Section II · Haydn · Hob. XVI:20 · first movement
The whole first movement, 100 bars, line by line, with the questions an examiner asks about its form and its details. Look, answer out loud in English, then check.
Play from this score · big, page by page, for iPadThe notes were typed in from photographs of one edition (Henle), and drawn by computer. Every page was transcribed twice, independently, and every disagreement was settled against the photograph; the pages with the thickest chords were read a third time (a third reader on the development) and the disputed notes were measured. The facts below about keys, bars and repeats were found by searching the typed notes. The tempo words (“adagio”, “Tempo primo”) were read from the page. Not exact: bar 87 is an “adagio” bar in free rhythm, so its note values are only approximate; ornaments, small grace notes and some chords in bars 75 to 80 may differ in detail from the print. Not typed in: fingering, dynamics and the editorial brackets. If anything here disagrees with your own score, your score is right.
The numbers under each line are the ones printed in the Henle edition (the small number above the first bar of each line). Another edition may number differently, so in the exam point to the music, or name the edition, before you say a number.
Press a part to see its bars lit up on the score below.
Each question sits under the line where its bars begin. Answer out loud first, then open the answer.
Before you play: what does the first page tell you about the piece, the tempo, the time and the key?
The title is Sonate in c, Hoboken XVI:20, with “Komponiert 1771” printed under it, and the sonata is numbered 6 in this volume. The tempo is printed (Allegro) Moderato, with “Allegro” in brackets (an editor's addition in this edition).
The time signature is C (common time, 4/4) and the key signature has three flats: C minor.
How is the movement laid out? Where are the repeat signs, and where does each main section start?
It is in sonata form, 100 bars in this edition. The exposition is bars 1 to 37, with a repeat sign at the end of bar 37.
A second repeat sign opens at bar 38, where the development starts, and closes at the end of bar 100: the development and the recapitulation are repeated together.
The recapitulation starts at bar 69.
Where does the second subject start? Is there a clear answer?
No clear answer: analysts disagree. The course notes name three starting points: bar 15, bar 26 and bar 32. In this score bar 26 is the “Tempo primo” after the written-out Adagio, which is why that point is a natural candidate.
Say that the sources differ and show the examiner the bar you choose; do not give one bar as the only right answer.
Look at bar 24. What is the “adagio” here, and what happens next?
A short written-out adagio, a slow, free flourish in small notes, in bar 24. It leads to a fermata in both hands at the start of bar 26, and then Tempo primo brings back the original speed.
The same thing happens at the end of the movement: an “adagio” in bar 87, a fermata chord in bar 89 and Tempo primo again. Bar 46 also has a fermata in both hands, but the page prints no tempo word there.
The movement starts in C minor. Where does the exposition end?
In E♭ major, the relative major: bar 37 ends on a chord of E♭, G and B♭ with E♭ in the bass, followed by the repeat sign. The bars before it use E♭, G, A♭, B♭, C, D and F.
The development goes through some distant keys. Which, and where?
From bar 49 the music rests on the notes B♭, D♭, F and A♭ (B♭ minor), and in bars 53 to 56 it repeats the idea on E♭, G♭ and B♭ with A♭ and F (E♭ minor), a fourth higher.
Both are flat, dark keys far from C minor. The development begins at bar 38, after the repeat sign.
How does the development get back to the recapitulation?
The bass sinks to G1 in bar 65, the lowest note of the whole movement, and G is the dominant of C minor. Four bars later, at bar 69, the opening returns.
How can you tell that the recapitulation starts here?
Bars 69 to 72 have the same pitches in the same order as bars 1 to 4 (I compared every pitch of both stretches by computer, and the two stretches look the same on the page), so the opening theme returns in the tonic. The only differences are small editorial marks: in the recapitulation some slurs are in brackets, which means the editor added them.
This is also the one place where analysts do not disagree about where a section starts.
How does the movement end? Is there a tierce de Picardie?
The last chord of bar 100 is built on C and E♭ (C2, C3, E♭3, C4): a minor chord, so there is no tierce de Picardie. It is followed by the repeat sign back to bar 38.
The words to use are on the Answer Cards (Haydn, Q3). To practise speaking, use the voice examiner and ask for Haydn, question 3.