The term sonata is here employed in the sense which it has borne since the time of Haydn. If it is widened so as to include composers of the 17th and early 18th century, we must start from two primitive types in place of one.
[12]
The development may be illustrated if we take alphabetical letters to represent the clauses. The primitive ballad form is A B A: each verse being a unit, and therefore the whole song inorganic. The primitive rondo form is A B A B A B A, etc., the whole song being a unit, and therefore slightly organised. The form of Purcell's song is A B A C A, and therefore the most highly organised of the three.
[13]
The analysis of the Mozart Minuet may be tabulated as follows:—
First Part.
Second Part.
Third Part.
(a) Melody in A major.
(a) New episode in B minor.
(a) Repetition of first melody in A major.
(b) Melody in E major.
(b) The same repeated in A minor.
(b) Repetition of second melody in A major.
(c) New cadence-phrase to dominant of A.
[14]
As a simple instance of the form, we may take the first movement of Beethoven's Piano Sonata in G major, Op. 14, No. 3:—
Prologue or Introduction.
First Canto or Exposition.
Second Canto or Development Section.
Third Canto or Recapitulation.
Epilogue or Coda.
None
(a) First Subject in G major (bars 1-8).
(a) Treatment of First Subject, G minor to B flat major (bars 64-73).
(a) First Subject in G major (bars 124-131).
Final reminiscence of First Subject (bars 187-199).
(b) Transition modulating to D major (bars 9-25).
(b) Treatment of Second Subject in B flat major (bars 74-80).
(b) Transition extended so as to lead back to G major (bars 132-151).
(c) Second Subject, consisting of four sections, in D major (bars 26-63).
(c) Treatment of First Subject in A flat, G minor, F minor and E flat (bars 81-106).
(c) Second Subject in G maj. (bars 152-186).
(d) New Episode on dominant pedal of G, and anticipation of First Subject (bars 107-123).
[15]
So says Karasowski, who was intimately acquainted with the Chopins, and was entrusted by them with the materials for an authoritative biography. The monument in the Holy Cross Church at Warsaw gives March 2, 1809, as the date. Liszt and FÉtis both give 1810. It is a salient instance of the carelessness with which the records of Chopin's life have been treated.
[16]
The Polonaise in B flat minor, 'Adieu an Wilhelm Kolberg,' appears to have been written on Chopin's departure for Reinerz in 1826. But Fontana calls the three, which were published posthumously as Op. 71, 'les trois premiÈres Polonaises.' Two of them were composed in 1827-8 and the third in 1829.
[17]
Not the E minor Concerto, as M. Karasowski asserts. The fact is put beyond dispute by a letter of May 15, 1830, in which Chopin says that the Adagio of the latter work is still unfinished. Both movements, by the way, are marked Larghetto in the score.
[18]
See the letter of Sept. 4, 1830, quoted by Professor Niecks.
[19]
The so-called Étude in C minor, Op. 10, No. 12.
[20]
Letter to Dziewanowski (abridged), Jan. 1833.
[21]
Chopin had certainly composed some of these before his arrival in Paris.
[22]
Professor Niecks' Chopin, Vol. i. p. 284.
[23]
Valse in A flat, Op. 69, No. 1.
[24]
See the pamphlet entitled Une Contemporaine, published during the Revolution of 1848.
[25]
Karasowski, Vol. ii. p. 327.
[26]
George Sand, by Matthew Arnold. Fortnightly Review, June 1877.
[27]
Sainte-Beuve. Portraits Contemporains, i. 523.
[28]
Letter to Pierret, June 22, 1842.
[29]
'Alles was sie fÜhlt und denkt haucht Tiefsinn und Anmuth.' Heine, Lutetia, 'George Sand.'
[30]
See the letters of Feb. 15 and Ap. 7, 1852, quoted in Mrs Sutherland Orr's Life of Robert Browning.
[31]
Journal, Vol. iii. p. 242 (Dec. 1, 1868).
[32]
Professor Niecks' Chopin, Vol. ii. p. 197.
[33]
See the Essay on George Sand, in Mr Henry James' French Poets and Novelists.
[34]
There was a short visit to Genoa in the early part of May.
[35]
M. Brault's character can best be gauged from his pamphlet, Une Contemporaine. See also the Histoire de ma vie, and George Sand's letter of Aug. 9.
[36]
See George Sand's letter to Gutmann, May 12.
[37]
'George Sand was a woman with a woman's ideal of gentleness, of the "charm of good manners" as essential to civilisation.'—Matthew Arnold, Fortnightly Review, June 1877. See Professor Niecks' Chopin, Vol. ii. p. 200.
[38]
See George Sand's letter to Gutmann, May 12, 1847.
[39]
Liszt declares that the rupture took place at Nohant. If so, this alternative is settled.
[40]
See Professor Niecks' Chopin, Vol. ii. p. 318.
[41]
The Ballade, which originally ended in F major, was altered to its present conclusion by an afterthought. See the review of it in Schumann's Collected Works.
[42]
Étude in D flat, Op. 25, No. 8.
[43]
Étude in A flat, without Opus number.
[44]
This opus number is appended to the autograph score. The Quintett and both the symphonies are still unpublished.
[45]
See a complete history of this work in the preface to the present libretto; see also Dr Stecker's article on DvorÁk in the new 'Bohemian EncyclopÆdia.' Both these authorities give 1871 as the date.
[46]
See the biographical sketch of DvorÁk, by H. E. Krehbiel, Century, Sept. 1892.
[47]
The account of this episode is taken partly from Ehrlich's KÜnstlerleben, partly from an article by Dr Schubring in the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung.
[48]
It should be noted that the first version of the Serenade in A (Op. 16) was also produced in this year and published at Bonn in 1860. Brahms, however, subsequently withdrew it for revision, and its present form dates from 1875.
[49]
The Neue Zeitschrift mentions the successful dÉbut of Fritz Brahms at Hamburg in January 1864.
[50]
The Thematic Catalogue gives the date of this work as 1866. But it must have been published earlier, for it is reviewed in the Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung for Sept. 9, 1863.
[51]
See Ehrlich's KÜnstlerleben, p. 156 n.
[52]
Shortened from an article in the issue for November 21, 1862.
[53]
To them should be added the last three books of Romances from Tieck's Magelone, which were not printed until 1868, though they were almost certainly written some considerable time earlier.
[54]
Dr Parry, Art of Music, pp. 173-4.
[55]
Compare the corresponding movements in Schumann's D minor Violin Sonata and Pianoforte Quintett.
