Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The sonata form (also sonata-allegro form or first movement form) is a musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of the 18th century (the early Classical period ).
While the first-movement form had been the subject of theoretical works, it was seen as the pinnacle of musical technique. Part of the training of 19th-century composers was to write in sonata form and to favor sonata form in the first movement of multi-movement compositions, like symphonies, piano concertos, and string quartets.
The third movement usually follows a dance-like form, such as Minuet [or Scherzo] and Trio form. It is commonly written in the home key. Or, if used as the last movement, is in a fast tempo such as prestissimo, presto, or vivace. Like in Beethoven's "Pathetique" sonata Op.13 Third Movement
This first movement, a sonata form movement in G minor and common time, begins immediately with the first theme, a declamatory statement in straight quarter-notes, stated in octaves for the piano alone. This theme is the opening cell that governs the content of the rest of the musical material in the movement.
The first movement is in sonata form, divided into five sections: orchestral introduction, exposition, development, recapitulation, and coda. This movement is large, lasting between 20 and 25 minutes.
While adhering to the standard compound ternary design (three-part structure) of a dance movement (scherzo-trio-scherzo or minuet-trio-minuet), the scherzo section has an elaborate internal structure; it is a complete sonata form. Within this sonata form, the first group of the exposition (the statement of the main melodic themes) starts out ...
Crucial to most interpretations of the sonata form is the idea of a tonal center; and, as the Grove Concise Dictionary of Music puts it: "The main form of the group embodying the 'sonata principle', the most important principle of musical structure from the Classical period to the 20th century: that material first stated in a complementary key ...
The first movement is in the traditional sonata form that Beethoven inherited from his Classical predecessors, such as Haydn and Mozart (in which the main ideas that are introduced in the first few pages undergo elaborate development through many keys, with a dramatic return to the opening section—the recapitulation—about three-quarters of ...