment and development. When a sonata is written for orchestra it becomes a symphony, in which form the different ideas are more easily followed because they derive a certain individuality from the tone-color of the instrument first announcing them. When an artist plays a sonata he seeks to intensify the individuality of the leading ideas and thus aid the hearer in recognizing and remembering them. ”

“ Seldom are important themes given to the pianoforte or orchestra alone; they are shared generously. And no words can reproduce the colors of the orchestral tone-paintings, or describe the marvelous results gained by simple means and an unerring instinct. The first movements are in the sonata form, but there is a certain freedom, and the proportions are on a larger scale. There is a cadenza, invariable, at the conclusion, and Mozart in his concerts excited wonder by his improvisations. ”

“ For few works better exhibit the various ranges of the instrument, better contrast different volumes of piano-sound. The sonata actually lies on different planes, proceeds from various directions, delimits a solid form, makes even Beethoven's seem flat and two-dimensional by contrast. Here, almost for the first time, is a sonata that is distinctly music of the pianoforte. And the modern achievements in pianoforte composition do not by any means lessen the wonder of your comprehension of the instrument's dynamics. ”

“ The many slow second pieces, or the popular dances such as the Polonaise, the Sezile, the Musette, which form the concluding parts of a group, the repetition of the first part after the second, the divisions into slow movement, slower, and lighter, which are specially visible in “La Triomphante,” and “Les Bacchanales”—all these are as much the germ of the future sonata arrangement, as the severer thematic was the germ of sonata-playing. The charm for us lies in observing, in the springtime of art, the natural uprising of these forms which appear to us almost laws of nature. ”

“ There is also an Allegro of Hasse's in B♭, quoted in Pauer's Alte Meister, which deserves consideration for the light it throws on a matter which is sometimes said to be a crucial distinction between the early attempts at form and the perfect achievement. In many of the early examples of sonata-form, the second section of the first part is characterised by groups of figures which are quite definite enough for all reasonable purposes, but do not come up to the ideas commonly entertained of the nature of a subject ”

“ Sorrow, joy and genius have now transformed the mere musician into the artist and the poet. Beethoven, as the master of the intellectual world of tones, began his career with this sonata in D minor. From this time forward, his every piece is a psychological picture of life. The form of the sonata had now fully developed the intellectual germ which in it lay. It is no longer mere form, but a finite vessel holding an infinite intellectual treasure as its contents. ”

“ When we know more of overtones we shall see that the tempo of every masterpiece is absolute, and is exactly set by some further law of rhythmic accord. Whence it should be possible to show that any given rhythm implies about it a complete musical form, fugue, sonata, I cannot say what form, but a form, perfect, complete. ”