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Sonata! (suggestion)


Rabbival507

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Johnbucket is totally right. Scholars in modern Sonata theory are not the type of people populating a site like this. However, I am also not that convinced it would be useful for “Young Composers”. Sonata theory tries to analyze music and distill certain general properties for certain types of music. They do not try to follow the way a piece was composed or what the composer was thinking when he chose certain paths for the music in a sonata. 

There are scholars that try to do that, and some of them lived in the hey-day of classical sonata. One of them was Heinrich Christoph Koch, a German musician and author, who compiled a very popular music lexicon and also a multi-part treatise on composition. What he writes is corroborated by other musicians and writers of his time. Now, what he wrote wasn’t on the cutting edge of musical change, but as he published his treatise in the years 1782-1793, is very useful for understanding the compositional strategies of many composers in the second half of the 18th century.

Some friendly soul at the publisher Cengage has chosen an excerpt from Koch as sample pages for a publication, so here is a small part translated into English: https://www.cengage.com/music/book_content/049557273X_wrightSimms/assets/ITOW/7273X_44_ ITOW_Koch.pdf

Edited by Willibald
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I would be delighted to master class on classical forms: I own both of those books (E book version); Allow me to read them thoroughly and prepare the master class. Also, it might have for those who are interested in this to know common practice harmony: cadences, tonal voice leading, counterpoint. For they could come up in a lesson. If you need a recommendation on books on those topics, ask me or anyone here. 🙂

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Myabe it's just me but I really don't like the idea you have to "read" about sonata form. I think I kind of know what's going on after going through tens of sonatas and symphonies and chamber music...

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1 hour ago, PCC said:

Myabe it's just me but I really don't like the idea you have to "read" about sonata form. I think I kind of know what's going on after going through tens of sonatas and symphonies and chamber music...

For me the most crucial thing is like what you said, to go through the real pieces and see in each case how the composer use that form in each situation. But a good thing of the books is that they can summarize it and analyze it in a different and objective way.

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