Sonata form | Classical Music Structure & Development | Britannica (original) (raw)

Also called:

first-movement form or sonata-allegro form

sonata form, musical structure that is most strongly associated with the first movement of various Western instrumental genres, notably, sonatas, symphonies, and string quartets. Maturing in the second half of the 18th century, it provided the instrumental vehicle for much of the most profound musical thought until about the middle of the 19th century, and it continued to figure prominently in the methods of many later composers.

Although sonata form is sometimes called first-movement form, the first movements of multimovement works are not always in sonata form, nor does the form occur only in first movements. Likewise, the variant sonata-allegro form is misleading, for it need not be in a quick tempo such as allegro.

Three-part structure

The basic elements of sonata form are three: exposition, development, and recapitulation, in which the musical subject matter is stated, explored or expanded, and restated. There may also be an introduction, usually in slow tempo, and a coda, or tailpiece. These optional sections do not affect the basic structure, however.

At first glance sonata form may appear to be a species of three-part, or ternary, form. The three parts of ternary form are a first section (A), followed by a contrasting section (B), followed by a repetition of the first section (that is, A B A). The parts are interrelated not in terms of basic structure but by purely lyrical or character contrast. Actually, the three parts of sonata form developed out of the binary, or two-part, form prominent in the music of the 17th and early 18th centuries. In binary form the structure depends on the interrelationship not only of themes but also of tonalities, or keys, the particular sets of notes and chords used in each part. Thus, the initial part, which is repeated, leads directly into the second part by ending in the new key in which the second part begins. The second, also repeated, moves from the new key back to the original key, in which it ends. The second part thus completes the first.

In sonata form the exposition corresponds to the first part of binary form, the development and recapitulation to the second. The exposition moves from the original key to a new key; the development passes through several keys and the recapitulation returns to the original key. This echoes the motion, in binary form, away from and back to the original key. In relation to binary form, sonata form is complex. It offers, in the exposition, contrasting musical statements. In the development these are treated dialectically; that is, they are combined, broken up, recombined, and otherwise brought into change and conflict. In the recapitulation they are restated in a new light. This organic relationship between parts marks the sonata form as a higher, more complex, type than the ternary form. The occasional designation of sonata form as compound binary form is useful in that it stresses its origins in the earlier form, but notes its added complexity.

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Exposition

The emphasis on contrast, even conflict, is the element that distinguishes the exposition of a sonata-form movement from the first section of an earlier binary form. The first section of a binary movement in a Baroque suite or instrumental sonata, for example, might contain two clearly differentiated themes, but the stress is on continuity and on uniformity of musical texture rather than on contrast. In sonata form the emphasis is more dynamic; there is a stronger sense of contrast within the movement. The terms usually given the contrasting areas are “first subject/second subject” or “principal group/subsidiary group.” These are misleading terms, for they imply a simple contrast of themes.

In reality it is contrast of key, or tonal contrast, that characterizes the sonata-form exposition. Usually the opening of the exposition is firmly rooted in the tonic, or “home,” key of the work. The later segments of the exposition move decisively to a closely related but distinct key. The second key chosen is almost invariably one of the two keys most closely related to the home key. If the home key is a major key, the dominant key is chosen; if the home key is minor, the relative major is chosen. (The dominant key is the one whose keynote is five tones above that of the tonic, as C–G; the relative major has a keynote three tones above the relative minor, as A minor–C major.) The exposition thus creates an opposition of tonalities or key areas that the rest of the movement—the development and recapitulation—will strive to reconcile. Compared with the contrast of keys, the question of how many themes the movement possesses is of minor structural significance. Very often, a movement in sonata form has two clearly defined main themes, for example the first movement of Mozart’s Symphony No. 41 in C Major, K 551 (1788; Jupiter). It may also have only one, like the first movement of Haydn’s Symphony No. 85 in B-flat Major (1785?). Or it may have more than a half dozen strongly characterized themes, as does the first movement of Brahms’s Symphony No. 4 in E Minor (1884–85).

The thematic organization of a movement in sonata form may affect the character of the exposition, and thus of the whole movement, in two specific respects. When two themes or groups of themes are clearly differentiated, their distribution may help the listener to assimilate the cardinal points of the tonal design (that is, the arrangement of keys) of the movement. When, on the other hand, such differentiation between themes is obscured or set at variance with the organization of tonalities, the very tension between thematic design and tonal scheme may greatly enhance the subtlety and interest of the form. Such tension may produce not merely an interplay of melody and key within the movement but an interplay between two interplays. One fairly simple way of achieving this is shown in the first movement of Haydn’s Symphony No. 99 in E-flat Major (1793). Here, as in Symphony No. 85, the first theme is restated in the dominant key. This restatement could appear at first to be the second subject. But later it is followed by another distinct motive that, in terms of themes, is the real second subject. At the same time the neat, almost epigrammatic character of the second subject makes it similar to a codetta theme, which is often used to round off the exposition after both main subjects have been stated.

The interplay between themes reaches an even higher level of subtlety in the first movement of Mozart’s Symphony No. 35 in D Major, K 385 (1776; Haffner). The second theme, against which the first persists as a counterpoint, is stated “on” rather than “in” the dominant; that is, its harmonies suggest the dominant key, but remain part of the home, or tonic, key. The second theme is thus heard as a new perspective on the tonic. Later, when the dominant key is firmly established in its own right, Mozart introduces a new subject whose tune is closely related to the first theme. In this richly ambiguous structure, the newly introduced motive would be regarded by the criterion of key, as the second subject; in purely thematic terms, it might almost be said to constitute the beginning of the codetta, or concluding section.