Sonata Theory

Sonata form, as Charles Rosen has noted (Sonata Forms, 16-97), developed from a variety of genres and forms during the early 18th century. Consequently, composers have recognized its inherent flexibility and have explored a wide assortment of formal designs in their sonata-form movements. One such design, prevalent around 1750, was the three-part division of the exposition. Jens Peter Larsen and Michelle Fillion have illustrated how this formal arrangement (in which main theme and closing material are mediated by an expansion section), can serve as an alternative to the two-part division (main theme plus transition, followed by subordinate theme group and closing section). The three-part exposition, often used by Domenico Scarlatti and his mid-century contemporaries, never entirely disappears in the Classical and early Romantic periods. This paper seeks to trace the three-part exposition from ca.1757-1828, as sonata form develops from its Baroque origins as an opposition of tonal regions to the Romantic ideal of thematic opposition. There is a large stylistic difference between early Haydn and late Schubert, yet the three-part exposition is still in evidence throughout these years, even though its period of greatest prevalence is long past by the year of Schubert’s death.

"Two works (Treber, Denton 2010; Luong, Montreal 2012) have recently reconsidered the collection of papers about opus 90 by Schenker and Elias housed in the Ernst Oster Collection, New York.
Vivian Luong examines the question of Schenker's concepts of performance and analysis, using Agawu's and Smith's definitions of ambiguity and incorporating revisionist Schenkerian theories of multiple analytical and performance interpretation. Her research on Schenker ́s conflicting graphs and annotated scores outlines two critical passages: the exposition ́s transition and the development ́s end. The ambiguity of the placement of the subordinate theme (mm. 45 or 55?) in Schenker's graphs is supported by a consideration of Caplin's formal functions.
On the other hand, Luong's explanation of the transition ignores the Eb (mm. 37-38) in the enharmonic reinterpretation of Bb (mm. 37-44) and underestimates the „few textural changes“ in the recapitulation. Why does the transition begin at the distance of a third (mm. 24/167) and land at the distance of a fifth (mm. 45/188)? I will insert my analysis (Hamburg 2012) here, integrating tools of historical and systematical German-speaking theory, and then compare my results for the first movement with Schenker's ambiguity among “apparent tripartite organization” and “underlying two-part interrupted structure”.
Stefan L. Treber embeds his Schenkerian analysis in a biographical-historical frame: according to Schindler/Krones, a program could explain the two-movement-structure of opus 90. My approach renounces to any non-musical references but the category of Historicism in art applied to Beethoven's harmonics. It extends the definition of enharmonischer Wendepunkt (Besseler 1955, Bahr 2005), reflects on funktionale Mehrdeutigkeit (s. Holtmeier 2011) and opens to a multi-level interpretation of subthematics:
1) Single ton: Distinctiveness principle, autonomous and integrated tone, signum (Hohlfeld) 2) Several tones: Tonfolge (“ton succession”), model(s), paradigm
3) Abstraction: Formel (Dahlhaus/Hohlfeld?), Vehikel (Sprick 2011).
This path conducts to a coherent large-form including both movements of the sonata."

Charged with the task of confirming the new key in the exposition and resolving to the home key in the recapitulation, the second theme group performs perhaps the defining actions of any sonata form. Although Classical works provide many instances of a clear beginning to this crucial part of the form, in a significant proportion of works the beginning of the second theme (ST) cannot be so easily discerned, especially in works from Beethoven’s middle and late periods. Consequently, debate continues to surround the issue, particularly in the work of James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy and that of William E. Caplin. The problem is that no matter how powerful a single rule may be, no rule by itself can identify all those locations which may be considered an ST beginning. For this reason I contend that there are several indications which contribute to its expression. One may therefore understand the initial ST of a movement to be a synthesis of musical signals which, taken together, allow a passage to be perceived as the first syntactically complete set of formal functions (at the very least, a beginning and end) which centres on the secondary key of the movement. Not all signals appear with every initial ST, nor are they necessarily in their clearest state when they do appear: an ST may still be expressed when some of the most familiar signals are considerably weakened or even absent. Consequently, STs have many possible degrees of expression, obviating the need to decide between all-or-nothing levels of expression in cases that seem to hover somewhere between the two. Moreover, this spectrum of possibilities allows us to understand how STs, and sometimes entire ST groups, may be engaged in a dynamic process which seeks to compensate for weaknesses in the ST’s expression, a phenomenon I call an ST process.

The last of Felix Mendelssohn’s series of popular and influential concert overtures, the Overture to the Tale of the Fair Melusina of 1835 remains the least familiar of these works. It is also the most unusual with regard to formal design in its purposeful confounding of introduction and sonata-form elements alongside the dialogic relation of clearly gendered thematic materials. Such calculated ‘deformation’ of classic and early Romantic sonata form has been understood as a means of generating a kind of musical-narrative content, though the precise relation of formal experiment to such narrative content has remained elusive. This chapter reconsiders the problematic relation of experimental formal procedure to the narrative dimension and the role this may have played in the composer’s subsequent abandonment of the quasi-programmatic concert overture genre, despite his unparalleled artistic success in the field
Keywords:   Felix Mendelssohn, Die schöne Melusine, sonata form, Sonata Theory, musical narrative, programme music, deformation

In May 2014, the Library of Congress purchased an autograph manuscript of Robert Schumann's Marchenbilder, Op. 113, for viola and piano. Although details in the manuscript indicate that it likely served as the exemplar used by the engraver to create the printed edition, it is nevertheless a working copy, recording many aspects of the creative process. An examination of the manuscript offers valuable insights not only into Schumann's creative process, but also into the unique status of the work as a hybrid of character piece and multi-movement sonata, with implications for analysis and performance.

This work presents an aesthetic analysis that approaches the first movement of the sonata for trumpet and piano by Paul Hindemith; which is one of the most important twentieth century works of the genre for the trumpet repertoire. Thus, the analysis content on this paper is divided in four main subjects; formal structure, melodic and rhythmic structure, harmonic and tonal structure, texture, articulation and dynamics.
The complete piece is a three movement work; although, for the purpose of this work, only the first movement is going to be analyzed in order to provide a better coverage of the material that fulfills it. The approaches achieved hereby do not intend to be an absolute truth, nor the most complete reference, or even the only source that addresses the piece this way, but it should be taken on the way that considers the available sources and resources herein applied.
On the other hand, this paper does not intend to approach strictly the performance or describe appropriated techniques willing the preparation of the piece as a beforehand stage guide. Though, even if it was intended to, it would be an incomplete source due to the fact that it covers only the first movement. Despite that, the content hereby discussed may be also useful for the performance preparation − if applied properly. Otherwise, the points discussed hereby aims better to help clarifying the compositional process from an analytical point of view.

Shortlisted for TAGS prize 2014

The gendered associations of the sonata principle - a discourse of conflict between a 'masculine' subject presented in alterity with a second 'feminine' subject before eventual masculine triumph - have caused much controversy, yet have created valuable space for social and critical theory to come into contact with music formal analysis. Published in the shadow of *Feminine Endings*, McClary's 'Narrative agendas in absolute music' has received less attention than her other works, yet provides a pragmatic approach to what she claims are the ideologically significant oppositions between self, Other, and the predetermined terms of resolution. Within this, however, her readings of Brahms's third symphony continues to perpetuate male hegemony within form, concluding ultimately that tonal resolution amounts to a 'violent destruction of identity.'
This paper aims to question McClary's gendered reading of the symphony by exploring the semiological implications of the specifically phallic associations in her work. Such associations are, I think, based on a misunderstanding of the relationship of the phallus to desire that has been reformulated since Freud to hold a more meaningful place within symbolic analyses. Lacan's theory of Sexuation charts the relationship to the phallus of Man (the One) and Woman (the Other) within the symbolic form of desire in a way that resists masculine hegemony. Using this as an alternative symbolic form, I will consider the ways in which Brahms's third symphony reacts to the conventions of closure in order to suggest that eventual submission to the tonic could be seen from a more positive feminine perspective.

In this brief paper I focused on the first movement of the Sonata no. 19 by Creston. My aim was to obtain, throughout an detailed analysis, a clear idea of the formal aspects and the harmonical structure, the main tonalities, the melody and the rhythmic pattern used by the composer.

Franz Liszt has all too often been discarded as the virtuosic showman, despite the fact that his orchestral works have often gained great praise and attracted scholarly engagement. However, one also finds striking development of formal design and tonal harmony in many of the works for his principal composition medium, the piano. This thesis seeks to explore the genesis of Liszt’s magnum opus for the instrument, the Sonata in B Minor, to uncover the time-frame in which the work was composed and from where its inspiration was derived.
Considering the historical analyses placed upon the work that deal with structural design, as it pertains to the paradigm of Classical sonata form, I wish to utilise a practical application of James A. Hepokoski and Warren Darcy’s Sonata Theory in order to survey the Sonata in B Minor’s landscape in a new light. In particular, I offer new perspectives on the validity of the double-function form, insight into the rhetorical layout of a rotational discourse, and propose a nuanced analysis befitting of this striking work.
Finally, I shall explore the implications of a hermeneutical reading of the Sonata to engage with the discursive meanings contained within the work as a whole. The composer’s literary influences and the evidence uncovered within the body of this thesis help to support a possible narrative that may have been a significant influence upon Liszt’s composition of this great work.

Comparative Literature Studies 58.2 (2021): 308-339.


ABSTRACT
The article is a comparative investigation of sonata-form literary narratives employing William H. Gass’s “Cartesian Sonata” and Leo Tolstoy’s The Kreutzer Sonata as a joint sample case. Sonata properties are revealed in the two novella’s contents, not form, by way of linking them with the nineteenth-century “gendered” explanation of the sonata layout. Intermedial relations between sonata phenomena in fiction and music are regarded to be intertextual. The “sonata” status of the Gass novella is acquired when the author combines three previously published fragments under a “musicalized paratext,” providing no musical clues beyond the title. Decrypting that title, the article focuses on the idea of sonata form, which the term’s coiner A. B. Marx once described as a relationship between “masculine” and “feminine” tonal subjects. Without musicological expertise, the intersexual conflict between Gass’s characters is difficult to relate to Marx’s metaphor. This relation is facilitated by pairing Gass’s literary “sonata” with Tolstoy’s. The tonal structure of Beethoven’s “Kreutzer”—the catalyst of marital disaster in Tolstoy—is shown to share certain affective parameters with Gass’s and Tolstoy’s narratives. The established connections are instructive insofar as texts, contexts, and readings from different zones of cultural experience transform and enrich one another.

Rivolto agli studenti del Conservatorio, Università o Licei Musicali, il libro tratta della Forma Sonata attingendo direttamente ad alcuni degli studi più accreditati nell'attuale panorama musicologico. Lo studente può così dialogare con teorici come Caplin, Rosen, Hepokosky, Darcy, Webster ed altri ancora, acquisendo concetti e terminologia in linea con gli indirizzi di ricerca più moderni ed autorevoli. Sono presenti le analisi di 8 brani (da Clementi a Schubert) più altrettanti questionari di verifica.

The first movement of Joseph Haydn’s String Quartet in B minor, op. 64, no. 2, has long resisted conventional sonata-form analysis. A sense of unrest characterizes its musical journey: ambiguous, incomplete, or seemingly misplaced formal units hold sway as the exposition unfolds, setting a turbulent tone that persists throughout the development section. Subsequently, rather than establishing formal clarity in the recapitulation, Haydn further dissolves the musical material until it stalls completely, resuming its motion with great difficulty as the movement concludes.

This study, drawing upon previous discussions by William Caplin (1998), Mathieu Langlois (2014), and Matthew Hall (2019), presents an in-depth analysis of this movement, primarily using Caplin’s theory of formal functions, James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy’s Sonata Theory (2006), and Janet Schmalfeldt’s becoming (2011). The blending of disparate analytical methods provides a framework to illustrate how Haydn both articulates and stretches the boundaries of sonata form.

This paper investigates Mauro Giuliani's approach to blending Veinnese sonata form with the Italian bel canto. Special attention will be paid to the conflict between A major and C major and its role in the medial caesura and the recapitulation. This paper also explores the question of the Gran Sonata's authenticity and the role of the Classical guitar's idiomatic key areas in the structure and design of the sonata.

The Ms. Cary 703, purchased by the Morgan Library of New York, has brought about the discovery of a few unknown sonatas attributed to Domenico Scarlatti as well as 29 unknown sonatas by Antonio Soler composed in his earlier years in Madrid and El Escorial, since the manuscript – although perhaps copied around the last third of the 18th century or a little earlier – includes works dated 1756, at least for a group of sonatas. The style of the works of Soler is here very close to Scarlatti’s, and the fact that the sonatas of both authors were copied together is proof of the high esteem that their music had at the time. This paper analyses all these new sonatas and presents several tables with the numbering and the possible pairing of the sonatas.

In what turned out to be the last of his innovative "characteristic" concert overtures, that to "The Tale of the Fair Melusina" (op. 32, composed 1834), Felix Mendelssohn faced a particular challenge in balancing an immanent, musical-formal "narrative" with implicit reference to Romantic narrative tropes and (I argue) details of specific literary embodiments of these. His frustration in regard to achieving this balance, and with the relatively cool reception of the work on the part of critics and audiences, may have led in part to his abandonment of what was arguably his most significant contribution to Romantic musical culture. At the same time, the musical traces of this balancing act illuminate the composer's innovative negotiations with Classical-Romantic sonata form in telling ways.  The essay investigates the relation of musical "narrative" to background literary-cultural tropes with reference to "Sonata Theory" ideas of formal defaults and "deformation," as well as form-functional methodologies of William Caplin and Janet Schmalfeldt.

The continual evolution of Beethoven's musical style had a profound effect on his treatment of the medial caesura (MC), James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy's term for the break in texture that occurs in a sonata form before the secondary-theme zone. Over his career, Beethoven gradually preferred increasingly obscured MCs in his fast-tempo Type 3 sonatas. This article categorizes these MCs by their degree of obscurity and examines the techniques that contribute to their obscured state. It is argued that the increasing obscurity of these MCs is linked to Beethoven's larger stylistic migration towards a greater musical connectivity as time progresses.

The dissertation focuses on the early piano sonatas of Russian composer Nikolai Karlovich Medtner (1880–1951). It approaches them in the context of genre history, confronts them with other composer’s works, and discusses them from various analytic perspectives. A special goal is to consider the pieces in the aesthetic environment of their time, and to regard them as peculiar instances of the ›sonata principle‹, an ageless conception of musical form. The study is subdivided in three large parts, the first of which presents a summary of sonata composition before Medtner, exploring lines of tradition in Western Europe and Russia. The second part concentrates on Medtner’s musical language and its stylistic features. The third and most comprehensive part provides detailed examinations of eight of Medtner’s piano sonatas, including aspects of their genesis and reception, and making use of recent methods of musical analysis.

This is the book I have prepared and used for 20 years in the class of Musical Analysis I, as Professor of Musical Analysis and Composition in the Real Conservatorio Superior de Música de Madrid. This is a subject intended for students (players, conductors, composers, musicologists and pedagogues) in college or university level. It contains my own reflections in theory and analysis, as well as quotations from well-known scholars in the field of Theory of Music. It encompass a first theme devoted to the definition, place and types of analysis, followed by another theme with varied concepts as function, Fibonacci series, golden section and psychology of music. The third theme goes back to Gregorian modes and rhythmic modes, as well as the world of tones. The fourth is devoted to Rethoric of music and the Theory of topics, and this is a good place to propose an analysis of a fugue of Bach. The fifth theme explains the functional harmony, a field from which I have written several papers before in Academia. And the sixth theme updates the theory of sonata with the last publications and contrubutions of scholars as William Caplin and Hepokosky & Darcy. It ends with the analysis of a binary sonata of Scarlatti and a classical sonata by Mozart.
The book contains a list of works to analyse from Gregorian Chant to 19th century, an extended bibliography and many pages devoted to theory including several charts, figures, examples and analysis.

ABSTRAK Penelitian ini merupakan sonata bagian dalam jenis-jenis musik. Biasanya sonata dimainkan pada karya-karya berbentuk instrument tunggal (solo), kontinuo, duo, dan trio. Sonata muncul sejak awal tahun 1660-1700 pada zaman barok. Jenis pertama dikembangkan dari kanzona, disebut sonata da Chiesa (sonata gerejawi), unsur yang lebih diutamakan pada sonata ini yaitu kontrapung, dan gerakan-gerakannya tidak diberi judul dansa. Jenis yang kedua disebut sonata da Camera (sonata kamar atau ruangan), yang terdiri dari beberapa gerakan dengan judul dan bentuk dansa. Gerakan-gerakan pada sonata gerakan cepat dalam gaya kontrapung imitatif, gerakan berkecepatan sedang yang berjalinan homofonik dalam metronome 3/2 dan 6/4, dan gerakan cepat yang berunsur kontrapung yang ada kesamaannya antara irama dan bentuk melodi dari gerakan pertama. Ketiga gerakan ini dihubungkan dengan selingan-selingan lambat dan homofonik yang singkat. Kesamaan dalam tema di antara gerakan-gerakan merupakan suatu hal yang jarang terjadi pada akhir abad 17. Kebanyakan komponis cenderung membentuk sonata-sonata mereka, supaya setiap gerakan bersifat independen dari segi melodi dan ritme. Kata Kunci : Sonata, Gerakan-gerakan ABSTARCT This research is a part of sonata the types of music. Usually the sonata is played on works in the form of a single instrument (solo), continuo, duo, and trio. Sonata appeared since the beginning of 1660-1700 in the baroque era. The first type was developed from canzone, called the sonata da Chiesa (ecclesiastical sonata), the element that takes precedence in this sonata is the counterparts, and the movements are not given the title of dance. The second type is called sonata da camera (chamber music or room), which consists of several movements with the title and form of dance. The movements in the fast-motion sonata in the imitative counter-style, the medium-speed homophonic interlocking movements in the 3/2 and 6/4 metronome, and the fast-motion counter-motion that have similarities between the rhythm and melodic shape of the first movement. These three movements are associated with slow interruptions and brief homophonics. The similarity in theme between movements is something that rarely happens in the late 17th century. Most composers tend to form their sonatas, so that each movement is independent in terms of melody and rhythm.

In a groundbreaking 1974 paper the German musicologist Friedhelm Krummacher offered a series of “theses” concerning Mendelssohn’s mature sonata style, using the opening movement of the String Quartet in E minor, Op. 44 No. 2 (1837), as his paradigmatic example.  In a succession of detailed analytical points, Krummacher took issue with earlier, often highly superficial characterizations of Mendelssohn’s sonata practice.  Yet for all his revisionary zeal and acumen, what is conspicuous on rereading this account today is how those elements that would appear to modern theorists as crucial to this movement’s design are passed over with little or no consideration.  In this paper I offer both a concise new analysis of Mendelssohn’s paradigmatic quartet movement and a self-reflexive critique of the historical contingency of the methods of any such analytical method in trying to come to an understanding of this composer’s music.  I focus on four key aspects of this movement: 1) the preparation of the subordinate theme by a Medial Caesura on the wrong dominant and lack of any EEC thereafter; 2) the formal elision of the point of recapitulation; 3) the process of expansion or extension to tight-knit lyrical phrase types seen throughout the exposition; and 4), at the largest level, the deferment, overriding or sidestepping of expected points of large-scale harmonic articulation until the coda.  My concluding section offers, in turn, new theses concerning the nature of Mendelssohn’s mature sonata practice, preparing the following papers in the session. 

Part of ‘Rethinking Romantic Form: Mendelssohn’s Sonata-Form Practice’, panel I co-convened with Steven Vande Moortele, presented at the Society for Music Theory Annual Meeting, Vancouver, 6th November 2016.

Forthcoming in 'Rethinking Mendelssohn', ed. Benedict Taylor and Angela Mace Christian (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).

This study will examine the opening sonata-form movements of the piano trios by Felix Mendelssohn (1809–1847) and Robert Schumann (1810–1856) concentrating on the interaction between analysis and performance. The aim is to consider and explore musical motion from various analytical perspectives – such as formal, structural, metrical, and a more general dramatic aspect – and see how they interact with each other. In addition, these analytical insights are related to the issues of musical ‘shaping’ in performance, and the study examines both how the analytical findings might be reflected in performers’ shaping and, vice versa, how the analytical interpretation might be influenced by the experience gained while rehearsing the works for performance. The practicing process of the piano trio ensemble (with myself at the piano) is documented in an informal rehearsal diary. By capturing the ways in which performers themselves discuss the pieces fresh and new ideas are brought to the analysis and performance studies that traditionally have been dominated by the analysis-to-performance discussion, not the other way round. As a conclusion, the study includes both a more analytical, scholarly viewpoint and an introspective, performance-related viewpoint making the study a mixed method research.

When Hans Keller published his book on the Haydn quartets in 1986, he entitled it The Great Haydn Quartets, and discussed virtually every one of Haydn’s works in this genre from Opus 20 onward (omitting only Opus 33 no. 4). He pointedly neglects the early 10 quartets (opp. 1 and 2), nor does he consider the half dozen Opus 3 quartets, now generally believed to be by Roman Hoffstetter. More surprisingly, Keller discusses only one of the Opus 9 quartets (the admittedly impressive Opus 9 no. 4 in d minor), and avoids any mention of the Opus 17 set altogether, despite its many impressive movements. Keller’s relative silence regarding the two quartet sets from ca. 1768-71 is curious, given that Haydn himself wanted his published quartets to begin with Opus 9, acknowledging the high esteem in which he held these works, and by extension, its companion set, Opus 17.

Despite this high esteem on the part of their composer, the literature has, until recently, given the Opus 9 and 17 string quartets short shrift. Building on recent positive appraisals by James Webster, Floyd and Margaret Grave, Nancy November, and Adem Birson, this study seeks to reevaluate these works on their own considerable merits, and not merely as stepping stones on the road to the Opus 20 “Sun” Quartets and a mature Classical style.

The aim of this doctoral thesis is the study of the form in the keyboard sonatas of the spanish composer Antonio Soler (1729-1783), a hieronymite monk born in Olot (Gerona, Spain) who became Choir Master at the monastery of El Escorial, where he spent all his working life. In this place he composed all his enormous religious and instrumental work, consisting of more than 471 entries in the Catalogue of Samuel Rubio, and also had the opportunity to engage with members of the nobility and royalty. In fact, in addition to the sonatas he wrote for use by the brothers of the order in Montserrat for educational purposes, many of the sonatas composed since 1765 were probably dedicated first to Pedro de Santamant (between 1765 and 1772), a young protégé of the Duke of Medina Sidonia, and then to the Infante Don Gabriel, son of King Carlos III, to whom he also wrote 6 Concerts for two organs and the 6 Quintets for harpsichord and strings. 
The first requirement for this research has been to expose as a preliminary framework (hence I have numbered it as Chapter 0) the whole terminological apparatus needed to explore the thematic, harmonic and formal aspects of the sonatas, as well as the abbreviations resulting from the concepts, functions and defined terms, that will be used consistently throughout the work. In the commentary on the methodology details will be given about the sources used to develop this terminology.
Chapter 1 provides a biographical sketch of Antonio Soler, in order to update the information already known with the latest bibliographical data, and especially revising or denying some claims that have been perpetuated through successive generations of researchers and monographic texts. Perhaps most prominent in this regard is to confirm that Soler was never the keyboard teacher of the Infante Don Gabriel, partly because of the obvious distance from their respective homes. The regular teacher of the Infante after the death of José de Nebra in 1768 was Nicolás Conforto, and autumn seasons when the Court was in El Escorial were, therefore, almost the only occasion on which the monk and the Infante could meet and make music together, all of which happened moreover from 1773, not from 1766, as a mistaken interpretation of a Soler’s letter to Padre Martini led believe to several musicologists throughout the twentieth century. Many other almost unknown aspects of the life of Soler –like the trips to Andalusia to review an organ, the meetings with the Infante in Aranjuez and El Pardo, his facet of enlightened man and worthy son of the century, his less mystic side or its disagreements with the prior of the order– will emerge in this chapter, a quite surprising one to anyone who has read the biographies circulating until now in most dictionaries, monographs and books of history.
Chapter 2 focuses on the theoretical argument required for the study of the sonata and its assimilation in the eighteenth century Iberian music. Sonata theory is displayed here in the light of the latest and essential contributions of W. Caplin and Hepokoski & Darcy, who naturally assume the knowledge of earlier texts by Schönberg, Ratz, Newman, Kerman, Ratner, Rosen, Wolf, etc. The sonata as a form and as a genre, its basic principles, the essential generic markers, the sections and thematic groups shall be examined in order to lay the foundations that will enable further analysis of the sonata. It will be also worth taking a look at the opinions from experts about the transformation of the genre in the eighteenth century sonata, supplemented by the writings on music theory of that century (Koch, Riepel, Galeazzi). Now it will be possible to establish, with the help of Hepokoski & Darcy, an initial typology of the sonata, to focus then on the two formal types that will concern us, the Type 2 (binary sonata) and Type 3 (sonata form). However, while the latter formal type is not specially problematic, the binary sonata type lacks from a theoretical firm foundation, due to the patent disregard of much of the repertoire, and this is the reason of the revision and expansion of types proposed in this paper in the light of my research on Soler.
To close this chapter, we will take a survey of the scene before Soler in the Iberian Peninsula, along with the technical, historical and formal background of Iberian sonata and its main forerunners: D. Scarlatti, C. Seixas, S. Albero, V. Rodriguez Monllor and J. de Nebra, gathering their most remarkable thematic, harmonic and formal traits affecting the configuration of the Iberian sonata in the 18th century. The extensive sampling collected from their works will allow a comprehensive description of the usual behavior of the genre since its introduction as such in Spain and Portugal. Another important aspect concerns the use of the sonata in one movement, the possible grouping of sonatas and the sonatas in several movements, all of them fully implemented practices in the Iberian Peninsula in the mid-eighteenth century, which will have its counterpart when we address this issue in Soler’s sonatas, at the end of Chapter 3. 
The central aim of this research is to manifest in full in Chapter 3, centered precisely on the question of form in the sonatas of Antonio Soler. As an introduction I have reviewed the research on this subject –very unequal, indeed– from preceding researchers who have written dissertations or master papers focused on this repertoire, and the most interesting contributions have been taken into account, duly verified with mine from here on (especially in this chapter and in Appendix 2). Thus arrives the moment to establish the criteria governing the types, subtypes, variants, models, etc., used as categories for characterizing the sonatas, a theoretical work complemented by the constant reference to examples from the sonatas, many of them reproduced as musical illustrations throughout the text. We study here the three resulting types of sonata (binary sonata, mixed sonata and sonata form), with its models –the basic pattern of each formal type and the models derived from the changes that occur in the exposition, development and recapitulation– and submodels.
Another criteria used to analyse are: the formal-functional pattern, a creation of William Caplin which refers to cadential goals in the intra- and interthematic context; the derivations between thematic groups (to check unity or differentiation); the melting between thematic groups; variations and modifications as a consequence of several alterations found in the exposition and recapitulation of the sonata; the vamps (a concept that Sutcliffe applied to Scarlatti), peculiar ostinato-like passages; the proportions, to study the balance between the two parts of the sonata, and between the inner sections of each part; and finally the crux, a concept already introduced by Kirkpatrick in his book about Scarlatti, expanded by Hepokoski & Darcy and reviewed by me (with the idea of double crux), which refers to the measure or measures of the recapitulation in which the exposition material comes again in its original pitch (the first thematic group) or transposed to the home key (the second one).
The chapter continues with a dip in the sections and parts of the sonata, studying the different alternatives which lie in the combination of thematic groups, tonal areas and formal configurations. Apart from the generic form of sonata allegro, Soler has written some movements following genres as rondo, minuet and intento (which, like the tiento, is a fugue-like piece), always included in the sonatas in several movements composed in his final years for the Infante Don Gabriel. The chapter closes with a reflection on the types of grouping showing Soler sonatas: sonata in one movement, ‘grouped sonata’ and multimovement sonata.
Chapter 4 closes this research with conclusions that are merely a proposed new interpretation of this repertoire in the light of recent sonata theories and of the methodology emanating from it, sifting through the revisions, extensions and new design concepts, types and models that I have established as a result of the same problem of Soler sonatas. The data obtained in the typological categories and the pointed developments in our author’s biography, have led to a tentative chronology essay of the sonatas in the knowledge of the precariousness of manuscript sources and the almost total absence of dating of the works contained therein. But we know something else than about 30 years ago, when Rubio wrote a first draft of chronology in his Catalogue, followed by the contribution of Ife & Truby in his edition of the 12 sonatas of the Manuscript of the Madrid Conservatory, and it is worth trying.

__________

From the first contact with the available editions of Soler’s sonatas it could be seen that an updating of this other question was needed, a process that runned in parallel with the critical study I prepared for my edition of 20 Sonatas by Soler which were already to be published. This updating of sources and editions is the central issue in Appendix 1. Appendix 2, no doubt, is the documentary basis of this thesis, since it includes the analysis of each of the sonatas and sonata movements presented through a Scheme-summary, typology tables and a commentary. Of course, the previous chapters regularly refer to the pages of this appendix. Appendix 3 provides a series of numerical data embodied in the form of statistical tables and graphs that provide an undeniable support to the claims of objectivity in particular of Chapter 3. Appendix 4 contains a comment about the scores of the sonatas that are attached on a CD-ROM at the end of the paper. The thesis includes a bibliography divided into four sections: general music bibliography, specific literature on the eighteenth century music, specific literature about Antonio Soler and writings of Antonio Soler and his contemporaries.

This thesis approaches Haydn’s sonata-form procedures from the perspective of the eighteenth-century listener, asking, if a moment is allegedly “witty” according to modern analysts, would Haydn's contemporary audience have heard it as such? Eighteenth-century wit has two sides: wit involves an aspect of surprise or deception, a breaking of understood norms; however, wit must also involve an unsuspected congruity, a broader connection created only by breaking the aforementioned norm. Taking this as my starting point, I explore false recapitulations in the Haydn’s music, concluding that this device cannot be considered witty because it did not break an understood convention. I then provide detailed analyses of the first movements of Haydn’s “Military” Symphony no. 100 and String Quartet in D major, op. 33 no. 6, arguing that they are witty not solely because they are disruptive, but because this disruption binds the sonata together in an unexpected way.

The following essay argues that Caplin, Gjerdingen, and Hepokoski and Darcy explicitly and implicitly borrow ideas from the works of Heinrich Schenker while simultaneously relegating Schenkerian concepts, making anti-Schenkerian protests, and opposing certain Schenkerian interpretations in their own work. It also proposes that Schenkerian analysis can be used as a complement to the three aforementioned approaches. The first part demonstrates that Caplin’s terminology and hierarchical conception of musical form invites accompanying Schenkerian graphs. The second part suggests that Schenker, in his 1923 analysis of the first movement of Mozart’s K 545, noticed a schema similar to Gjerdingen’s Prinner. The third part contends that a Schenkerian interpretation of K 545 by Snyder aligns with Hepokoski and Darcy’s Type 2 sonata. The conclusion takes note of recent significant developments in field of Schenkerian studies that promote a healthy engagement with other theories.

1. “Wallace Berry’s and William Rothstein’s Divergent Paths from Analysis to Performance: Some Formal Implications in Mozart’s ‘Dalla sua pace’”
    2. “Leopold Kozeluch’s Charismatic Conformance with the Symphonic Conventions of Viennese Classical Style”
    3. “An Alternative Perspective on Webern’s ‘Crowning Achievement’ of Formal Synthesis in the Final Movement of Op. 28”

In the 18th century, the introduction of new musical genres such as the sonata, the quartet or the quintet - largely linked to the nascent Classicism -, will be the origin of a repertoire that will have famous and internationally renowned representatives in the Iberian Peninsula, including authors from Italy. And one of the composers who practiced both styles (religious and instrumental) is Antonio Soler (1729-1783), known as 'Padre Soler', due to his status as a Jerome monk. However, the biography of this musician has been - and continues to be in many texts - full of errors and inaccuracies that must be corrected as soon as possible, so that the image of the musician comes as close as possible to reality (incorporating for this the data of the most recent research on the musician and his time).

Hatten (1994) writes that if musical passages are “inappropriate to the context of the movement . . . an ironic
interpretation would be one way to reconcile that inappropriateness as a compositional effect rather than a flaw” (185). Is
there something systematic that prompts listeners to interpret musical “inappropriateness” as ironic? Building upon Hatten’s
work, this article explores how a listener might infer irony in Beethoven’s music by drawing on cognitive principles and
analogies shared by music and language. I create an analytical framework that draws conditions from language psychologists’
empirical studies of verbal and situational irony (Colston 2001, Lucariello 1994). The first condition is a violation of
expectations established through a norm or schema. I use Caplin’s (1998) theory of formal function, Gjerdingen’s (2007)
schema theory, and Hepokoski and Darcy’s (2006) Sonata Theory to measure violation of expectation as defined by
Beethoven and his audience’s shared stylistic knowledge. Since listeners develop expectations in music simply by listening
(Meyer 1956), this paper incorporates “common ground,” Clark’s (1996) term for the information, knowledge, and cultural
norms that the composer and listener share. The second condition is blatantly failing to fulfill one or more of the “maxims”
defined by the linguist H.P. Grice (1975), who argues that a person implicitly follows the maxims in any “cooperative”
conversation. I apply this framework to analyze three Beethoven string quartet movements that Hatten and others have
described as “ironic”: op. 95/iv, op. 131/v, and op. 130/i. I close by discussing implications for musical communication as a
whole.

This article approaches Haydn’s treatment of sonata form from the perspective of the eighteenth-century listener, asking: if a moment is allegedly “witty” according to modern analysts, would Haydn’s contemporary audience have heard it as such? Eighteenth-century wit is a two-sided coin: wit does involve an aspect of surprise or deception, a breaking of understood norms; however, wit must also involve an unsuspected congruity, a larger-scale connection created only by breaking the aforementioned norm. Taking this as my starting point, I provide detailed analyses of the first movements of Haydn’s “Military” Symphony no. 100 and String Quartet in D major, op. 33 no. 6. Compared to the expectations set forth by each exposition, Haydn has recomposed each piece’s respective recapitulation in a significant way. I argue that these pieces are witty in the eighteenth-century sense of the term but not in the sense that the term has been used by recent scholars such as Hepokoski and Darcy, who emphasize the disruptive aspects of wit. Ultimately, I suggest that Haydn can be witty without necessarily being deceptive; wit can involve establishing a kind of unexpected coherence that binds together the recapitulation and another section of a sonata form.

Franz Liszt has all too often been discarded as the virtuosic showman, despite the fact that his orchestral works have often gained great praise and attracted scholarly engagement. However, one also finds striking development of formal design and tonal harmony in many of the works for his principal composition medium, the piano. This paper seeks to explore the practical application of James A. Hepokoski and Warren Darcy’s Sonata Theory upon Liszt’s magnum opus for the instrument, the Sonata in B Minor.

I shall first consider the historical analyses placed upon the work that deal with structural design, as it pertains to the paradigm of Classical sonata-form. Previous research reveals two main theoretical camps; those in favour of a multi-movement analysis (with conflicting hypotheses therein) and those in favour of a single movement sonata form. An understanding of these historical conceptions of the piece allows one to then highlight areas of conflict and offer a new solution.

Finally, I shall use Sonata Theory to survey the Sonata in B Minor’s landscape in a new light. The title ‘Sonata’ has clear generic implications, many of which are met by Liszt; Sonata Theory provides a model with which to outline the compositional deformations employed by the composer and the implications of this practice. In particular, I offer new perspectives on the validity of the double-function form, insight into the rhetorical layout of a rotational discourse, and propose a nuanced analysis befitting of this striking work.

"Durch Nacht zum Licht" (und zurück in die Nacht): Formstrategien, dramaturgische Funktionen und semantische Implikationen der Dur-Aufhellung in Reprisen "klassischer" Moll-Sonatenformen [in: Dur versus Moll – Zur Geschichte der Semantik eines musikalischen Elementarkontrasts. Ed. by H.–J. Hinrichsen and S. Keym. Vienna: Böhlau, 189--218.]

This essay examines the consequences of the exposition’s off-tonic opening for the recapitulation in the first movement of Haydn’s “Oxford” Symphony. It will be argued that the massively recomposed recapitulation in the “Oxford” can in part be understood as the result of an attempt to recontextualize the form-functionally discrepant beginning. Although it is not possible to demonstrate that Haydn pursues a fixed musical task in any straightforward manner, it becomes clear that he nevertheless aims at exploiting in various ways the rich potential implied in his expositional material. In particular, Haydn creates in the recapitulation a long-range prolongation of dominant harmony – the problematic sonority with which the exposition begins – by an unexpected succession of voice-leading schemata expressing specific intrinsic formal functions.