Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 3.djvu/764

752 two or more closely-related Keys; sometimes returning, after this process, to the initial Strain, and thus completing the symmetry of the Movement in accordance with principles of the deepest artistic significance. The most highly-developed forms were those of the Courante and Allemande. In these, the First Strain, if in the Major Mode, almost invariably modulated to the Dominant, for the purpose of proceeding to a formal close in that Key: if in the Minor Mode, it proceeded, in like manner, to the Relative Major. The Second Strain then started with a tolerably exact reproduction of the initial Subject in the new Key, or some other closely related to it; and the Reprise terminated with the transposition to the original Key of that portion of the First Strain which had first appeared in the Dominant, or Relative Major. In these forms, the share of interest allotted to the process of development was very small indeed, compared with that absorbed by the Subject itself; insomuch that, in many very fine examples, the entire Movement consisted of little more than a Subject artfully extended by the articulation of two members of not very unequal proportions.

IX. Very different from this was the next manifestation of progressive power. Taking the lines of the Allemande as the limit of his general contour, Haydn used a primary Subject, of comparatively limited dimensions, as the foundation of a Movement of greater length and higher development than any previously attempted. For this form a good Subject was of paramount importance; but its office was that of a text, and nothing more: the real interest of the Movement lay in the completeness of its treatment. And, because no form of treatment can be complete without the element of contrast, the Father of the Symphony enriched his new Art-form with a Second Subject, so constructed as to enhance the beauty of the Primary Theme by the introduction of some form of expression distinctly opposed to it. Presented for the first time immediately after the first great Modulation to the Dominant or Relative Major, the subordinate Motive naturally brought the First Section of the Movement to a conclusion, in one or other of those nearly related Keys; and, naturally also, reappeared after the Reprise, with the transposition necessary to terminate the Second Section in the original Key. Haydn sometimes, and Mozart and Beethoven constantly, followed this Second Subject by a Third one, in the same Key—as in the Overture to 'Figaro,' and many similar Movements: but this plan introduced no new principle, and was, in fact, no more than a re-assertion of the leading idea that of introducing a new source of interest at a critical turn of the Movement. With the working of these Subjects we have, at present, no concern. It remains only to show the various forms they assumed in the most important styles of Composition.

In the Overture, the First Subject, if untrammelled by any dramatic or descriptive purpose, is usually a spirited one; and the Second, of a more sustained or cantabile character. In the great majority of cases, both Subjects are complete in themselves; but the first is generally a comparatively short one, while the second sometimes presents the form of a fully-developed Air, consisting of two or even more distinct Strains, as in the Overtures to 'Euryanthe' and 'Ruy Bias.' Very frequently the first forte introduces an independent Theme in the primary Key, as in 'Der Freischütz' and 'A Midsummer Night's Dream.' Classical Overtures almost always start with a strongly marked Theme in Simple Common Time. There is, indeed, no law concerning this point: but the custom is so general, that one of Mendelssohn's most active coadjutors at the Gewandhaus condemned the identity of Time (6-4) in 'The Naiades' and 'The Ruler of the Spirits,' as a self-evident plagiarism on the part of Sterndale Bennett, notwithstanding the entirely different character of the two works. Yet the Overture to 'Egmont' is in 3-4 time.

The First Subject of the Symphony is open to greater variety of character than that of the Overture; is frequently in 3-4 or 6-8 Time, or even in 9-8, as in Spohr's 'Die Weihe der Töne'; and is often of considerable length and extended development, as in Mendelssohn's 'Scotch Symphony.' This last characteristic, however, is by no means a constant one: witness the First Subject, of Beethoven's C minor Symphony, which consists of four notes only. As a general rule, the Second Subject of the Symphony is less extended in form than that of the Overture; and it may be predicated, with almost absolute certainty, that the less extended the Theme, the more completely and ingeniously will it be 'worked,' and vice versa.

The Subjects of the Sonata differ from those of the Symphony chiefly in their adaptation to the distinctive character of the Instrument or Instruments for which they are written; and the same may be said, within certain limits, of those of the Concerto, which however are almost always of greater extension and completeness than those of any other form of Composition, and are treated in a manner peculiar to themselves, and differing very materially, in certain particulars, from the plan pursued in most other Movements—as, for instance, in the almost epigrammatic terseness with which all the Subjects of the First Movement were interwoven, in the opening Tutti, into an epitome of the whole.

But in the important points of completeness and extension, all these Motivi yield to those of the Rondo, the First Subject of which forms a quite independent section of the Movement, and often closes with a definite and well-marked Cadence before the introduction of the first Modulation, as in the Rondo of Beethoven's 'Sonata Pastorale' (op. 29); that of the Sonata in C major (op. 53); that of Mozart's Sonata à 4 mains, in C major; and numerous other instances. This Subject is rarely presented in any other than its original form, in the primitive Key; though, in certain exceptional cases—such as Weber's Rondo