CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE
Program Notes
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements
For the degree of Master of Music in Music, Performance
By
Timothy Lewis
December 2019 The thesis of Timothy Lewis is approved:
______
Dr. Arthur J. McCaffrey Date
______
Dr. Gayle Kowalchyk Date
______
Dr. Dmitry Rachmanov, Chair Date
California State University, Northridge
ii Table of Contents
Signature Page ii
List of Examples iv
Abstract v
Chapter 1: W.A. Mozart’s Piano Sonata in B-flat Major, K. 333 1
Chapter 2: J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E Major, Well-Tempered Clavier Book II, 6
BWV 878
Chapter 3: Claude Debussy’s Préludes 9
Chapter 4: Franz Liszt’s Ballade No. 2 in B Minor, S. 171 13
Works Cited 17
iii List of Examples
Example 1: Mozart, Sonata No. 13 in B-flat Major, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 1-10. 1
Example 2: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 23-31. 2
Example 3: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 50-54. 2
Example 4: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 39-40. 3
Example 5: Formal diagram of Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro. 3
Example 6: Mozart, K. 333: II. Andante cantabile, mm. 28-32. 4
Example 7: Formal diagram of Mozart, K. 333: III. Allegretto grazioso. 5
Example 8: des Prez, Missa Pange Lingua, Kyrie eleison, mm. 17-21. 7
Example 9: Froberger, Ricercar IV, subject and countersubject, mm. 1-7. 8
Example 10: Bach, Fugue in E Major, WTC II, BWV 878, subject and 8
countersubject, mm. 1-3.
Example 11: Debussy, Les collines d’Anacapri, Préludes Book 1, mm. 51-53. 11
Example 12: Liszt, Ballade No. 2 in B Minor, S. 171, mm. 1-2. 14
Example 13: Liszt, mm. 24-26. 14
Example 14: Liszt, mm. 92-98. 15
iv Abstract
Program Notes
By
Timothy Lewis
Master of Music in Music, Performance
This paper serves as a listening guide to works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Johann
Sebastian Bach, Claude Debussy, and Franz Liszt. By mapping out the forms of each piece and giving a clear explanation of significant harmonic and motivic events, I hope to give listeners and readers a deeper understanding of the music. While much of my discussion regarding
Mozart’s Sonata No. 13 in B-flat Major and Bach’s Prelude and Fugue from the Well-Tempered
Clavier Book II is primarily rooted in theoretical analysis, I give a significant amount of attention to program in regard to Debussy’s Préludes and Liszt’s Ballade No. 2 in B Minor. This is because the composition of these unique pieces was driven in some part by an extra-musical program. In the case of Debussy’s Préludes, I explore how the composer used an abstract concept or image to shape his musical gestures and harmonies. In contrast to this, I interpret
Liszt’s Ballade as a dramatized retelling of the Greek myth of Hero and Leander by analyzing his use of motivic elements as stand-ins for specific plot elements.
v Chapter 1: W.A. Mozart’s Piano Sonata in B-flat Major, K. 333
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his thirteenth Piano Sonata in B-flat Major, K. 333 in 1783, most likely while stopping in Linz on his way back to Vienna.1 However, the piece was not published until April of the following year. In the first movement, Mozart establishes a clear
Primary Key Area (PKA) in the tonic B-flat major in the opening measures of the exposition.
Example 1: Mozart, Sonata No. 13 in B-flat Major, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 1-10.
After some elaboration on the opening descending motif, we are presented with the Secondary
Key Area (SKA) in the dominant F major at bar 23.
1 Cliff Eisen and Stanley Sadie, “Mozart, (Johann Chrysostom) Wolfgang Amadeus,” Grove Music Online.
1
Example 2: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 23-31.
The exposition ends with a closing theme that is still in the SKA of F major. Here, a descending chromatic motif in the left hand is counter-balanced by a rising sixteenth-note line that seems to teeter on the ledge of the high register before gracefully descending to the middle of the keyboard to resolve in F major.
Example 3: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 50-54.
In the excerpts above one can see the repeated use of accented suspensions. This melodic device is perhaps one of the defining traits of this movement as it appears in every motif in the two key areas. While the flowing lyricism of the melody gives the movement an undeniable
2 elegance, these suspensions bring an almost child-like quality that keeps the music light and not- too-fancy. Perhaps the most glaring example can be heard in the SKA when repeated V7 (C7) /
V (F) marked fortepiano are interrupted by a hiccup-like motif:
Example 4: Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro, mm. 39-40.
It could be that Mozart was recalling his time trying to keep himself entertained while at court!
The remainder of the first movement follows what one would expect in a typical Sonata-
Allegro movement. The Development begins in the dominant F Major and, in a pre-Beethoven style, quickly returns to the tonic B-flat major by the beginning of the Recapitulation. Here we revisit the thematic material from the PKA and SKA, however now everything is stuck in the tonic B flat.
Example 5: Formal diagram of Mozart, K. 333: I. Allegro.
The second movement is interesting formally – like the first movement, it is also written in sonata form – but also harmonically. Following an exposition in the sub-dominant key of E-flat major, the development begins with what could be one of Mozart’s greatest dissonances: following a string of V7 - I - V7 chords that are moving away from each other, the hands
3 continue moving chromatically in the same direction and land on a viio7 / ii (F minor) by way of a suspension on F# and A:
Example 6: Mozart, K. 333: II. Andante cantabile, mm. 28-32.
The tonal clash is not fully resolved until three bars later where we get a clear PAC on F minor.
This sets the tone for the next 16 bars as the harmony shifts from F minor to C minor and then descends down a series of chromatic mediant modulations: A-flat major, F minor, and D-flat minor. D-flat minor gives way to a dominant extension (Bb7) that lasts for three bars before the opening theme in the tonic E-flat major returns at bar 51. From here, the themes from the exposition return in highly embellished forms that evoke Mozart’s coloratura operatic style.
While it is the most technically demanding of the three movements, the final movement of the sonata is the most straight-forward in terms of form and harmony. The movement is a rondo in the tonic B-flat major with an A theme that has the feeling of an early Classical concerto – the first statement of the theme is marked piano and features a simple melody and sparse accompaniment. This is immediately taken up by the imagined orchestra as it is restated, now forte, with a more active accompaniment and embellished melody. Mozart exploits this dynamic throughout the movement, oscillating between different texture densities and levels of activity to mimic the back-and-forth of the soloist and orchestra. This chart outlines the remainder of the movement’s sections and their respective key areas:
4
Example 7: Formal diagram of Mozart, K. 333: III. Allegretto grazioso.
5
Chapter 2: J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E Major, Well-Tempered Clavier II, BWV 878
Johann Sebastian Bach’s Das Wohltemperierte Klavier stands as one of the most important collections of keyboard works written in all twenty-four keys.2 Composed in two volumes, the first written in 1722 and the second in 1740, the work comprises forty-eight pairs of Preludes and
Fugues, beginning in C major and progressing chromatically while alternating between major and minor, i.e. C major is followed by C minor, then C-sharp major and C-sharp minor, and so on. The Preludes in the set are a written testament to Bach’s remarkable improvisation skills – during his tenure as the Kapellmeister for Prince Leopold of Cöthen and as Thomaskantor in
Leipzig, he was known to perform incredibly complex improvisations on the keyboard and organ.3 Many of the Preludes, like the Prelude in C Minor from the first book, exploit a single texture or rhythmic motif to explore winding harmonic avenues, the only real cadences occurring when the music suddenly comes to a halt be it at the end of the Prelude, or, in the C Minor
Prelude, to begin a virtuosic cadenza. This freely improvisatory character was typical of the genre, and anyone studying a keyboard instrument in the eighteenth-century would have been expected to improvise to some degree.
The Prelude in E Major from WTC II, BWV 878 is one of the few in the set that has a clear binary form with an A section that moves from the tonic E Major to the dominant B Major followed by a B section that moves in the reverse direction, beginning in the dominant key returning to the tonic. The Prelude contains three distinct voices: an upper and middle voice that take turns carrying the melodic line while the other provides contrapuntal support, and a bass line
2 Maurice Hinson, Guide to the Pianist's Repertoire 4th ed., Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2014: 61-64.
3 Christoph Wolff and Walter Emery, “Bach, Johann Sebastian,” Grove Music Online.
6 that acts as a harmonic guide when the upper voices move into more chromatic territory.
Rhythmically the prelude derives its sense of forward motion from a simple two-note gesture: an off-beat eighth-note followed by a quarter-note. To a performer, this is a clear indication that the emphasis is to be placed on the quarter while the eighth is kept light, giving the music a skipping feeling.
The Fugue that accompanies this Prelude presents some interesting experiments in contrapuntal writing that reveal Bach’s love for the genre. The first is the subject itself: a simple motif that rises and then falls, Do-Re-Fa-Mi-Re-Do. This bears an uncanny resemblance to subject material found in the music of Thomas Aquinas (Pange lingua, ca. 1250), Josquin des
Prez (Missa Pange Lingua, 1515), and Johann Jakob Froberger (Ricercar IV, 1658).
Example 8: des Prez, Missa Pange Lingua, Kyrie eleison, mm. 17-21.
While Bach alluded to Josquin and Thomas Aquinas, we can deduce that he was making a specific reference to Froberger’s Ricercar IV. In his Fugue, Bach not only uses Froberger’s subject but also uses some of the same contrapuntal devices found in the Ricercar, e.g. the Sol-
Re-Sol gesture in the countersubject.
7
Example 9: Froberger, Ricercar IV, subject and countersubject, mm. 1-7.
Example 10: Bach, Fugue in E Major, WTC II, BWV 878, subject and countersubject, mm. 1-3.
In the exposition of the Fugue, the subject is accompanied by a simple countersubject that always appears in whichever voice last carried the subject. This is elaborated upon after the first
Episode when the subject is passed between the voices in a different order and in stretto, resulting in a much quicker presentation. Episode Two is followed by the presentation of not one, but two new countersubjects simultaneously in the bass and tenor. Here the counterpoint becomes much tighter as the tenor countersubject is passed to the alto and then the soprano, giving the impression that Bach decided to compose a double fugue. However, the subject is embedded deep in the texture, buried underneath the two new countersubjects. Episode Three arrives and this countersubject that could have stood on its own is not heard again for the remainder of the fugue. The Fugue reaches its harmonic climax when it cadences on the median
G-sharp minor at bar 35 – from there the subject and first countersubject return in drastically extended forms, and the Fugue comes to its peaceful conclusion.
8
Chapter 3: Claude Debussy’s Préludes
Claude Debussy’s Préludes have captivated listeners and performers alike for over a century with their eclectic musical styles and subject matters, as well as the colors and sonorities that Debussy was able to evoke on an instrument that had not yet reached its peak. The collection is divided into two books, each containing twelve short pieces. The first book was composed between 1909-10, and the second between 1912-13.4 While the work contains twenty-four preludes in total, Debussy broke away from the model that was established by J.S. Bach and then reinforced by Frédéric Chopin and Charles-Valentin Alkan in the nineteenth-century: one prelude in each key.5 In fact, a handful of Debussy’s preludes hardly adhere to a definable key to begin with. The departure from this rigid tonal scheme was due in part to Debussy’s fascination with programmatic music. While this is obvious in many of his other piano works, e.g. Images,
Estampes, and the Children’s Corner Suite, here Debussy was experimenting with portraying his subject in a new way. We can deduce this based on the placement of the title on each prelude in the set: each title appears at the end of the piece towards the bottom of the page and is in parentheses and preceded by ellipses. One is not meant to hear the piece with a clear image or scenario already in mind, but instead they should hear an impression of the subject conveyed by the emotions and colors in the piano. This would echo Claude Monet’s desire to paint the light that permeated his surroundings rather than the surroundings themselves.
…Bruyères opens with a single-line melody simply marked piano that gives way to increasingly sonorous and lush harmonies as the range expands outward from the middle of the
4 Hinson, Guide to the Pianist’s Repertoire, 312-315.
5 Ibid.
9 keyboard. The significance behind the title of this particular prelude is not so clear - if it is interpreted as the pastoral village Bruyères east of Paris, perhaps the opening melodic line is meant to resemble the sound of a church bell echoing over the hills. There are also ties between the name and a type of flower that grows in Europe which could account for the innocent beauty of the piece. In either case, the melody seems improvisatory, so the prelude’s form is revealed through its harmonic structure. The piece can be divided into four sections: an introduction that hovers around A-flat Major, an A section that begins clearly in A-flat, a B section that remains solidly in B-flat major, and a return to the A section in A-flat, now with a clear tonal center.
…Les collines d’Anacapri (“The Hills of Anacapri”) begins with another bell-like motif, this time followed by a quick outburst in the high register. This gestural combination is repeated, and the range expands dramatically before we are left with just a simple alternating third. The excitement and subsequent calm of this opening conjures up images of the Italian island from which this prelude derives its name – known for its tall peaks and shimmering grottos, this island off the coast of Naples is known to have been a frequent destination for Debussy.6 Similar to
Bruyères, Anacapri contains an introduction followed by an ABA form; however, in this prelude, the sections are defined by their motivic content rather than their harmonies. Leaving the technically dazzling A section, the B section, marked Modéré et expressif, resembles a colloquial drinking song and is complete with slurring of words depicted by chromatic inflections in the inner voice.
6 Claude Debussy, Préludes, ed. Roy Howat and Claude Helffer, Paris: Éditions Durand, 2007: ii.
10
Example 11: Debussy, Les collines d’Anacapri, Préludes Book 1, mm. 51-53.
« …Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir » (“Sounds and Perfumes Turn in the Evening Air”) is one of two preludes in the twenty-four whose title quotes a literary source, the other being «…Les fées sont d’exquises danseuses», indicated by the addition of quotation marks. The former is a line from Charles Baudelaire’s poem “Harmonie du soir” in which the poet evokes images of wilting flowers, the sounds of violins, and swirls of perfumes enveloping a tormented heart in darkness.7 While this prelude sounds anything but tormented, the only indication that the piece is in A Major is a bell-like low A that repeats throughout. Dense chromatic harmonies quickly erase this pedal from listeners’ ears, however, always maintaining an aura of mystery until the final four bars that are grounded firmly in A major.
One of the most popular preludes in the set, …La fille aux cheveux de lin (“The Girl with
Flaxen Hair”) is the most contemplative in the group selected for this program. It opens with a single-line melody similar to the one in Bruyères; however, the marking sans rigeur gives the performer much more rhythmic freedom. This persists throughout the thirty-nine-bar prelude giving it a meandering character that makes it easy to imagine a young girl wandering by herself, singing a simple melody as she walks along.
7 Charles Baudelaire, « Harmonie du soir, » in Les Fleurs du Mal, Paris : Flammarion, 1991: 94.
11
Debussy may have been inspired to write …Ce qu’a vu le Vent d’Ouest upon reading
Hans Christian Andersen’s The Garden of Paradise or Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “Ode to the West
Wind.” In both Andersen’s story and Shelley’s poem, the West Wind is described as a “wild boy,” a “destroyer and preserver,” and “dirge of the dying year.”8 Debussy’s interpretation of these characterizations maintains their violent descriptions and hints at the cyclical properties of the wind. This is the only prelude out of the 24 in which dynamic markings below mezzo-piano are in almost equal number to those above mezzo-forte. Debussy writes strident, en serrant, and
Furieux et rapide to incite a sense of urgency and panic in the listener: one must get out of the
West Wind’s path or else suffer its wrath!
8 Debussy, Préludes, ii.
12
Chapter 4: Franz Liszt’s Ballade No. 2 in B Minor, S. 171
Franz Liszt’s Second Ballade in B Minor, S. 171 was written at an interesting moment in the composer’s musical development – composed in 1853 alongside the monumental Piano
Sonata (also in B minor), Liszt was working on this piece at a time when he was deliberately pushing Western art music into its next phase. It was in 1853 that Liszt introduced the term
“symphonic poem,” referring to a single-movement orchestral work that breaks away from the antiquated symphonic form, instead using an extra-musical program as a formal guide.9 Coming off the heels of his Douze Études d’exécution transcendante, S. 139 (1851) and Grandes Études de Paganini, S. 141 (1851) Liszt was steeped in his mission to develop a new “transcendent” piano technique, much to the disdain of his contemporaries, the Schumann’s: Robert called the
Grandes Études “studies in storm and dread for, at the most, ten or twelve players in the world,”10 and Clara referred to the Sonata as “blind noise.”11
Perhaps due to the harsh criticism he was receiving at the time, or perhaps for his own reasons, the Second Ballade does not contain any indication of a specific program. However, some have attributed their own interpretation of the work to the Greek myth of Hero and
Leander. In this myth, a young man, Leander, falls in love with Hero, a priestess of Aphrodite who lives in a lighted tower in the middle of the Hellespont, a narrow passage between the
Aegean and Marmara Seas. Leander would swim to the tower each night to visit his beloved
Hero; however, when the light in the tower is extinguished by a storm one night, Leander cannot
9 Alan Walker, “Liszt, Franz [Ferenc],” Grove Music Online. 10 Music Criticism 1846-99, trans. Henry Pleasants, Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1950: 53.
11 Kenneth Hamilton, Liszt: Sonata in B minor, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996: ix.
13 find his way, and he drowns in the raging waters. Hero, upon discovering Leander’s body on the shore the next day, throws herself from her tower into the sea.12
With this interpretation in mind, the narrative map of Liszt’s Ballade becomes clear. Liszt guides his audience through the piece with the aid of motifs that represent different elements of the story that he presents in a manner strongly resembling Sonata-Allegro form. The first of these, a sweeping chromatic line in the low register of the keyboard may represent the dark waters of the Hellespont that Leander was crossing under cover of night.
Example 12: Liszt, Ballade No. 2 in B minor, S. 171, mm. 1-2.
This is followed by a delicate melody in the high register marked Allegretto and dolce, representing the love that Leander felt for Hero which motivated him to risk his life swimming the channel every night.
Example 13: Liszt, mm. 24-26.
These two motifs combine to make up the PKA, and they return in bars 36 and 59 respectively – now a half-step lower than before – as if Liszt intended to include a repeat sign.
12 Thomas Horde, “Leander and Hero. A Tragedy,” Eighteenth Century Collections Online.
14
The SKA begins at bar 72 when a march theme begins in D major before quickly unraveling into a wash of what seems to be F-sharp minor. This can be heard clearly beginning in bar 98 when the sea motif returns in a much more torrential form – perhaps foreshadowing the storm that will eventually drown Leander.
Example 14: Liszt, mm. 92-98.
The stormy waters are subdued when Leander reaches Hero’s tower at bar 135. Here the music, marked a piacere and cantando, takes on the character of a love song with its sweeping single-line melody and harp-like accompaniment. This, and the chorale-like section that follows, paint a clear picture of the two lovers spending many summer hours together, but it does not last as the opening sea motif returns at bar 162. This signals the end of the Exposition and moves the piece into the Development that begins in the sub-median key of G-sharp minor. The motif undergoes a harmonic shift to C minor before crashing into a second-inversion A#o7 chord, making it unclear whether we have reached the tonic B minor or the relative D major. After a virtuosic cascade of chromatic octaves, the music gives way to return of the SKA, now in B major.
At this point in the piece, Liszt deviates from what, until now, had been a relatively clear
Sonata form. At bar 254, instead of transitioning into a Recapitulation in the original PKA, Liszt instead introduces an entirely new theme in the key of B major. This theme, first appearing in the inner voice of the right hand before being playing in octaves and then massive chords, carries the same love that Leander and Hero felt for each other in the SKA. However, this theme is notably
15 resolute and free of the wistful quality of the latter. Because of this, it is possible to interpret the virtuosic climax in bars 195-215 as the storm that drowns Leander and the subsequent return of the SKA as a scene in which Hero happily awaits the arrival of her beloved. Keeping with this interpretation, the new theme that appears at bar 254 would depict the moment when Hero discovers Leander’s body, and the development of that theme to its climactic peak would echo
Isolde’s Liebestod in Richard Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde – an aria that Liszt arranged later in his lift. A literal programmatic reading of the work’s conclusion would follow Hero climbing to the top of her tower as Liszt writes a climbing chromatic motif. A poignant return of the love motif from the very beginning of the piece returns when the music is at its strongest volume, but it gradually diminuendos, and the rhythm is augmented as Hero meets her poetic end by the side of her beloved Leander.
16
Works Cited
Baudelaire, Charles. “Harmonie du soir,” in Les Fleurs du Mal. Paris: Flammarion, 1991.
Debussy, Claude. Préludes, ed. Roy Howat and Claude Helffer. Paris: Éditions Durand, 2007.
Eisen, Cliff and Stanley Sadie. “Mozart, (Johann Chrysostom) Wolfgang Amadeus.” Grove
Music Online. Accessed November 6, 2019.
Hamilton, Kenneth. Liszt: Sonata in B minor. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
Hinson, Maurice. Guide to the Pianist’s Repertoire 4th ed. Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 2014.
Horde, Thomas. “Leander and Hero. A Tragedy.” Eighteenth Century Collections Online.
&userGroupName=csunorthridge&tabID=T001&docId=CW110070211&type=multipage &contentSet=ECCOArticles&version=1.0&docLevel=FASCIMILE>. Accessed November 6, 2019. Schumann, Robert. Music Criticism 1846-99, trans. Henry Pleasants, Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1950. Walker, Alan. “Liszt, Franz [Ferenc].” Grove Music Online. Accessed November 6, 2019. Wolff, Christoph and Walter Emery. “Bach, Johann Sebastian.” Grove Music Online. Accessed November 6, 2019. 17