Back and Forth from Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart, and the Nonresolving Recapitulation

JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

JAMES HEPOKOSKI

In a world of contending analytical systems, My plan here is less ambitious. I shall merely several of which have settled into the comforts call attention to some elementary analytical of orthodoxy, what does it mean to confront points about a few works of Beethoven and of formal structures adequately? At times it can Mozart and inquire into their ramications for be a matter of nding a fresh perspective that a more productive hermeneutics. This article encourages us to ask questions that might oth- is primarily neither about Beethoven and Mozart erwise be overlooked, neutralized, or dismissed nor about the analyses themselves. Instead, it within current paradigms. What would it re- is an exercise in a way of framing questions, of quire to seek a different perspective, to proceed pursuing implications, of registering the pro- from a new site of questioning? vocative corollaries that even simple observa- In what follows I shall glance at a few ideas tions can generate. that we might use in sonata-form analysis—to My point of departure—the initial elemen- suggest some features of a perhaps unaccus- tary observation— is noticing the curiosity, in tomed mode of thinking about this topic. Along the way this may entail some unfamiliar concepts, terms, and denitions, all of which are in more detail each aspect of the terminology and style of basic to the analytical and interpretatio nal the hermeneutics that underpin this article. Put another way, my goal here cannot be to derive this system but method that I call Sonata Theory. Laying out only, within certain limitations, to demonstrate the meth- the justi cation for each concept would be a odology in action. Thus I hope to suggest some of the different enterprise altogether, requiring many practical results to which it leads and to refer readers to the more elaborate discussions of the basic principles that separate discussions. And in any event, that will soon appear in the Elements of Sonata Theory . I should aspect of the project is carried out elsewhere. 1 perhaps mention two additional points. First, while there are points of contact between the present article and the forthcoming book, this article, taking up a central issue and several examples in more detail, is not an extract from 1James Hepokoski and Warren Darcy, Elements of Sonata the latter. Second, this essay was conceived as one of a Theory: Norms, Types, and Deformations in the Late-Eigh- complementary pair of articles. Its sibling is “Beyond the teenth-Century Sonata (New York: Oxford University Sonata Principle,” Journal of the American Musicological Press, forthcoming). Elements of Sonata Theory takes up Society 55 (2002), 91–154.

19th-Century Music, XXV/2–3, pp. 127–54. ISSN: 0148-2076. © 2002 by The Regents of the University of 127 California. All rights reserved. Send requests for permission to reprint to: Rights and Permissions, University of California Press, Journals Division, 2000 Center St., Ste. 303, Berkeley, CA 94704-1223. 19TH some sonata-form compositions, of what I call tional generic mission of tonal closure. Rare in CENTURY MUSIC the nonresolving recapitulation. The term is the decades around 1800, this phenomenon is not self-explanatory. From the outset we have easy to identify, but the conceptual and inter- to think about denitions. This use of the word pretive problems swirling around it are numer- recapitulation refers to what I distinguish as ous and challenging. the rhetorical recapitulation, a stretch of compositional space normatively recognizable as The Overture to EGMONT: Nonresolution, by and large symmetrical in layout to the expo- Deferral, and Post-Sonata Attainment sition-pattern, its thematic and textural model. We may begin by reminding ourselves of what (It is sometimes useful to distinguish this rhe- is surely the locus classicus of the nonresolving torical recapitulation, a matter of thematic- recapitulation: Beethoven’ s Egmont Overture, modular arrangement, from the completion of op. 84 (1810). Here the exposition’s tonal plan the linear-tonal argument—a tonal resolution — is regular, moving from minorÊi to major III for which may be understood to concern itself with the secondary theme (from F minor to A ma- harmonic matters.) Although a range of jor). Moreover, the secondary theme’ s generic recapitulatory deviations from the referential goal, like that of all secondary themes of this pattern are possible— deletions, reorderings , period, is to secure a perfect authentic cadence telescopings, expansions, recompositions of in- in the new key— to produce what I call the dividual sections—within customary practice point of essential expositional closure (the EEC). expositions and rhetorical recapitulations are I understand the EEC as the rst satisfactory usually kept roughly commensurate with each perfect authentic cadence in the subordinate other. In a nonresolving recapitulation the com- key that proceeds onward to differing material. poser has crafted this rhetorical recapitulatory (Demonstrating what is meant by satisfactory revisiting, or new rotation,2 of previously or- would lead us astray here. This is a compli- dered expositional materials to convey the im- cated and fundamental issue within Sonata pression that it “fails” to accomplish its addi- Theory.) For now, we need only observe that its corresponding moment in the recapitulation is the point of essential structural closure, the 2 By a rotational process I mean an ordered arrangement of ESC. This is expected to be a perfect authentic diverse thematic modules that is subjected to a (usually varied or altered) recycling, or several recyclings, later on cadence in the tonic, thus completing the es- in the work. Expositions thus provide an ordered, referen- sential structural trajectory of the musical pro- tial rotation through a set of materials that is recycled, cess at hand. In other words, the ESC marks with alterations, in the recapitulatory rotation. In the decades around 1800 developments may also be fully or par- the attainment of a resolving recapitulation, tially rotational (including the possibility of half-rotations, one with a satisfactory articulation of closure blocked rotations, and the like), although nonrotational in the tonic. The outlines of this are indicated developments are also a possibility. The concept is elaborated further in Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of Sonata in the diagrams in g. 1a–b, which provide an Theory, which also includes a discussion of the utility of overview of the generalized conception of so- the speci c term, “ rotation.” For considerations of rota- nata form under the paradigm of Sonata Theory. tions a century later, see Hepokoski, Sibelius: Symphony No. 5 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), pp. (P, TR, S, and C stand for primary theme, tran- 23–26, 58– 84; “ The Essence of Sibelius: Creation Myths sition, secondary theme, and closing theme; and Rotational Cycles in Luonnotar,” in The Sibelius Com- MC stands for the medial caesura [the frequent panion, ed. Glenda Dawn Goss (Westport: Greenwood, 1996), pp. 121–46; and “Rotations, Sketches, and [Sibelius’s] midexpositional, cadential break in a two-part Sixth Symphony,” Sibelius Studies, ed. Timothy L. Jack- exposition]; PAC stands for a perfect authentic son and Veijo Murtomäki (Cambridge: Cambridge Univer- cadence.)3 sity Press, 2001), pp. 322–51. See also Darcy, “The Meta- physics of Annihilation: Wagner, Schopenhauer, and the Ending of the Ring,” Music Theory Spectrum 16 (1994), 1– 40; “Bruckner’s Sonata Deformations,” in Bruckner Stud- 3For the MC and two-part exposition, see Hepokoski and ies, ed. Timothy L. Jackson and Paul Hawkshaw (Cam- Darcy, “ The Medial Caesura and Its Role in the Eigh- bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp. 256–77; and teenth-Century Sonata Exposition,” Music Theory Spec- “Rotational Form, Teleological Genesis, and Fantasy-Pro- trum 19 (1997), 115– 54. For considerations of the addi- jection in the Slow Movement of Mahler’ s Sixth Sym- tional concepts, see Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of phony,” this journal 25 (2001), 49–74. Sonata Theory, from which gs. 1a–b are taken.

128 a. Exposition only JAMES HEPOKOSKI Essential Expositional Trajectory (to the EEC) Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

MC, nal PAC cadence “continuation modules,” or: EEC series of energy-gaining modules ...... Relaunch: C TR = “energy-gain” S + “acceptance” of P Post-cadential “Appendix” or set of “accessory ideas.” May be 1 2 Launch: “new key” multisectional (C , C , etc.) and of P usually piano varying lengths. Usually forte or often lyrical, etc. gaining in rhetorical force. often forte non-tonic key proposes the in V either modulatory (or, if P was in minor, in III or in v) main idea for or non-modulatory the sonata

tonic key

Exposition, Part 1 Exposition, Part 2

b. The entire structure Essential Sonata Trajectory (to the ESC)

interruption MC, EEC nal cadence Development: often P– or P–TR dominated (perhaps “rotational”) S C MC, ESC nal V as “restart” cadence chord Coda V or III P TR P TR S C often recomposed

I I I I (emph: IV?) (“tonal resolution”)

Exposition Development Recapitulation (One central mission: laying out (S, as agent, carries out the central generic the strategy for the eventual attainment task of the sonata—securing the ESC: of the ESC: a “structure of promise”) a“structure of accomplishment”)

Figure 1a–b: The Generic Layout of Sonata Form (Exposition and Entire Movement).

129 19TH In the exposition of the F-Minor Egmont Beethoven for answering expositional mediants CENTURY MUSIC Overture the EEC is produced unequivocally with recapitulatory submediants (most nota- with a perfect authentic cadence in III (A ma- bly, in the Piano Sonatas in G, op. 31, no. 1, jor) in m. 104. (Example 1, only a melodic line, movt. I; and C, op. 53, movt. I). provides an aide-mémoire .) Following generic To this obj ection, howe ver familiar or expectation, one anticipates, even within a commonsensical it might initially seem, one quasi-programmatic overture of that period, that can propose several interrelated lines of re- in the recapitulation the secondary theme will sponse, which are perhaps necessary only to return and resolve in the tonic, producing an touch on here. The rst point to recognize is ESC in either a victorious F major or a tragic F that the most often-cited Beethovenian prece- minor that is reinforced by a brief closing zone dents (pre- Egmont) for such fth-relations be- in the same key. But this does not happen. In tween expositional mediant and recapitulatory the rst half of the recapitulatory space the submediant occur in major-mode compositions drive to the medial caesura is derailed onto a (where an expositional choice of iii or III for the suddenly asserted D major (VI, m. 207: see ex. secondary theme would be unusual), not in 2), soon proceeding to a prolonged dominant minor-mode ones. When such a recapitulatory chord of the same key, mm. 217–24 (with MC submediant “balance”— if that is in fact what at m. 224). Consequently, the secondary theme, it is—is furnished in these major-mode prece- merely transposed from the exposition— as is dents, the recapitulatory VI, unlike the exposi- typical—is articulated not in the expected tonic, tional III, is usually ephemeral, incapable of F major, but rather in the submediant, D ma- sustaining itself at length. Very soon after it jor. It is in this “wrong key” that the rhetorical begins, the submediant-in ected secondary- cadential substitute for the ESC is made to theme area self-corrects to the tonic to resolve occur (m. 247). This perfect authentic cadence properly (that is, to produce a normative, tonic in VI is conrmed by a similar D -major clos- ESC). This may involve a backing-up to rebegin ing zone—a transposition of the original twelve the entire, “improperly launched” S-theme in measures from the exposition. This closing the tonic (as in op. 31, no. 1, movt. I) or an theme brings the rhetorical recapitulation to a almost immediate tonal correction en route cadential and emphatically major-mode end, within the S-theme itself (as in op. 53, movt. though a tonally displaced one, in m. 259. In I).4 In other words, from an only slightly ad- sum, the recapitulatory rotation has not pro- justed standpoint the perceived tonal balance duced a tonal resolution. All of its closures are in a “false” VI, D major, not in the “ true” tonic, F. This produces one type of nonresolving 4A related situation occurs when the second half of an exposition, grounded essentially in the “proper” key, the recapitulation. dominant in major-mode expositions, contains an interior So much might seem self-evident—but even passage that momentarily tonicizes a contrasting key (not here we might pause to underscore the point necessarily a mediant) only to return to the more standard key to conclude the passage in question. Normally, toward and to anticipate one or two possible caution- the end of the movement, the fth-transposition that gov- ary or critical replies. Within this repertory the erns the shift from the expositional V to the recapitulatory crucial tonal factor, rendered effectively obliga- I will also— as a matter of course— control any eeting interior “escape” to the contrasting key. The rst move- tory by decades of precedents, is recapitulatory ment of Beethoven’s String Quartet in D, op. 18, no. 3, for resolution in the tonic. To my observation about example, arrives at an A major (V) perfect authentic ca- the nonresolution in Egmont, though, one might dence in m. 57, but slips ephemerally into C major (locally, III of A) in mm. 68–71— shortly thereafter returning to A imagine a caveat suggesting that since the minor (mm. 72–75) and A major (m. 76). In the exposition’s A and the recapitulation’s D are recapitulation’s fth-transposition the corresponding key related by fth-transposition, this would suf- that is briey alluded to, of course, is F major ( III of D), mm. 199–202. (Here I avoid the term “secondary theme” ce to produce at least some type of satisfac- because this exposition is better interpreted as a provoca- tory balance, both because fth-relations with tive instance of the second type of continuous exposition, the exposition at this point of the composition lacking a proper medial caesura and secondary theme—a structural and expressive issue whose explication would are common within sonata forms and be- require too much space in the present context. See, how- cause there are a few celebrated precedents in ever, n. 23 below along with its related passage in the text.)

130 JAMES 82 S HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, cresc. Mozart dolce dolce

3 3 EEC 3 3 3 3 94 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 C

106

Example 1: Beethoven, Overture to Egmont, op. 84, mm. 82–116 (single voice line only).

205

214

224 S MC

dolce

Example 2: Beethoven, Overture to Egmont, op. 84, mm. 205–28 (single voice line only).

in these cases might be more accurately con- that “Beethoven invariably balances a mediant strued as a complementary rec apitulatory in the exposition with a submediant in the feint—something soon amended— that recalls recapitulation” (italics mine). 6 This is not the or acknowledges the non-normative key planted in the parallel passage of the exposition. It may be the nonsustainable aspect of the 6Rosen, “Schubert’s Inections of Classical Form,” in The recapitulatory submediant, not its eeting ap- Cambridge Companion to Schubert, ed. Christopher H. pearance, that is the main point. 5 Gibbs (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 87. One presumes that Rosen’ s initial impulse, in this Moreover, as a general claim or summation context (a discussion of tonal issues in Schubert’s “Grand of “common wisdom” about sonatas, it is not Duo” in C, D. 812, movt. I), was to refer primarily to true, as Charles Rosen has recently asserted, major-mode sonata-form examples, since the number of self-evident minor-mode sonata-form contradictions to the claim is vast (as is mentioned in my subsequent paragraph below in the text). And yet, following references to op. 31, 5Thus in their incompleteness—or when not followed up no. 1, and op. 53, Rosen sought to include a number of with a more precise description of the situation at hand— minor-mode “late-style” examples of this, some of which, one might nd blunt statements of the type encountered, as it happens, were inaccurate. e.g., in Charles Rosen, The Romantic Generation (Cam- Additionally, Rosen suggested—with slightly more de- bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995), p. 244, to tail, perhaps, in The Romantic Generation, p. 244, directly be insufcient: “In the Waldstein Sonata, in C major, the following the statements cited in n. 5 above—that “in the E major mediant of the exposition is balanced by the E at-Major Quartet, op. 127 [rst movement], the mediant submediant A major/minor in the recapitulation. In the G major is balanced later by submediant C major.” The Sonata for Piano in G Major, op. 31, no. 1, the second problematic element nessed in this claim (concealed un- group in the mediant B major returns in the submediant E der the general word, “later”) is that the presumed balance major.” Compare n. 6 below. occurs in fundamentally different parts of the rotational

131 19TH case, for instance, with the C-Major Overture, With this in mind, we may return the “fth- CENTURY MUSIC Leonore 3 (1806), whose expositional S-theme transposition” discussion to minor-mode so- in E major (III) is recapitulated intact, more or nata-form practice, perhaps more immediately less as a direct transposition (including some relevant to the F-Minor Egmont. And here the transient internal sequences), down a major central point is this: minor-mode expositions third, in C. And although the very concept of a with secondary and closing themes in III (that recapitulation is problematized in its C-major is, most minor-mode expositions) do not nor- predecessor, Leonore 2 (1805), we may at least mally provide such a “balancing” submediant observe that no submediant balance for the at the corresponding points in the recapitula- exposition’s secondary-theme mediant is pro- tion. Instead, the recapitulatory S and C almost vided in the nal third of the composition (say, always appear only in the tonic—that is, down mm. 348 [C minor]–530): the closest approxi- a third from the exposition. As a result, minor- mation comes with the E trumpet-calls (unre- mode sonatas moving to the mediant in their lated to the secondary theme), mm. 392–441, a expositions are not primarily under the sway of at-mediant “breakthrough” parenthesis within the fth-transposition guideline more properly the form. In short, even in major-mode sonata encountered as normative practice in those forms of this period not a ll expositional major-mode works (or minor-mode works) that mediants call forth recapitulatory submediants move to the dominant in their expositions. To in the complementary passages. And when they be sure, any nontonic fth-transposition that do not, we do not criticize these works as awed does occur in a minor-mode sonata form (such or unbalanced. 7 as the A –D relation in Egmont) provides a symmetrical tonal logic that is instantly com- prehensible as a musical procedure. When such layout. The exposition’s secondary theme, in the mediant symmetries do occur (and again, they need not (m. 41), returns intact in the tonic in the recapitulation do so), they may also be interpreted as alluding (m. 207), a situation unlike that in op. 31, no. 1, movt. I and op. 53, movt. I. The cited C-major element surfaces to the tonal satisfactions normatively obtained (and is nonsustainable) only considerably earlier and with through the usual fth-conventions of major- reference to another theme altogether, at m. 135, Maestoso mode practice. But there is no reason to sup- (the onset of the third rotation of basic materials). Among the obvious questions to be raised are: how can tonal “bal- pose that the situation must be interpreted that ances” occur in radically different parts of a rotational way, nor that the resulting structure is some- layout?; how can recapitulatory, pre-medial-caesura tonal how rendered satisfactory solely on the basis of moves “balance” expositional, post-medial-caesura keys?; why are the specic thematic or textural statements that this hypothetical allusion. In other words, a underpin these “ balances”— and their assigned positions musical conguration may be in some respects within the general layout—utterly irrelevant to these tonal rhetorically balanced while still falling short of generalizations? 7Also instructive is the perhaps related procedure found in basic expectations in other generic areas. And the rst movement of the String Quintet in C, op. 29. that “falling short” might be the larger, more Here the exposition (mm. 1–93), non-normatively, moves troubling point of the composition. Here and from an initial I (C major) to the submediant, VI and vi (A major, A minor). (At this point one might recall Rosen’ s elsewhere, the problem-ridden fth-relation ar- assertion in The Romantic Generation, p. 240: “ One gument alone does not provide an adequate should, I suppose, make basic distinctions among these explanation for what happens in Egmont. In- third relationships: major and minor mediant, atted mediant, submediant, and atted submediant. . . . But deed, invoking it only leads to more conceptual Beethoven employs all of these in similar fashion.” ) The uncertainties. In this piece the rhetorical reca- recapitulation of op. 29, movt. I, presents the corresponding S– C portion (which, like the exposition, includes a eetingly local tonal “escape” to a related at-key shortly into the passage) up a third, in C major-minor-major certain recapitulations were optional features. In other throughout, albeit with expansions and other rhetorical words, when they do appear, they are surely important complications at its end, none of which are directly re- and worthy of our hermeneutic attention, but they seem lated to tonal choice. Thus in this recapitulation, as would not to have responded to what we might imagine to be be the case in Leonore 3, Beethoven provides not the slight- Beethoven’s keen sense “in general” about the acute need est hint of any lower- (or upper-) fth-based balance or to provide such a recapitulatory balance. (Compare also compensation for the unusual S-and-C key in the exposi- the recapi tulatory tonic-treatment of the origina lly tion. One may conclude that within this repertory what submediant secondary theme in the rst movement of the we might regard today as compensatory fth-balances in “Archduke” Piano Trio in B , op. 97.)

132 pitulation, however balanced, is most prot- in the century). Nevertheless, once again, given JAMES HEPOKOSKI ably regarded as nonresolving. the early-nineteenth-century context it would Egmont: Nor is this the place to enter at length into a surely be preferable to suppose that Beethoven Beethoven, quite differing discussion, perhaps occurring to was working most fundamentally within so- Mozart current neo-Riemannian or transformation theo- nata-generic guidelines rmly established by rists, concern ing the degree to which the precedent and resolutely diatonic (and thereby recapitulation’s D within S and C may be seen invoking the tonic/ nontonic binary) in their as something of a workable substitute or proxy expected practice. for the more normative F-minor tonic (and in- Taking the more obvious interpretive course, deed, as a sonority prepared by earlier appear- by regarding the overture as purposefully dis- ances of D major within the overture, as in playing a generically transgressive tonal path, mm. 15–17 of the introduction). Inecting the one of nonresolution, also leads to more re- pitch C of an F-minor triad up a half step to warding hermeneutic observations. The theat- D —one type of 5–6 shift that is sometimes rical implicat ion—sona ta-process as meta- now referred to as the “L” relation for Leitton- phor—could not be clearer. Just as in Goethe’s wechsel—would produce a D triad, which could play, the hero and political martyr, the Flemish be stabilized by being recon gured into root Count Egmont, fell short of the immediate ideal position. In Richard Cohn’s terms, F minor and of liberating the Netherlands from Spain, so D major are thereby hexatonically (and too the sonata-space of Beethoven’s overture “smoothly”) related as “ adjacent harmonies” replicated that lack of success in the purely on a cycle of triads based on voice-leading ef- musical terms of a nonresolving recapitulation. ciency. One could thus envision an argument Similarly, just as Count Egmont’ s impending suggesting that the Overture to Egmont might execution at the end of the play— the sign of be more preoccupied with laying out equiva- his apparent failure within his own sphere of lences within hexatonic elds or cycles rather time and action—was in the long run to be the than relying on a perhaps overly restrictive tonic igniter of utopian consequences (as we learn resolution per se. 8 Such a proposition can hardly from his famous last-moment prison-speech be regarded as irrelevant (even though such foretelling the uprising of the people), so too, claims are typically more fruitful when applied the “ sonata-failure” in the overture’ s reca- to a more chromatically saturated music later pitulatory space functions as the musical precondition for the work’s tonal resolution outside of sonata-space, namely, in the coda. 9 8See, e.g., Richard L. Cohn, “ Maximally Smooth Cycles, And what happens, of course, is well known. Hexatonic Systems, and the Analysis of Late-Romantic Following the rhetorical recapitulation, a short, Triadic Progressions,” Music Analysis 15 (1996), 9– 40; Cohn, “ As Wonderful as Star Clusters: Instruments for S-based in-tempo link (mm. 259– 86) begins a Gazing at Tonality in Schubert,” this journal 22 (1999), dénouement-appendix interpretable as includ- 213–32; and the entire issue of Journal of Music Theory 42 ing a reference to Egmont’s execution (m. 278). 10 (1998), devoted to Neo-Riemannian theory. The transformation-labels “ L” ( Leittonwechsel, or “leading-tone ex- change”), “P” (parallel), and “R” (relative), a development of earlier work by David Lewin, were proposed by Brian 9Compare the similar remarks in Martha Calhoun, “Mu- Hyer, Tonal Intuitions in Tristan und Isolde (Ph.D. Diss., sic as Subversive Text: Beethoven, Goethe and the Over- Yale University, 1989); and presented in a formal publica- ture to Egmont,” Mosaic 20 (1987), 43–56 (esp. pp. 50–51). tion in Hyer, “Reimag(in)ing Riemann,” Journal of Music 10Calhoun, “ Music as Subversive Text,” pp. 50– 51, lays Theory 39 (1995), 101–38. The suggestion of potential tonal out the allusive options: “The break [the rst fermata, m. substitutions and tonal representations “by proxy” (p. 228) 278] could represent Klä rchen’ s death, the quasi-chorale is most clearly anticipated in Cohn, “As Wonderful as Star [mm. 279– 86, leading to the second fermata on V], the Clusters,” e.g., p. 231: “ My thesis [concerning the rst apparition to Egmont of Freedom in the form of Klärchen, movement of Schubert’ s B Piano Sonata, D. 960] . . . is and the Symphony of Victory [mm. 287 ff.], Egmont bravely that ef cient voice leading, emphasizing semitonal dis- mounting the scaffold to die as an example. Or, the [rst] placement, furnishes a context in which to understand break could represent Egmont losing his head; the reli- nineteenth-century triadic progressions that are not ad- gious music intones a eulogy or apotheosis, while the coda equately reconcilable to diatonic tonality. . . . Diatonic celebrates the eventual victory of the Netherlands. While tonality and voice-leading proximity are equivalently sys- the rst interpretation seems more in line with Goethe’s tematic ways of interpreting harmonic relations.” Com- Egmont, the second agrees more closely with what we pare n. 17 below. know of Beethoven’s vision of the play. Still, both play out

133 19TH This link shows us that the recapitulation’s con- fortuitous stand-in for an insufciency of prior CENTURY MUSIC cluding D major was, in the long run, a mere sonata-action. In this historical period such a upper neighbor to V of F (fully secured in mm. situation is never problem free. From an only 285–86, under an expectant fermata), the domi- slightly shifted hermeneutic perspective one nant precondition for real tonal resolution. And might wonder whether a closure-providing coda on that V of F is ushered in the utopian coda does not so much resolve the deferred tonal proper, the Siegessymphonie (Victory Sym- argument as reect on the absence of closure in phony) in F major (mm. 287ff., Allegro con the recapitulatory space. Restated: In resolving brio)—probably triggering a dramatic shift from what was not resolved earlier, such a coda might the local struggles of present time to an ideally serve principally to show us what the preceding projected future—with a rapidly gathering rush sonata form did not accomplish, thus under- from pianissimo to fortissimo. Only here is the scoring the primacy of the more essentia l overture’s initial F minor both resolved and over- recapitulatory nonresolution. Alternatively, a turned in jubilant F-major cadences. rhetorically reinforced resolution within a cli- Thus the self-evident analytical observation: mactic utopian or apotheosis-coda (as in Egmont a nonresolving recapitulation defers closure be- and, in later decades, in the nales of many of yond rhetorical sonata-space into a function- Bruckner’s symphonies) suggests the possibil- ally enhanced coda. Rhetorical structures and ity of a different understanding. Here the reve- tonal structures do not coincide. But this obser- latory claims of such an apotheosis collapse the vation opens the door onto a thicket of related preceding, nonclosed sonata into a mere matrix reections. Confronting the historical state of or disposable delivery system that exists only the genre “sonata form,” for instance—how its to make possible that which is conceptually component spaces emerged historically—means superior, the Klang-telos attained in the coda. confronting the distinction between closure ac- However we interpret it, it is the drastic nature complished inside the rhetorical recapitulation of the rhetorical recapitulation proper that must (always a generically obligatory space within a be confronted as the central issue. sonata, one whose express task was to deliver But in re ecting on the Egmont Overture that closure) and closure deferred to a rhetori- from this point of view, we might ask another cal coda (an optional, not-sonata accretion that question: to what extent is this a sonata move- had arisen to serve a variety of grounding func- ment at all? Everything depends on denitions. tions, though not this one of functional resolu- This is an especially relevant concern if our tion). In terms of its generic history a coda understanding of the form hinges on the sup- existed to interact on its own terms with the posed requirements of tonal practice (while completed essential action of the preceding so- minimizing, say, the norms of thematic pat- nata form—extending, conrming, celebrating, terning). On the face of it, Beethoven’s Egmont reacting, and so on. Although codas were in- falls short of the most basic harmonic feature creasingly placed in provocative juxtapositions of a sonata at that time: a sufcient sense of with the sonata, as rhetorically extra spaces tonal resolution within the recapitulatory space. they were parageneric surpluses not to be mis- Looming in the background of this discussion taken for the essential action itself. are two disputable postulates. The rst is the Such a realization raises the question of mid-twentieth-century insistence that a “so- whether a parageneric zone not historically fash- nata form” — qua genre—is de nable over- ioned to produce essential closure—the coda— whelmingly by harmonic criteria, in the ser- can in fact do the job non-problematically, as a vice of which thematic elements, inappropri- ately emphasized in nineteenth-century discussions of the form, were at best secondary. 11 The death, apotheosis and victory. It is perhaps not possible to argue denitively for one interpretation over another. What is most striking is that at this point in the piece the music does generate extra-musical meanings (even if they cannot 11See, e.g., the inuential article, Leonard G. Ratner, “Har- be proven to represent specic dramatic events) and it is monic Aspects of Classic Form,” Journal of the American this process which invites further reection.” Musicological Society 2 (1949), 159–68; and cf. the useful

134 second is the complementary construction of face of Egmont. Within sonata-space a norma- JAMES HEPOKOSKI the so-called sonata principle, identifying the tive “ sonata” remained unrealized in actual Egmont: one essential tonal thing that, supposedly (by sound and material architecture. On the other Beethoven, modern de nition), all sonatas are normally hand, it also seems clear that Beethoven was Mozart expected to do (tonal resolution of nontonic inviting his listeners to understand what they expositional materials). 12 did hear by ltering it through the expectations Both the harmonic view of sonata form and that they had of sonatas, then observing the the sonata principle provide conveniently adapt- veering away of this recapitulation from those able principles that can smoothly legitimize expectations. Thus within its rhetorical sonata- recapitulatory freedom and seeming coda-reso- space the piece is both a sonata and not a so- lutions of tonally recalcitrant elements. (They nata: it is not a sonata in its literal, material could permit one to assert, for instance, that presentation, and yet Beethoven’ s audience— the key problem in Egmont is no problem at real, implicit, or ideal—was to understand it as all—nothing much to be concerned with—since a sonata insofar as the composer had appar- the piece is eventually brought to tonal closure ently asked them to set it into a dialogue with in the coda.) As I hope to have shown else- a conceptual model not explicitly attained in where, however, when invoked for “unusual” the sounding music. compositions, the often-heard “ sonata-prin- This may seem obvious, but its implications ciple” claims are at best questionable, and they are vast. It suggests, among other things, that are certainly inadequate unless they make in- the category of understanding needed to come terpretive distinctions—as its proponents usu- to terms with a piece of music—for example, ally do not—between closure inside or outside the conceptual category, “sonata”— is different of sonata-space. 13 Regardless of the analytical from what one literally hears as the piece un- system favored, the larger point is this: any folds in real time. More broadly, it suggests analysis of such a work as Beethoven’s Egmont that the concept of “form” is not primarily a Overture that does not problematize such non- property of the printed page or sounding sur- normativity as a prominent feature of its face. Instead, “form” resides more properly in method, as opposed to normalizing it or ex- the composer- and listener-activated process of plaining it away as merely another neutral op- measuring what one hears against what one is tion within a eld of overgenerous exibility, invited to expect. would pass too frictionlessly over its central If so, then the “real form” of any such piece— structural point, its “failed” recapitulation. and indeed, the “real piece” itself— should not The most ef cient appoach to this matter be restricted to the shape of its literally presen- lies in reconguring our conception of what a tational succession of sound-events. Instead, “sonata form” is. Any consideration of histori- the real form exists in that conceptual dialogue cal sonata exemplars and their harmonic norms with implicit generic norms, which exist out- will tell us that a generic sonata was not prop- side of the material surface of the printed page erly articulated on the pre-coda acoustic sur- and its acoustic realization. This means that the construct that we call “ sonata form” is more a set of tools for understanding (a set of discussion of this issue in Mark Evan Bonds, “The Para- enabling and constraining rules for interpreta- dox of Musical Form,” chap. 1 of Wordless Rhetoric: Mu- tion) than it is a bottom-line practice that must sical Form and the Metaphor of the Oration (Cambridge, be minimally satised in the workings of any Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1991), pp. 13– 52. Also relevant, of course, is Heinrich Schenker, Der Freie Satz given piece before we grant that piece, for what- [1935], trans. Ernst Oster as Free Composition (New York, ever purpose, the label of “sonata.” Judgments Longman, 1979), I, 133. The issue is also explored histori- concerning form, therefore, are incomplete if cally in my “Beyond the Sonata Principle” (n. 1 above). 12Here the standard citation is Edward T. Cone, Musical they are conned only to a description of “the Form and Musical Performance (New York: W. W. Norton, music itself.” Rather, such judgments must ex- 1968), pp. 76–77. The sonata principle has been recast in a tend to the music’s dialogical embeddedness in number of differing formulations. See Hepokoski, “Beyond the Sonata Principle.” a web of cultural and generic expectations. 13Hepokoski, “Beyond the Sonata Principle.” The practical challenge for the analyst is

135 19TH twofold: rst, to recognize in which situations problematic, sonata-related structure in E ma- CENTURY MUSIC it is reasonable to suppose that we are being jor (major VI of the trio’s G major). Before deal- invited by the composer to use the “ sonata ing with its recapitulation we will have to look perspective” to process what we do hear in the at its exposition. presentational succession; and second, to have The primary theme (P) sets out as a norma- grasped as fully as possible what the enormously tive, if slightly expanded, sentence in E major manifold generic options of the processing-con- and projects something of a leisurely, major- cept, “ sonata form,” actually were in, say, mode dream-idyll (ex. 3). 16 In m. 9 the repeti- Beethoven’s Vienna in the decades around tion of the rst theme initiates a transition of 1800—they should not be articulated too re- the “ dissolving-restatement” type (one of strictively. In part to acknowledge these issues, around a dozen standard strategies) and pro- I refer to the Egmont Overture not as a “so- ceeds through a generically typical series of nata” but as a “sonata deformation”— that is, a events: a modulation to V—though anticipated work whose succession of events contravenes here in a premonitory B minor (not B major)— certain essential generic markers of sonata form the securing in m. 18 of the new structural- (recapitulatory tonal resolution is one) but dominant lock (V of B minor), and the move to which nonetheless asks us to use sonata norms a more or less conventional medial caesura in to interpret what actually does happen in that m. 23 (ex. 4), completing a much-extended half- individual utterance. 14 cadence in the dominant minor, stretched out and bridged over with two measures of major- A Beethovenian Precedent? mode caesura- ll, mm. 24– 25. The secondary Op. 1, No. 2, Movt. II. theme begins in m. 26—normatively, in B major (V), though over an ominously pulsating We might wish to know whether Egmont was dominant, F , as if unable to shake loose the the earliest example of the nonresolving reca- dominant-lock of the preceding measures. We pitulation—for at this time anything even re- recall that a secondary theme’s generic goal is motely like this sort of tonal pattern was a to secure a perfect authentic cadence in the key most exceptional procedure. So far as I have of the dominant— to produce the point of es- been able to locate, there are one or two curi- sential expositional closure (the EEC), the rst ous antecedents to it in Beethoven’ s earlier satisfactory perfect authentic cadence in the work, and even an example or two in Mozart’s subordinate key (in major-mode works before work, although each earlier case presents us 1800, almost invariably V). But what happens with further complications and more challeng- here on the way to this generically obligatory ing subtypes of the genre. One early instance of B-major perfect authentic cadence is extremely what might be regarded as a forerunner of such unusual—almost unprecedented—in histori- a “failed recapitulation”— though there are cer- cally signicant compositions prior to this one. tain ambiguities within it—occurs in the slow The surprising aspect of this secondary theme movement of Beethoven’s Piano Trio in G, op. is that it ends not with a cadence in B major, 1, no. 2, composed in 1793–94 and published in the dominant, as promised, but with a cadence 1795.15 The slow movement unfolds as a deeply

gio of the Piano Sonata in C, op. 2, no. 3 (whose deformational “ exposition” also moves to G major) and 14I have discussed the principle and implications of sonata the E-major Largo of the Piano Concerto No. 3 in C Mi- deformations at greater length in Sibelius: Symphony No. nor, op. 37. 5, and especially in “Beethoven Reception: The Symphonic 16Measures 1– 9 of op. 1, no. 2, movt. II, were used as a Tradition,” chap. 15 of The Cambridge History of Nine- paradigm of a sentence with expanded cadential function teenth-Century Music, ed. Jim Samson (Cambridge: Cam- by William E. Caplin, Classical Form: A Theory of Formal bridge University Press, 2002), pp. 424–59. See also Darcy, Functions for the Instrumental Music of Haydn, Mozart, “Bruckner’s Sonata Deformations” (n. 2 above). and Beethoven (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998), 15Related movements— all three are most pro tably con- pp. 46 [ex. 3.16a], 47: “ The extra measure of this nine- sidered together, as differing realizations of somewhat simi- measure theme is created by a small expansion of the larly posed problem s (although not uniform ly with cadential progression [mm. 8–9 with upbeat]. (Schoenberg nonresolving recapitulations)— include the E-major Ada- speaks of similar situations as a ‘written-out ritardando.’)”

136 1 Largo con espressione JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

Largo con espressione

Example 3: Beethoven, Piano Trio in G Major, op. 1, no. 2, movt. II, mm. 1–10. in a strange, almost “false” place, G major ( III, nant has been lost forever. (In fact, that B major mm. 39, 40). The secondary theme’ s anteced- never existed as a concretized reality, only— ent phrase, mm. 26– 31, with its uncannily over its dominant— as a promise.) Instead, in levitational opening, prolongs V of B major (sus- m. 34, using f and d as common tones for a taining the dominant of the preceding medial new dominant-seventh chord, one nds a will- caesura, holding it open). One expects the par- ful, fortissimo push and diminuendo into G allel consequent to bring this situation to B- major ( III of E, VI of B minor). As if pretending major closure. In m. 32 the consequent sets out that this is not “ a place where one doesn’ t to do so, still over the persistent dominant, but belong,” the dynamics are reduced to the com- in the next measure, m. 33, B major decays placent piano in m. 35. Thus a “false security” 6 unexpectedly to B minor (the 4 position over is restored in III.17 Surely not coincidentally the dominant, recalling the B minor of the preceding transition). This sets off an expressive and structural alarm: the threat of the loss of 17As before (n. 8 and the discussion in the text to which it the major mode at the point of essential exposi- refers), one can envision a neo-Riemannian response to a tional closure, the EEC, and with it, the dis- situation in which an ongoing B major that “ought” to be stable successively shifts two chromatic semitones (D be- solving of the seemingly secure, major-mode comes D ; F becomes G) to become transformed into G dream-idyll announced at the movement’s out- major—one species of chromatic 5–6 shift in which the second element, G major, is locally prepared by its own set. (An EEC in a nongeneric minor v would 6 V5. Here the speculative question is whether in the mid- signify a strong reversal of expectations.) 1790s such a shift between what Cohn has recently called The expressive point of what follows is clear. “modally matched harmonies [or ‘ next-adjacencies’]. . . The intrusive B minor (minor v), the sign of [involving] dual semitonal displacements in contrary motion” (in this case, within what he identied as the “West- modal collapse, threatens something profoundly ern” hexatonic cycle, which includes the B and G triads— disturbing. In m. 34 the narrativ e subject “As Wonderful as Star Clusters,” pp. 217, 216) is to be counters defensively by wresting back the ma- interpreted as establishing a relatedness between the two sonorities to the point where one may act as an effective jor mode. But not B major: once decayed away, “proxy” for the other. As I have suggested above, one may the generic assurance of the normative domi- certainly consider such questions to be both germane to

137 19TH 22 CENTURY MUSIC

espress.

Example 4: Beethoven, Piano Trio in G Major, op. 1, no. 2, movt. II, mm. 22–48.

the situation at hand and provocative in their implications the more central concept of a tonally non-normative expo- (e.g., what might the nature and expressive function of sition, which will eventually result in the nonresolving such a representation by proxy be?) without abandoning recapitulation to come.

138 37 JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

Example 4 ( continued)

this would seem simultaneously to suggest an Is this the end of the exposition? This turns in extremis appeal to the G-major governing out to be a crucial question, and the answer is tonic of the outer movements and the trio as a anything but clear. Notice that the recapitula- whole. However we might choose to under- tion begins only seven measures later, in m. 47. stand it, the rhetorical module is brought to an From one perspective, in m. 40 one might wish expanded cadential progression that in m. 40 to regard the elided recalling of the primary closes non-normatively in G major. (Measure theme in the cello as the beginning of an expo- 40 is the rhetorical equivalent of the point of sitional closing zone: closing themes that in- essential expositional closure, the EEC, mo- voke primary themes are anything but rare. But mentarily ignoring the crisis of the “ wrong if so, the allusion is eeting. Within a measure key.”) the thematic continuity decays into a waste-

139 19TH land of successive diminished sevenths that, at E-major closure (essential structural closure, CENTURY MUSIC best, suggest the almost immediate inability of the ESC). Analogously with the exposition, in these measures to function as a normative clos- m. 74 we nd a disintegration of mode into E ing zone. Two interpretive possibilities remain minor. Within the slow movement as a whole, open here, and either conclusion may be justi- this inability to sustain the tonic major in the ed. The rst is that mm. 40– 47, at least in now all-important pre-ESC region confronts us retrospect, may be considered entirely as a with an image of the unfaceable—the negative retransitional link, registering the misfortune inverse of the idyllic E-major tonic, the perhaps of the exposition and pushing fatalistically for- permanent loss of the E-major wholeness pos- ward, with thematic anticipation, to the head- ited (or hoped for?) at the movement’s opening. motive of Rotation 2, the recapitulation, in m. At least for the next measure or two the trans- 47. (On this understand ing, the exposition positional parallels with the exposition con- would end with the secondary theme’s cadence tinue, and we nd the corresponding quick- in m. 40, which is then immediately elided escape, the fortissimo and diminuendo com- with the retransition.) The second interpreta- mon-tone push onto C major in mm. 75–76. tion is that m. 40 starts out as something seek- Were the secondary theme deployed in a man- ing to be a closing zone but—doubtless in reac- ner fully parallel with that of the exposition, it tion to the expositional events—dissolves al- would now conclude in this “ false-major,” C most instantly into retransition. This leaves major ( VI of E). This would grasp at the recapitu- the exact nal point of “exposition” open. Per- latory straws of a “sham” or “ self-deceptive” haps that sense of futility and indecision is part nontonic major mode, but one that at least of its expressive point. For our purposes the fullls a recognizably generic role of a balanced central thing is that the last cadence of the fth-relation to the G major at the end of the exposition, the EEC-substitute in m. 40, oc- exposition’s secondary theme, although in a curred in III, G major, the “wrong key.” The larger, more trenchant sense remaining non- exposition has veered off-course. How will all resolving with regard to the governing tonic of this be revisited in the recapitulation? this Largo con espressione as a whole. But in As a rule, a recapitulation’s generic task is to perhaps the most telling gesture of the move- secure the point of essential structural closure ment, Beethoven proceeds to demonstrate the (the ESC), the secondary theme’s attainment of non-sustainability of this “false-hope” CÊ major a perfect authentic cadence in the tonic and, in by falling away from the pattern of direct trans- Schenkerian terms, the rst successful comple- position from the exposition. Unexpectedly, C tion of the recapitulation’s linear descent that major itself decays by slumping to its sub- may coincide with the long-range 3–^ ^2–1^ Urlinie mediant, A minor, in mm. 78– 79, in which motion in the upper voice of the Ursatz. Will key, in m. 82, the secondary theme is brought the harmonic twist in the secondary theme be to its close in ashen dissolution: A minor (mi- straightened out? If so, how? We now need to nor iv of the original E major!). consider the recapitulation at the crucial mo- We have reached a crucial point in the piece. ment, the beginning of the secondary theme, If we had concluded earlier that the parallel m. 67, which begins hopefully, in the tonic, E moment in the exposition was in fact the end major, though, as had been the case in the of the exposition, then we have—following the exposition, over a pulsating dominant (ex. 5). norm of symmetrically rotational recapitula- Predicated on sonata norms, the musical ex- tions—reached the end of the rhetorical reca- perience unfolded here is that of once-shining pitulation. In short, we would be confronted hopes collapsing into ruins. Seeking stability with a nonresolving recapitulation, ending in and closure in E major, the secondary theme the extraordinary, “ lost” place of the minor “fails” in its generic mission—even more dras- subdominant. Is what follows, mm. 82–90 and tically than had been foretold in the exposi- its varied restatement in 90–100, both of which tion, because the modulatory scheme now nally reinstate EÊmajor with a perfect authen- sprouts a nal, negative element. In m. 73 this tic cadence, a newly “ expanded” or billowed theme’s parallel consequent sets out—seeking out part of the recapitulation? In musical terms,

140 65 JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

espressivo

Example 5: Beethoven, Piano Trio in G Major, op. 1, no. 2, movt. II, mm. 65–90.

141 19TH 80 CENTURY MUSIC

smorz.

Example 5 ( continued)

it begins by ruminating bleakly on the nontonic, space? Or is this the onset of a corrective coda, minor-mode void (mm. 82–85)— on the shatter- à la Egmont?18 This is a difcult question, and ing of the dream-idyll—but eventually ends by restoring E major (or pretending to restore it, ^ ^ ^ 18Some readers might initially consider also, however m. 89) and nally closing the requisite 3–2–1 briey, the merits of a third interpretation, namely whether linear descent completing the Urlinie. this movement might be grasped under the paradigm of But, again, are mm. 82–90 and then the var- the sonata-rondo. The relevant model here would be the pattern sometimes described as ABAB’A + coda, although ied restatement in 90–100 to be understood as in such manifestly sonata-oriented cases as these it is more existing within rhetorical recapitulatory space? accurately laid out as: exposition—recapitulation— return Do they constitute a recapitulatory extension of primary theme (P)—coda. As always, everything depends on the range and clarity of one’ s denitions, but in the of that which had been smothered off, not al- present situation the sonata-rondo reading seems the least lowed to ourish, in the exposition’ s closing- desirable of the available interpretive options. The sonata-

142 substantial cases may be made both for and regrasping of the texture at m. 40: this would JAMES HEPOKOSKI against either view. It is true, for example, that argue that m. 82 initiates the onset of a new Egmont: the secondary-theme cadence at m. 82 is elided referential rotation, an unusually large coda- Beethoven, with an A-minor invocation of the primary rotation (in this case, what I call an example of Mozart theme’s head motive, one, moreover, that pro- a “discursive coda”) whose task, in part, is to ceeds at once to exploit diminished-seventh ruminate on what did not happen in sonata- sonorities—events that had also occurred at the space by correcting and setting to rights (“out- parallel point after the EEC-substitute in m. 40. side of the essential action” ) what the sonata On the other hand, the texture at m. 82 (piano itself had failed to accomplish. Still, there is no alone) is more suggestive of a recapturing of the denying its equally telling relationships with opening measures of the piece rather than a ideas planted in mm. 40–47, which may suggest that mm. 82– 100 could be understood, albeit with a degree of conceptual overextension, as in rondo subtype in question represents an intermixture be- part accomplishing some kind of deformational, tween the rondo principle and the so-called sonatina (or corrective recapitulatory function. sonata-without-development—which we call the “Type 1 Readers might want to consider this ambi- Sonata” in the Elements of Sonata Theory ). (In our view, an example of such a mixture is found in the second move- guity in more detail on their own, but the main ment of Mozart’ s Symphony No. 39 in E , K. 543.) It is point is this: at the very least, we have a clear, however, that this kind of sonata-rondo mixture is nonresolving secondary theme, substantially similar to another formal possibility: the sonatina (Type 1 Sonata) with extended, P-based coda. In the Elements of alienated from tonal resolution in the recapitu- Sonata Theory, these nearly identical formats are distin- lation—thus foreshadowing what would hap- guished by such factors as: (1) the presence in the sonata- pen in Egmont—and if we choose to regard the rondo of a clear, separate retransition-link (RT) between the end of the recapitulation and the restatement of the symmetrical m. 82 as the close of at least the rondo “refrain” that follows (as opposed, for instance, to a rhetorical recapitulation (measuring its expanse simple elision of the one into the other); (2) the seeming against that of expositional space), then we rondo-character, or lack of it, of the P-theme; and (3) the degree to which the thematic integrity of the (tonic- would also have an unequivocal nonresolving grounded) P is maintained in the nal statement of it after recapitulation. However one might choose to the recapitulation (more deviations from the original model understand it, this is a tonally anguished struc- suggest a coda, not a rondo refrain). Instructive along these lines— and clarifying with re- ture. My own suspicion is that its expressive gard to the present op. 1, no. 2, movt. II situation—is the point is not to ask us for a quick-and-easy ana- A -major second movement (Adagio molto) of Beethoven’s lytical solution but to invite us to experience Piano Sonata in C Minor, op. 10, no. 2, which presents some of the same issues without the “nonresolving” com- the difculty of decision, the strain of the pro- plications of the Trio movement. Lacking an RT between cess of structural deformation and secondary- the end of the recapitulation and the onset of P (m. 91)— theme “failure.” and presenting that P in an incomplete, “ decaying,” and much-varied form (mm. 91– 102)— this movement is best Beyond all this, there are still larger considered a Type 1 Sonata (sonatina) with discursive coda hermeneutic questio ns to ponder. Broadly (mm. 91–112), not a sonata-rondo. (Within this paradigm, speaking, one might wish to regard the eigh- “discursive codas” — or lengthy, multisection al codas, which can appear in conjunction with any sonata type and teenth-century sonata as the abstract, meta- often begin with P-based material— often also feature a phorical representation of a successfully car- “coda-to-the-coda” effect at the end.) The fuller rationale ried-out, symmetrically disposed human action and argumentation behind these assessments (along with a few more nuances) are provided in Elements of Sonata (albeit one whose specic details are Theory. In any event, within the second movement of the underdetermined). Within the metaphor, that Trio, op. 1, no. 2, the potential candidate for any supposed action includes such central components as the nal, post-recapitulation rondo-statement, m. 82, is begun off-tonic (A minor), is unprepared by any retransition (it is essential sonata trajectory, the long-range, suc- elided directly with the nal chord of the recapitulation), cessful bringing-into-being of full tonic pres- and is subject to extreme decay and variation from the ence within sonata-space—perhaps a represen- original P-idea. For these reasons it is not helpful to regard mm. 82– 107 as participating principally in a broader so- tation of a now-enhanced self-ident ity—by nata-rondo structure. (In other words, there is a simpler means of authentic-cadential resolution at the explanation of the form to be found other than that result- recapitulatory point of the ESC (linear and ing from a primary appeal to the sonata-rondo concept— which in any case does not affect the central “nonresolving” cadential tonic resolution at the end of the argument presented above.) secondary theme). Only at this point, norma-

143 19TH tively, is the tonic marked as lastingly stabi- that one might momentarily question whether CENTURY MUSIC lized, made permanent, brought into a full on- it is best regarded as a sonata movement, and tological presence. 19 Within this conception of yet its rst-movement position, along with its the genre, any nonresolving recapitulation con- unmistakable repeat-scheme, decla res un- veys the unfolding of an unusually disruptive equivocally that we are to understand the events expressive situation. of this piece through the expectations that we The result suggests a number of interpreta- have of more “ normal” rst movements. As tions. The most conventional line of under- always, before thinking about the recapitula- standing would probably center on the private, tion, we need to look at its exposition, which is emotional turbulence of the individual experi- shot through with unmistakable topoi of mi- ence being represented, its subjectivity and im- nor-mode sorrow (ex. 6). pression of Innerlichkeit . But if one prefers, A quick inventory of potential precedents one may extend the metaphor. It would be an conrms the obvious—that this was a purpose- easy move, for example, to suggest (in classic fully deviant movement. Prior to K. 173 Mozart Adornian fashion) that elements of social cri- had written around a dozen and a half minor- tique are inscribed within the processes of such mode sonata (or instrumental “binary”) move- music. If the generic aspect of form is its social ments. Of the seventeen that I consulted (al- aspect, as Adorno argued—or alternatively, as beit with no claims to completeness), includ- New Historicists and others would claim, if ing a few from roughly the same time as K. that generic aspect is construed as a telling 173, all divided their expositions into two tonal mode of cultural, even ideological representa- planes, and all of the expositions were tonally tion—then the staging of a demonstration of normative. (Fourteen of them move to what I the insufciency of that socially grounded form call the rst-level-default, the major mediant, could underscore the arbitrariness and histori- for the second key, three to the second-level- cal contingency of this cultural practice, rather default, the minor dominant.20) But in this D- than its “timeless” perfection.

Mozart’s K. 173, Movt. I: 20“First-level default,” in this context, connotes “the most standard thing to do” in such a minor-mode piece— the A Representation of Extreme Distraction? most common, almost pre-assumed compositional “ option” that would have to be consciously overridden in Before proceeding further with the model and order to proceed to the next to most common available option, the “second-level default.” (The terminology is ex- its subtypes, we might ask whether Beethoven plored further in Elements of Sonata Theory .) In the present was the rst to articulate it. Apparently not, discussion the central point, of course—which is hardly a although it seems to have been rare, virtually surprise—is that the young Mozart had produced numerous fully “ normal” minor-mode sonata movements prior nonexistent, prior to Beethoven’s Piano Trio of to or around the time of K. 173, movt. I. Setting aside the 1793–94. One curious predecessor is the rst four minor-mode “ binary” (nearly “ sonata”) movements movement of Mozart’s String Quartet in D Mi- from the London Sketchbook collection of 1764—all four of which, in any case, make the standard move from i to nor, K. 173, written in Vienna in September III in their rst halves (K. 15 p, 15r, 15u, 15z)—we may 1773. (It is conceivable that young Beethoven note that at least ve fast movements proceeded from an could have known it: Artaria published the rst initial i to III in their expositions: the two outer movements of the Overture to Betulia liberata, K. 118 (74c); the two movements, rounded off with a nale from G-minor second movement (Allegro) of the Quartet in B , an earlier work, in 1792, a year after Mozart’s K. 159; and the two outer movements of the Symphony death. In other words, Artaria published the No. 25 in G Minor, K. 183. At least nine slow movements also moved from i to III, and they are from: the Violin early Mozart quartet three years before it pub- [Flute] and Cello Sonata (also printed as a Violin Sonata) in lished the Beethoven Trio.) This quartet move- F, K. 13; the Symphony No. 1 in E , K. 16; the Symphony ment from K. 173 could hardly be more strange. No. 5 in B , K. 22; the Violin Sonata in E , K. 26; the Cassation in B , K. 99 (63a); the Symphony in C, K. 96 Indeed, its tonal oddity is so non-normative (111b); the Quartet in G, K. 156; the Quartet in C, K. 157; and the Symphony No. 26 in E , K. 184 (166a). The “second-level-default” expositional shift from i to the more “negative” v was less common. It occurs in three slow 19This proposition about tonic presence is elaborated in movements, from: the Piano Concerto in G, K. 41; the chap. 11 of the Elements of Sonata Theory . Quartet in F, K. 168; and the Quartet in E , K. 171.

144 1 Allegro ma molto moderato JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

Example 6: Mozart, String Quartet in D Minor, K. 173, movt. I (exposition), mm. 1–45.

145 19TH 24 CENTURY MUSIC

Example 6 ( continued)

146 minor quartet movement things are different. the unusual rst movement of Haydn’s Quar- JAMES HEPOKOSKI Here the central points of cadential arrival are tet in G Minor, op. 20, no. 3, as an obvious Egmont: split among three nontonic keys: mm. 18, 22, tonal model for K. 173, movt. I, the former’ s Beethoven, and 24, A minor, minor v (an acceptable, if less erratic character, overstuffed with non sequi- Mozart frequent expositional option in the 1770s); m. turs and “wrong” tonal moves, may have pro- 33, E minor, minor ii (now losing sight of any vided something by way of a general sugges- norm); and m. 42, G minor, the virtually “im- tion.22) possible” minor iv (completing the expositional Coming to terms with the exposition of K. rhetorical layout proper before initiating a 173, movt. I, requires a knowledge of the nu- retransition, mm. 43–45). In sum, the custom- merous differing exposition types of the eigh- ary division of the exposition into two tonal teenth century and the manner in which they zones has been multiplied into four (i, v, ii, and might be subjected to internal deformations. iv—all minor keys, note), the last two of which Here Mozart seems to have produced music in are counter-generic. dialogue with what I have elsewhere called the What are we to make of this amboyant “second type” of continuous exposition. (Less deformation of expositional norms from the common than the “ two-part” exposition, a young composer? Assuming that it was intended “continuous” exposition lacks a properly ar- to make sense at all—as opposed to being merely ticulated medial caesura and hence lacks a “sec- a carnivalesque display of cheeky nonconfor- ondary theme” proper, even though a closing mity or, perhaps, a heavy-handed structural theme might be provided.) Very brie y— and ironizing of a stereotypical expression of mel- passing over the oddly asymmetrical, four- + ancholy—we might propose that at the very ve-measure openin g modules, which a re least the musical tale told is that of an ex- doubtless relevant— one could take m. 18, ef- pected structural course losing its directional fectively standing for a premature perfect au- sense and straying into “lost” tonal territory. thentic cadence in minor v, as a somewhat As listeners, we become witnesses to its ge- reckless veering into the closure of a potential neric trajectory undermined through lament- EEC “too soon” (and possibly “too negatively”) ing circle-of-fth descents and an unpleasantly in the composition. (Metaphorically, this is the peremptory, quasi-mechanic al cadential for- driving of the music into a cadential ditch.) mula ratifying the wrong keys at the wrong Such a procedure is characteristic of the second places. The affective image associated with such type of continuous exposition, and the normal musical behavior— especially in a minor-key strategy associated with it is immediately and work—would be that of a lamenting grief or repeatedly to undo the EEC- (closure-) effect of looming threat so uncontrollably powerful that the early cadence by “backing up” to provide it overows or shatters the very Enlightenment multiple, varied reiterations of the cadential vessel that had been devised to contain and module, as if again and again to defer the clo- direct it in socially acceptable ways—the tradi- sure-effect of the cadence until one has arrived tional pattern of expositional norms. We may even be confronting a representation of extreme distraction or a self-consuming melancholy tip- ping into madness. 21 (While one cannot claim rounding melancholia. Frequently associated with this sad- ness of temperament were such features as a studious frame of mind, extreme mental acuity and memory, a high de- 21For this suggestion I am indebted to the more general gree of self-absorption (though occasionally leading to ap- discussion of eighteenth-century conceptions of melancholy parent surface disorder), and occasionally a labyrinthine provided by Elaine Sisman in “C. P. E. Bach, Beethoven, convolution of thought process. Many eighteenth-century and the Labyrinth of Melancholy,” delivered at the Ameri- writers took pains to distinguish it from the extreme of can Musicological Society, Toronto, 2 November 2000; an genuine madness (typically understood as more raving or expanded version was presented at Yale University, 29 violent), but from time to time, as Sisman mentions, room November 2000. (I am grateful to Professor Sisman for was permitted for melancholy to slide into such states as providing me with a copy of this paper.) Sisman related a “melancholy madness.” number of minor-mode works or sections thereof— nor- 22I have provided a discussion of op. 20, no. 3, movt. I, in mally in slow tempo—to the contemporary discourse sur- “Beyond the Sonata Principle.”

147 19TH at a properly proportional spot within the expo- reading, the deformation of closing-theme space, CENTURY 23 MUSIC sition. mm. 33–42, ends through yet another reactiva- This line of argument understands m. 19 as tion of the hammer-cadence gure, now clos- a dgety, reactive reopening of the seeming ing in m. 42 on the “ impossible” G minor, closure of the A-minor cadence. It initiates an minor iv. Another reading might propose, implied question-and-answer dialogue between though, that the return to the unshakable individual modules, perhaps something like, cadential motive in mm. 41–42 undoes the pos- “Surely you didn’t intend to close down this sible earlier EEC-effect at m. 33. Such a view quickly in minor v?”, followed by the emphatic would entail the postponing of what is per- “Indeed I did!” of the forte reconrmation in ceived to be deformational closure to m. 42 mm. 23–24. It may be that the similarly appre- (which would also cancel out the only appar- hensive, questioning reactions in m. 25 (the ently “ closing” character of mm. 33 ff). More anxious uttering-about, piano, through the important than making any unequivocal ana- descending circle of fths) keep the cadential lytical decision here, though, is the perception space open by refusing to leave the main idea of the strain and deformational ambiguity to at hand. But this time, mm. 25–31, the passage which Mozart has submitted his materials. destabilizes tonally and veers toward E minor, Obviously, the presence of such a “failed” which is con rmed with another declarative exposition does not augur well for a tonally statement of the resolute hammer-cadence at successful recapitulation—which begins in m. m. 33: we have now lost our way. 65. The recapitulation starts to differ from the Now abandoning the utter-reactions of mm. exposition two beats before m. 77 (the norma- 19 and 25, m. 33 returns to the original pri- tive pre-crux recomposition), and at m. 80 we mary-theme incipit (carried out in canon with arrive at the crux, the point at which the reca- the cello). Even though this music reinvokes pitulation becomes by and large a transposition segments of the descending circle of fths, this of the exposition, down a fth. 25 Thus, while return to a variant of the rst theme is a famil- noting the occasional variant here or there (es- iar strategy of Mozartean closing-theme space, pecially in the rst few measures), we may and it is probably best understood as a last- regard mm. 80–112 as revisiting mm. 10–42 a minute effort to “normalize” at least some as- fth lower (our familiar fth-transposition, dis- pect of this eccentric exposition. 24 (Should we cussed earlier). As a result we need not provide interpret m. 33 as a closing theme, we would its music in a separate example. The D-minor be obliged to claim that the effective EEC—the perfect authentic cadence at m. 88 replicates sine qua non before closing-space may be con- down a fth the parallel, A-minor moment of sidered as having begun—had been sounded in the exposition (m. 18), but since this is a tonic E minor, ii, at m. 33. But by now the tonal cadence it also threatens the possibility of an course of the music has come totally unhitched unacceptably early essential structural closure from normative practice. This accounts, one (ESC), a threat reiterated in mm. 92 (cf. m. 22) supposes, for the representation of multiplying and 94 (cf. m. 24). As if to ee that premature laments through canonic treatment.) On this closure, the phrase beginning in m. 95 (cf. m. 25) moves the recapitulation from the existing tonic, D minor, to a new tonic a fourth lower, 23This type is dealt with in much more detail— with ex- A minor, in m. 103 (cf. the E minor m. 33): here amples—in Hepokoski and Darcy, Elements of Sonata the recapitulation detaches from its tonic-key Theory, chap. 4. (It is also mentioned in Hepokoski and Darcy, “The Medial Caesura and Its Role,” p. 119.) I might moorings. The deformational conclusion, start- only mention that two more normative examples may be ing in m. 103, brings the A minor up a third to found in the rst movement of Mozart’s Quartet in B , K. C minor (m. 112; cf. the G minor m. 42), clos- 458 (“ Hunt,” with multiple “ stuttering” cadences— and hence no secondary theme proper—in mm. 54, 60, 66, and 69, along with an effective EEC at m. 77, and a closing theme beginning at m. 78), and Haydn’s Symphony No. 88 in G. Compare n. 4 above. 25The term “ crux” is taken from Ralph Kirkpatric k, 24Characteristic C-types and their implications are dis- Domenico Scarlatti (Princeton: Princeton University Press, cussed in the Elements of Sonata Theory, chap. 9. 1953), pp. 253–61.

148 ing the rhetorical recapitulation on the “ im- “errant” exposition led inexorably, though the JAMES HEPOKOSKI possible,” “ lost” key of vii. The recapitulatory mechanisms of normative transposition, to a Egmont: space thus touches on three tonal planes, mi- “failed” recapitulation (although in the Beethoven, nor i, v, and vii. A retransition follows (m. Beethoven movement an extra, non-transposi- Mozart 113)—along with a repetition of the whole de- tional twist was added at the end). In both velopment and rhetorical recapitulation— and movements a counter-generic exposition was the negative tonic is attained and stabilized predictive of a nonresolving recapitulation. only in the coda (see ex. 7). This is not always the case: sometimes a ton- One might initially be tempted to hear the ally problematic exposition can be rehabilitated foregrounded cadence effect at m. 119 as a mo- by corrective action taken within the recapitu- ment of D-minor closure. But it is preferable, lation. In the Andantino slow movement of in my view, to unders tand the prece ding Mozart’s Piano Concerto in E , K. 449 (“No. 14,” retransition (mm. 113–17) as ending with a half from 1784), the unusual exposition proceeds in cadence in D minor (m. 117) followed by two a manner that somewh at foreshadows the measures of caesura-ll, albeit on the frustrat- Beethoven Trio. 26 In this B -Major Sonata move- ing cadential gure. In the two measures pre- ment the exposition’s second theme begins in ceding m. 119 the cadential module is stripped the proper key, F major (V, m. 41), but through a back to a single instrument (it is not sounded series of harmonic upheavals fails to cadence in in its usual all’unisono version in either three the normative F major and pushes instead to a or all four parts), it is sounded piano, not forte, perfect authentic cadence in the key of A ma- and the strength of its cadence effect is in part jor (locally, III; reckoned from the governing undercut by elision with the relaunch of the tonic, VII of B ) to conclude the exposition. rst-theme incipit. In context this cadence ef- (Thus: major I— “collapsing” V— and close in fect, far from closing what has just occurred, major VII.27) In the recapitulation, however (be- launches something new. The corrective coda ginning in m. 80), Mozart interpolates a correc- (mm. 119–36), an appendix existing outside of tive circle-of- fths passage within the second sonata-space, nally brings about (or re ects theme—something of a “magic passage” (mm. on) the resolution that the sonata proper was 103–06)— that deliciously subverts the mechani- not permitted to accomplish. Satisfactory per- cal transposition and makes possible the perfect-authentic-cadence closure in the tonic is fect authentic cadence—the ESC—in the proper produced only in m. 132, pianissimo. It is sub- tonic, B major (m. 116). Here the generic prin- sequently conrmed with two more grim, forte ciple of formal containment trumps the pre- reiterations, all’unisono, of the nightmarish dicted threat of a nonresolving recapitulation. cadential module that had so seized the whole But the reverse can also occur. Although in- piece (mm. 133–34, 135–36). At the end an omi- stances of these things are scarce in the de- nous fermata prolongs the silence—the void— cades around 1800, it was possible for a tonally into which this movement has nally been normative exposition to become tonally derailed thrown. in the recapitulation. In such cases, a non-prob- When confronting such a work by the young lematic exposition nds its negative reection Mozart from 1773, one should surely be cau- tious about advancing any grand hermeneutic claims. In this rudimentary instance it is any- 26Compare also the analysis of K. 449, movt. II, in Carl thing but clear whether the seventeen-year-old Schachter, “ Idiosyncratic Features of Three Mozart Slow Movements: The Piano Concertos K. 449, K. 453, and K. was merely toying with received ideas— ma- 467,” in Mozart’s Piano Concertos: Text, Context, Inter- nipulating short-winded, formulaic gestures in pretation, ed. Neal Zaslaw (Ann Arbor: University of Michi- ways that are momentarily curious—or whether gan Press, 1996), pp. 315–33. 27As before, of course, the issue of one key substituting for he genuinely meant something more disturb- another (that has proven “unable” to sustain itself for one ing. The slow movement of the Beethoven Trio reason or another) invites speculation about theoretical from 1793–94, on the other hand, may strike us matters of chordal and tonal transformation—although in this case the matters are not directly related to the con- as more trenchant, more expressively engaged cept of closed groups of hexatonic cycles “based on voice- in troubling ways. In both of these cases, an leading efciency.” Compare nn. 8 and 17 above.

149 19TH 106 CENTURY MUSIC

113

119

126

Example 7: Mozart, String Quartet in D Minor, K. 173, movt. I (conclusion), mm. 106–36.

150 132 JAMES HEPOKOSKI Egmont: Beethoven, Mozart

Example 7 ( continued)

in an unforeseen, nonresolving recapitulation— the major mediant in their expositions—or later, the tonal crisis intervenes late in the sonata, with Beetho ven and othe rs, to the major not in its exposition. The locus classicus, and submediant or other major-mode key. In other the model that doubtless ratied once and for words, these are sonatas marked by a minor- all the category of “failed recapitulation” in major contrast between the two planes of their the minds of later composers, was Beethoven’s expositions: the dark or “negative” minor-mode Egmont Overture. opening brightens into a more “ positive” nontonic major in the second half. One point of What Counts as a Nonresolution? the expositional nontonic major (normally sup- Differing Strengths of porting S and C) is to carry the possibility, “Failed” Recapitulations though not the necessity, of being recapitulated in the tonic major. In this case the sonata By way of a conclusion I might point toward form as a whole will have proceeded from a some nuances within the larger concept at hand, minor-mode opening to a major-mode close. 28 since we have been dealing only with the most (Such a possibility is more remote, although extreme examples of it, those whose rhetorical not unthinkable, within sonata forms whose recapitulations end in the “wrong key.” In fact, expositions move to the minor dominant, the obviously parallel structural procedures can be “second-level default” key-choice for S and C.) encountered in less tonally extravagant strains. In the category of “failure” under consideration, It might help to round out the discussion by this expositional contrast—dark to light— is acknowledging, in very general terms, three undone by the minor-minor uniformity of the broad, related categories of sonatas that fall recapitulation. Here the originally major-mode short of fullling their generic missions in S and C return in minor-mode transformations. one way or another and whose deformational All that was modally “promised” in the second aspects range from mild—even non-def or- half of the exposition (or at least all that ex- mational—to extreme. Only the last two of isted as generic potential, or perhaps even these three categories have recapitulations that “hope”) is extinguished, measure by measure, are properly described as nonresolving.

Category One: Minor-Mode Sonatas That Are 28The structural and expressive usages of major and minor Not Liberated into the Major Mode in the Re- within sonatas— usages that can be highly variable— are inventoried and discussed in chap. 14 of the Elements of capitulation. This category concerns primarily Sonata Theory, which lays out the hermeneutic implica- those minor-mode sonata forms that move to tions that undergird the present discussion.

151 19TH in the parallel zone in the recapitulation: nega- this minor-mode category are tonally closed. CENTURY MUSIC tive-positive is replaced by negative-negative. They do fulll the tonal generic requirements From this perspective, we may speak legiti- expected of sonatas. As such they have emphati- mately of “sonata failure.” In these cases that cally resolving recapitulations. Nevertheless, which a sonata can do, turn minor into major, the patetico cast of their unrelentingly minor- is not done. mode recapitulations shows a sign of pervasive As it happens, this is Mozart’s virtually in- negativity or “failure” precisely at the moment variable practice, from his rst minor-mode when the musical action is coming to its own sonatas onward. Under no circumstances should sense of successful tonal closure in the area we regard the procedure as in the slightest surrounding the ESC. This working at expres- deformational or non-normative. Such a proce- sive cross-purposes could be explored further, dure was always available from the start among but of course it is by no means a nonresolution. the generic options for minor-mode sonatas. Rather, it is more a portrayal of an all-consum- Still, this minorizing of previously major-mode ing, inescapably negative presence. For this rst secondary- and closing-space can suggest an broad category, then, we must distinguish be- expressive “failure” or negativity on the grand- tween these two characterizations, “nonresolv- est scale, as in the outer movements of the two ing recapitulation” and “ sonata failure.” And G-Minor Symphonies, K. 183 and K. 550, the again, because of such considerations, this is rst movements of the D-Minor Quartet, K. clearly the mildest of the three categori es. 421, the A-Minor Piano Sonata, K. 310, the G- Within the period’s norms of sonata-construc- Minor Piano Quartet, K. 478, the G-Minor tion it is not deformational at all. String Quintet, K. 516, and so on. Beethoven was also often attracted to this “negative” ge- Category Two: Suppression of a Perfect Au- neric option, although his practice is more vari- thentic Cade nce w ithin Secondary-Theme able than is Mozart’s. (When he did select this Space (or Its Equivalent) at the End of the Expo- option—as opposed to producing the recapitu- sition and Recapitulation. 30 Stronger than the latory S and C principally in the major-mode rst—and now moving into the area of struc- throughout—he sometimes began the recapitu- tural deformation—this category encompasses latory secondary-theme zone in the major only sonata forms in which both the exposition and to extinguish it, permanently, into the minor- the recapitulation are brought to their respec- mode a few phrases later.) Instances of the gen- tive proper keys in the secondary thematic zone, eral effect, though—closing the recapitulation but fail to close in that key with a perfect in the fatalistic, opposite mode from that which authentic cadence, or, in most cases, to close had concluded the exposition— may be found even with an imperfect substitute. In other with some frequency in Beethoven. It turns up words, these are instances in which secondary- not only in his earlier works—for example, in theme space is kept from cadential closure. the rst movements of his Piano Sonatas in F The exposition fails to produce an EEC, and, Minor, op. 2, no. 1, and in C Minor, op. 10, complementarily, the recapi tulation, even no.Ê1— but also in such later works as the open- though it unfolds wholly in the proper key, is ing movement of the Symphony No. 9 in D kept from producing the tonic closure of the Minor, op. 125. 29 ESC, the principal goal of any sonata form. The immediately required nuance is to in- Although a few earlier instances may be sist on a distinction between tonal closure and found, for instance, in Haydn (such as the rst modal emancipation within conventional so- movement of his Quartet in G Minor, op. 20, nata practice. To be sure, all of the sonatas in no. 3),31 the most familiar example is provided

29A convenient inventory of such movements and other 30The phrase about “ its equivalent” is provided to cover minor-mode patterns in Beethoven has been made by Jo- continuous recapitulations, which lack a medial caesura seph Kerman, “Beethoven’s Minority,” in Write All These and, consequently, lack a secondary theme proper. See n. Down: Essays on Music (Berkeley and Los Angeles: Uni- 23 above. versity of California Press, 1994), pp. 217–37. 31See n. 22 above.

152 by the nale of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 collapsing to D minor, major VI followed by JAMES HEPOKOSKI in C Minor, op. 67. Here the C-major exposi- minor vi, it is surely relevant to recognize its Egmont: tion moves to the dominant and launches a major-mode variant of the Egmont tonal pat- Beethoven, secondary theme in G major (m. 45). In fact, tern and to recall the other predecessors of such Mozart what is produced is a succession of themes, but nonresolving structures in the years around each nds itself barred from cadential closure. 1800 and thereafter. 32 The recollection resur- Beethoven here stages an exposition that seems faces when we observe that in the rst move- desperately “ unable” to produce an EEC, the ment of Mahler’s Symphony No. 6 in A Minor perfect-authentic-cadential knot that would tie the so-called Alma Theme (S) returns in the up the expositional layout as a whole. This recapitulatory space not in the planned-for, lib- cadential frustration must surely be the central erating A major, but rather in the “ false” D point not only of this exposition but also of the major, the subdominant major. The same type recapitulation, in which the secondary-theme of nonresolving tonal situat ion occurs in zone’s “ inability” plays out in the crucial C- Glinka’s Russlan and Ludmilla Overture; in major tonic. The whole symphony has been Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet; in the rst striving to ground—or better, to bring into be- movement of Saint-Saëns’ s Symphony No. 3 in ing—a secure, conrmed C major as a sign of C Minor, op. 78; in the nale of Rachmaninov’s liberation. Here we learn, even in the nale, Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor, op. 18; in the that C major is not going to be stabilized within second movement of Mahler’s Symphony No. the con nes of sonata-space. Thus the multi- 5; and in several other movements. modular secondary-theme zone of this reca- Much more could be added by way of nu- pitulation is quite literally nonresolving. It does ance, by way of qualication, by way of the occupy the proper key, but it is handled in a sharpening and deepening of the central topic way to suggest that it is incapable of bringing here. I could invoke transitional categories of about cadential resolution. Closure is conse- nonresolution or adduce special cases that fall quently deferred to the mighty coda, which, it outside of the three main categories. But per- turns out, has its own cadential stories to tell. haps the larger point has been made: Once we Parallel examples may be found in the nales recognize the persistence of any deformation- of Beethoven’s Second and Eighth Symphonies, family within any existing genre system—the ops. 36 and 93, in the nale of the C-Major nonresolving recapitulation is only one among Quartet, op. 59, no. 3, and in numerous post- many within the exible genre system that we Beethovenian works, including several outer call the “sonata”— once we attend to the gen- movements in Bruckner. esis and history of that deformation, once we ponder what its generic and structural implica- Category Three: Recapitulations Ending in a Nontonic Key. This is the most extreme of the categories, that in which the recapitulation’ s second part nds itself stranded in the “wrong key,” with or without cadential closure in that key. I need not discuss this possibility further, 32The tonal pattern found in the rst movement of Brahms’s for that is where we began, with Egmont, with Third Symphony may also be understood in relation to the earlier Beethoven Trio (at least according to such major-mode sonata forms with expositional closes in one interpretation of the two offered), and with the mediant as Beethoven’ s Piano Sonatas op. 31, no. 1, movt. I, and op. 53, movt. I. While in this part of his career Mozart’s Quartet, K. 173, movt. I. Still, when Beethoven had normally “ corrected” the recapitulation’ s we seek an understanding of the structure of fth-related submediant (when it occurred) in such a way such a piece, say, as the rst movement of as to produce the point of essential structural closure (ESC) in the tonic (see n. 5 above along with the related discus- Brahms’s Symphony No. 3 in F, op. 90—whose sion in the text), this does not occur in the Brahms move- exposition moves from I to III, F major to A ment. From this perspective, the Brahms piece may be major, then A minor—and when we notice that regarded as an instance of an “uncorrected” recapitulation—something on the order of the major-mode op. 53, the second half of the recapitulatory space re- movt. I, pattern additionally informed by the more non- turns not in the tonic F major but in D major, normative, minor-mode Egmont prototype.

153 19TH tions might be, the deformation-concept can ened into meaningful utterances when we at- CENTURY MUSIC serve as a centering principle not only of sonata tempt to reconstitute their apparent dialogues analysis but also of the larger task of sonata with pre-existing memory, with complex, pre- hermeneutics. For individual pieces do not ex- existing generic models within constellations ist in themselves alone. They cannot speak of competing, ever-transforming entirely for themselves. But they may be awak- systems.

IN OUR NEXT ISSUE (SUMMER 2002)

ARTICLES Benjamin Walton: “Quelque peu théâ tral”: Operatic Coronation of Charles X

Paul A. Bertagnolli: Amanuensis or Author? The Liszt-Raff Collaboration Revisited

Alexander Rehding: Liszt’s Musical Monuments

Kevin C. Karnes: Another Look at Critical Partisanship in the Viennese n de siècle: Schenker’s Reviews of Brahms’s Vocal Music, 1891–92

REVIEWS By John Daverio and William Drabkin

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