Form & Analysis

This class will take place in the Spring Quarter, 2004, and will provide a basic introduction to Schenkerian analysis.

Last year’s class was more general in scope. Here is the syllabus from Fall 2002:

SYLLABUS FOR FALL QUARTER 2002

Class time and location
Wednesdays, room 214, 10:00–11:50 am

Instructor
Jonathan Leathwood
office number 302
jleathwo@du.edu
303 871 6929 (office)

What is analysis?

There is analysis and there is description. When we describe a piece, we identify its form and its motivic and thematic content, name the harmonies and describe the proportions of the phrases. Many people call this analysis, but it is only description. Analysis begins after that. When we analyse we relate one motive to another, perhaps finding hidden links (where they exist); we examine how different harmonic areas, even the remotest, dramatise the form and are integrated with it; we look at the use of different textures, from contrapuntal to homophonic, and ask why they occur where they do.

Above all, we ask what the composer is doing instead of the form as it is described in the textbooks. We will see that in all the masterpieces we look at, there is the background of the traditional form, and the foreground, which contains elements which tell against the traditional form. Of course, it is crucial to know the forms inside out. To make a faultless description is a discipline in itself, and we shall have to devote a good deal of attention to it. But if one stops there, one hasn’t yet said anything about the specific piece under discussion.

When we analyse, we are also trying to relate the surface of the piece to its structure. Small details sometimes have big repercussions: an accidental casually introduced within the tonic key may herald a dramatic modulation later in the piece; a high note first stated within an ornamental figure with no harmonic support may later on acquire its own harmony to become the climax of the piece; dissonances such as diminished-seventh chords sometimes accumulate to form their own patterns; and so on.

Course description

In this quarter we need to address some of the basics not only of form – the large design – but also of the smaller units of motive, phrase, sentence, period, without which ideas could never be stated or continued or contrasted.

The most relevant textbook for all of this is Schoenberg’s Fundamentals of Musical Composition, and I shall be giving out photocopies from relevant chapters to help clarify terms and usage. It is well worth owning a copy of this book (I’m sure it’s available through Amazon, Barnes & Noble or other online bookstores).

We shall be learning about (first-movement) sonata form, slow-movement form (abridged sonata form), minuet and trio (rounded binary form), and rondo and sonata-rondo. Exact terms for these forms vary from writer to writer, and I myself have a tendency to use a variety of terms. If you are confused at any point in a class please ask.

While not the simplest of the designs mentioned above, sonata form is at the basis of much solo, chamber and symphonic music of the late-eighteenth, nineteenth, and early-twentieth century. It is hard to overestimate the prestige of this way of organising ideas, or the importance of learning to hear it and think it in playing and listening. A central aim of this course is that you should be able to follow ‘symphonic’ works (sonatas, string quartets, symphonies) in concert and hear them in the light of this model.

It is with sonata form, then, that we shall begin. Once the basic design is familiar to all of you, we shall go back to the building blocks of motive and phrase, and examine the inner construction of the larger sections of the sonata design. From there we shall turn to the smaller forms, such as rounded binary, the slightly more complex sonata-rondo, and perhaps also the concerto.

Repertoire

Although we shall certainly only look at a very few works from the following list, it might serve as a place to start as you pursue your own listening. Sonatas are piano sonatas.

Haydn
Sonata in Eb, Hob. xvi (1795)
Quartets opp. 33, 55, 77

Mozart
Sonata in F, K.332
Symphony n† 40 in G minor
Symphony n† 41 in C (‘Jupiter’)
Piano Concertos 21–25

Beethoven
Sonatas op. 2/2 (A major), op. 31/2 (D minor, Tempest), op. 53 (C major, Waldstein), op. 57 (F minor, Appassionata)
String Quartets op. 59/1 (F major, first Razumovsky), op. 95 (F minor, Serioso)
Symphonies 3, 5, 6
Piano Concertos 3, 4, 5

Schubert
Sonata in Bb, D 960

Brahms
Piano Concerto n† 1 in D minor, op. 15
Piano Quintet in F minor, op. 34
Symphony n† 4 in E minor, op. 98

Assignments & Grading

The following is a very provisional list of assignments. It will give you an idea of the topics I want to cover and the general weighting of topics throughout the quarter. I may set more than one assignment on a particular topic, leave a topic till next quarter, or give out a set of questions on a particular work combining some of these topics.

Sonata form recognition 20% (weeks 1–2)
Phrasing assignment 20% (weeks 3–4)
Motivic assignment 20% (weeks 5–6)
Final project 40% (weeks 7–10)

The final project will be a substantial study of a sonata first movement, to incorporate ideas discussed throughout the quarter. It will be set in the sixth week of the quarter (October 16), and a draft will be due in the eighth week (October 30). That week we shall hold tutorials on the drafts, and the final versions will be due on November 18 (the first day of the examination period).

Bibliography

Keller, Hans, Essays on Music, ed. Christopher Wintle, Cambridge University Press, 1994

Ratner, Leonard, Classic Music: Expression, Form and Style, New York, Schirmer, 1980

Réti, Rudolph, The Thematic Process in Music, London, Faber, 1961

—, Thematic Patterns in Sonatas of Beethoven, ed. Deryck Cooke, New York, Macmillan, 1967

Rosen, Charles, The Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, New York, Viking Press, 1971

Schoenberg, Arnold, Fundamentals of Musical Composition, ed. Gerald Strang, New York, St. Martin’s Press, 1967

Tovey, Donald Francis, The Main Stream of Music and Other Essays, collected with an introduction by Hubert J. Foss, New York, Oxford University Press, 1949

—, A Companion to the Piano Sonatas of Beethoven: bar to bar analysis, London, Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music, 1931