Trio sonata for organ in g major

cooperboy2000: Thanks! It's nice to see that people don't start bashing you for asking a simple question about music forms :)

I have spent a lot of my time reading on wikipedia, the fugue article makes more sense as I learn more. I have a pretty good idea of what a fugue is now (I thinka haha), Anilikos tought me some things about it after I made this forum thread.

I have been thinking about study music theory more seriously but I don't have the time right now, I really want to learn more though and that's why I'm on this forum so many thanks for your input.

composerorganist: I absolutely adore Bachs trio sonatas for organ so that's why I drew inspiration from them, as far as counterpoint goes, I'd like to think that each new song am make is a study, I've also studied the midi patterns from many of bachs works.

Sisteenth century, that's more renaissance than baroque, right? What is "plaestrina-like counterpoint"? Can I do some basic studies on counterpoint on my own?

Thank you very much for your interest, I'm struggling to understand more about music theory so any insight you might gave is highly appreciated!

I now know about intervals, this peice is very octave based so Anilikos tought me about fifthts, fourths and so on, wich made me read more about it. I now create polyphonic peices like this with subjects and answers, not only subject upon subject. Scales is also very clear too me, hard to write fugal works without knowing about scales :)

as far as G and F clefs go, well I haven't the slightes clue so please do elaborate on that?

I've always been in favor of the piano roll but perhaps I should try notation as well then, doesn't hurt to broaden your views.

grantco13: Thanks, that's what I was going for, since a trio sonata is in three voices I thought it could contain a fugue, becides, Bach trio sonatas for organ are very fugish.

G clef is the most used one as far as I can tell. Below that is the F clef. The only other clef I know of might be the C clef (looks like a big fancy B to me). I'm pretty sure you do know which spot is which note. The clefs are intended to orient you.

I'm glad you appreciate my help, but it goes both ways. You've helped me too. What little I understand I'm happy to tell you. Your skill in music composition surpasses mine, so it feels a bit pretentious of me to dole out advice.

Ok - I started a thread on 16th centruy 2 voiced ctrpoint 1st species (eg note against note). Try the exercises after reading the initial post and hearing a few examples done by YCers.

Although this is 16th century it helps you when writing 18th century. You do have to practice 18th century ctrpoint to get that style and learn how to write counterpoint more chromatically than what was done in traditional 16 th century polyphonic practice (note I say traditional, composers towrd the end of the 16th century began to experiment and the "rules" are more an approximation of the style). But 16th century is great because you work on the basics of consonance and dissonance, suspensions and where to "hide" parallel movement w/o sacrificing the sound of a web of seamless polyphony.

grantco13: Thanks, that's what I was going for, since a trio sonata is in three voices I thought it could contain a fugue, besides, Bach trio sonatas for organ are very fugish.

Yeah, it could be also that in Bach's organ "trio sonatas," he wrote them so that each part can be played separately. By that I mean that perhaps they are written so that an organist could play each separate part on a separate keyboard (2 manual organ) with the feet playing the pedal/bass part. I've never seen the scores to know if that's how they're arranged though...

That could be the difference he is indicating because in a "regular" baroque fugue (with or without pedals) parts would cross between the hands more. So for example in a 3 part fugue the left hand would probably play the bass part, and the right hand the treble. But the 3rd part would more or less go between the hands depending on what hand and which finger could best reach the notes at that time.

But I'm just theorizing. Without looking at Bach's scores, I don't know if the independence of the parts is as I'm describing or not :-)

Once one is talking about writing polyphonic music for a single performer, be it organ, harpsichord, lute etc., the fact that one person has to play all the parts also influences the type of parts that can be written. So for example, sometimes people will write a 3 part polyphonic piece and use an organ patch for the sound, only to find that in the REAL world of keyboard playing they wrote things that are unreachable for one person to play...:cool:

grantco13: Thanks, that's what I was going for, since a trio sonata is in three voices I thought it could contain a fugue, becides, Bach trio sonatas for organ are very fugish.

Hi Tobias, Looking on the IMSLP site (Which everyone should know about for free scores!) it looks like my "theory" about how the organ trio sonatas were written actually IS the case. They're made so that the hands keep separate parts going which could be played on separate keyboards. Interestingly enough at least for the 2 that are up on IMSLP, they are both considered spurious and not actually written by Bach :-) Doesn't mean they're not good music, but its amazing how often early musicologists seem to have assumed that IF something is good, it MUST be by Bach...

but I still don't understand why a trio sonata couldn't be a fugue? a fugue can be percieved as a texture and since the trio sonata has three voices it's no stopping it for being a fugue?

Fugues aren't defined by their number of voices. There's a two voice fugue in the Well Tempered Clavier (E minor, Book 1) and plenty of four voice fugues. What defines a fugue is its form and treatment of material, which is very different from the trio sonata.

cooperboy2000: Thanks! It's nice to see that people don't start bashing you for asking a simple question about music forms :)

I have spent a lot of my time reading on wikipedia, the fugue article makes more sense as I learn more. I have a pretty good idea of what a fugue is now (I thinka haha), Anilikos tought me some things about it after I made this forum thread.

I have been thinking about study music theory more seriously but I don't have the time right now, I really want to learn more though and that's why I'm on this forum so many thanks for your input.

You're welcome. I still remember being a beginner (in a way we're always beginners).

What would probably be most helpful is to work on the fundamentals. I say in an earlier post that you needed to ask what the dominant was? That's not a bad thing, but that type of information is extremely helpful in composition. Theory is essentially the scientific description of why music sounds good. Knowledge of theory helps you figure out which notes make the beautiful sound you're imagining. It's like learning to write; first you learn the letters (notes) and start making words (chords). Then you construct sentences (phrases), paragraphs (sections), and eventually write essays (sonatas perhaps?). Like writing, it is a complex process which requires each step to be sloid before building further (by the time you get to writing research papers, you should know your vocabulary pretty well).

I would recommend the Steinke series of books. They're a bit expensive, but very effective and quick.

Good luck with your compositions!

composerorganist: Thanks, I'll be sure to try out your exercises!

Yeah, it could be also that in Bach's organ "trio sonatas," he wrote them so that each part can be played separately. By that I mean that perhaps they are written so that an organist could play each separate part on a separate keyboard (2 manual organ) with the feet playing the pedal/bass part. I've never seen the scores to know if that's how they're arranged though...

That could be the difference he is indicating because in a "regular" baroque fugue (with or without pedals) parts would cross between the hands more. So for example in a 3 part fugue the left hand would probably play the bass part, and the right hand the treble. But the 3rd part would more or less go between the hands depending on what hand and which finger could best reach the notes at that time.

But I'm just theorizing. Without looking at Bach's scores, I don't know if the independence of the parts is as I'm describing or not :-)

Once one is talking about writing polyphonic music for a single performer, be it organ, harpsichord, lute etc., the fact that one person has to play all the parts also influences the type of parts that can be written. So for example, sometimes people will write a 3 part polyphonic piece and use an organ patch for the sound, only to find that in the REAL world of keyboard playing they wrote things that are unreachable for one person to play...:cool:

Wouldn't the pedals be used for bass though? Seems logical that the left hand would have a similar function to the right hand?

Indeed, I think the hardest part of writing the pedal melody in a trio sonata for organ style peice is to keep the pedal melody inside the two octaves pedals usually concist of, btw, which two octaves are the pedals handling?

Fugues aren't defined by their number of voices. There's a two voice fugue in the Well Tempered Clavier (E minor, Book 1) and plenty of four voice fugues. What defines a fugue is its form and treatment of material, which is very different from the trio sonata.

Yes but I think you missunderstand me, I know a fugue can concist of any number of voices but my point was since a trio sonata is in three voices it can easily be in the texture of a fugue. Or is it something in the form of trio sonata that prevents it from being like a fugue?

You're welcome. I still remember being a beginner (in a way we're always beginners).

What would probably be most helpful is to work on the fundamentals. I say in an earlier post that you needed to ask what the dominant was? That's not a bad thing, but that type of information is extremely helpful in composition. Theory is essentially the scientific description of why music sounds good. Knowledge of theory helps you figure out which notes make the beautiful sound you're imagining. It's like learning to write; first you learn the letters (notes) and start making words (chords). Then you construct sentences (phrases), paragraphs (sections), and eventually write essays (sonatas perhaps?). Like writing, it is a complex process which requires each step to be sloid before building further (by the time you get to writing research papers, you should know your vocabulary pretty well).

I would recommend the Steinke series of books. They're a bit expensive, but very effective and quick.

Good luck with your compositions!

Indeed I find every new thing about music theory I learn very helpfull, but I also got a kind of hippie view on the matter, I believe it's benefitial to start making music buy just feeling the instrument (piano in my case) and how you could use it's logic to create, I believe it broadens your creativity. At some point though learning mroe about music theory is essential of course so I'm really starting to read up on it now. Thanks for the colourful description about notes and chords :).

Wouldn't the pedals be used for bass though? Seems logical that the left hand would have a similar function to the right hand?

Indeed, I think the hardest part of writing the pedal melody in a trio sonata for organ style peice is to keep the pedal melody inside the two octaves pedals usually concist of, btw, which two octaves are the pedals handling?

I don't really understand the first part of your question. Yes, the pedals would be used for the bass and the left hand would function as the right hand in that each would have its own line potentially. But this is only true if we're talking about why an organ piece would be called a "trio sonata."

The point I was making is that most "normal" organ music and keyboard music doesn't work like that. Think for example of someone writing a 6 voice fugue for one person to play. Yes, the lowest notes would probably be the pedal part, but after that somehow the player's two hands are dealing with 5 leftover parts. They are NOT split up specifically between the left and right in a consistent manner. Chances are the middle voice of the 5 left over parts would be going between the right and the left depending on which hand can reach the given notes at the time.

Regarding your other organ question, I'm sure google or wikepedia would give a pretty clear idea of the note range for pedals. I'm thinking that the low note is low C two leger lines below the staff to middle C above. Keep in mind too that those can change somewhat by which pipe footage ( 4ft. 8 ft. 16 ft.) of stop you use. 8ft. is what would give you the written pitch. I can't imagine how there would be some type of difficulty keeping the pedal part within a 2 octave range. Once it needs to get higher the hands would take over, after all :-)