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A clarification on diminished chords built on the leading tone: if you want to call it a rootless seven chord, the invisible root will be the fifth degree of the key, just like in a normal seven chord.

The seven chord (rooted or rootless) and where it goes is really really really important in these sonatinas. Over and over and over and over we see a seven chord (that is, X7 specifically, or its extensions X9 or X7b9) heralding the chord (and fleeting key) with root a fifth below. See A7? Expect D or Dm. See B7? Expect E or Em. See G#7? Expect C# or C#m. Etc.

Good Sunday, everyone



No, not consistent with G minor. There is no C# in G minor. Plus, I think now that it is just some colour (a brief flat 9 in the A7) before returning to D.

Are we ready to Rondo, now? Or, more to uncover with the Allegro con spirito.

Of course, I am keen either way and believe we will soon be wrapping up this Clementi series. Is this correct, and has anything been earmarked for moving forward?

Sonatina #6, movement 1

Listened several more times. The second time, I was able to hear where the exposition, development, and recapitulation happen. I did this by listening very closely to what the very beginning of the piece sounds like, and where I heard that again. (This is hearing melodically what's going on; I have NO sense of "I was just in the dominant, now I'm back to the tonic, this must be the repeat.")

What confused me before is that there is a big cadence in the middle of the exposition (and the recapitulation) so when I heard it the first time I expected that to be the end of the exposition. So I ended up hearing lots and lots of sections instead of just six (expo, dev, recap, repeated).

My latest listen, I listened to the LH, and that was fun, hearing how it's doing something different from the RH, and it has some nice effects of its own.

Next I'm going to listen, score in hand, and mark the places where I hear something unusual happening.

Sonatina #6, movement 1

Something else I can hear is that the development ends in a very open-ended way. I'm not sure if the recapitulation starts in the only way that could complete the open-ended development, but it does sound quite natural.

Sonatina #6 Allegro con sprito

Just a quick clarify, PS88. Your confirmation note about the flat around M50 was marked Sonatina No 5. movement 1, when in fact we were discussing No. 6 movement 1. I had also carried this reference through, not realizing it.

So, just wanted to clarify if last couple of posts are also discussing No.6 vs. No. 5.

I thought we were all, complete with no. 5.

Thanks for spotting that, Greener. Yes, I meant Sonatina #6. I've fixed the sonatina # in the offending posts. Yes, recent comments are all on #6.

I'm still working on Sonatina #6, movement 1 and have some comments I'll post over the next couple of days, depending on as I get to them.

I find mm.12-16 to be quite the opposite of calming, with the expanding and briefly chromatic up-and-down eighth note figure from m.12 to m.13, and again at m.14 to m.15.


F#-G#-A (et passim ff.)

I had a quick play-through. It's got a feeling of "waiting for the shoe to drop" and there's a reason for it. From m. 55 to 56 you have A (V chord of D) developing into an A7 chord while we have "poco ritardando". It leads up to D, leads up to D, and then instead of giving us that D we end up with A7, the melody note being C#, the leading note of D, being held in a tenuto - followed by a tenuto pause. Literally we have a pregnant pause. Then "a tempo" the quick downbeat notes and we're back in the jaunty opening with the long expected D chord. Well heard!

Sonatina #6, movement 1, Allegro con spirito

Places that stand out to me listening (in addition to the pyrotechnics running up and down scales):

The up-and-down eighth notes in m.12 into m.13, and m.14 into m.15 (and similarly in the recapitulation). Curiously, while I can hear that the mm.14-15 set is higher than the mm.12-13 set, I don't register that it's an octave higher. It sounds like a completely new set of interesting notes to me, not just "oh that's the same thing, an octave higher".

The three quarter notes in the left hand from m.30 to the downbeat of m.31, and again from m.31 to the downbeat of m.32. Although they don't appear to ascend on paper, I hear the three dyads as an ascending sequence. This figure appears again at mm.34-36, and again in the recapitulation.

The accidental and dim7 laden passage from mm.48-51, and again from mm.53-56.

Try as I might, I can't hear the arrival of G# in m. 17 as an unusual note.

I hate to write of emotions since they are so subjective. What we feel is what we feel, and there is no right or wrong about feeling. Having said that, subjectively I also might feel a calming or settling down at that point. The music has been dancing up and down the scale in sixteenth notes, and suddenly we have a much slower dotted quarter followed by eighth notes. We have a simple D to G cadence, and the C#, C, B dance around the repeated D while gently drifting down from C# to B. The D octave in the bass also slows everything down for me, keeping it fixed on that one note. But as said, this is subjective.

Sonatina #6, movement 1, Allegro con spirito

Places that stand out to me in examining the score:

All the parts that stood out to me listening. Plus:

I like the way the bridge mm.16-22 from the exposition change completely for mm.72-74. Despite being less than half the length of the original, the new bridge manages to squeeze in no less than three ascending D major scales. But lest he be accused of hammering D major too much, Clementi cleverly varies the bass over which these scales sound: D, then C#, then B.

I like the way m.36 of the exposition is modified in m.88 in the recapitulation. By changing the turnaround point in the scale passage in m.88 compared to its model in m.36, Clementi moves the recapitulation from sounding a fourth above the exposition, to sounding a fifth below. Thus he gets to have a high and glittering second theme in his recapitulation, but then descend an octave for a firmly grounded finish.

Sonatina #6, movement 1, Allegro con spirito


Try playing that passage with the G's as natural a couple of times. It has a very bland sound but when you go back to G#'s it really lifts it!

Whether or not someone hears it as an unusual note depends on how they are hearing, which includes what they are naturally listening for, and what is coming in on a subconscious level. For example, I was more inclined toward relative pitch and hearing music in groupings that belonged together (I'm groping for words). I naturally shifted into a new key without being aware of it. That means that if I got the feeling of being in A major at that point, the shift would have happened at the same time, and there would be nothing strange or unusual about the G#. It is the leading note of A and it would feel like it belongs.

On the other hand, if I was more of a pitch-oriented person, who hears G as G, G# as G, plays each note separately according to what it is, then I would have been hearing all the G's, and that sudden G# would really strike me. Since that time I have learned to hear this way as well, which is why I'm aware of both.

Composers wrote music to be played by musicians, but to be heard by non-musicians. So they would write material that appears normal because of how it is absorbed subconsciously on many different levels. Some of those sensibilities also belong to the musician.

In other words, PianoStudent88 not hearing anything unusual may as much be due to what she does not hear, as it may be due to what she DOES hear. This hearing thing is tricky business, and has more sides to it than I once imagined.

I'm wondering if it's because the tonic to dominant key shift is so common that I don't register the extra sharp as being out of (the original) key.

I'll try listening to it as G natural and listen to how that compares to G#.

What about forming your own impressions, and checking what your own impressions are, knowing that whatever they are, they are right because they are yours? I think that the main thing this section does for me, is to tell me that it's about to go on to something else. I know it intellectually because it has ended on E7. If it didn't land on A and give a feeling of A major or minor, I'd be surprised or disturbed. But since it does the expected, it doesn't make a big splash.

I am forming my own impressions, but I'm also interested in enlarging my impressions. For example, I've noticed that I often seem to be able to hear accidentals in the music: they stick out to my ear as something unusual. So it's curious to me that I can't hear the G# as unusual.

It's true that I'm particularly interested in hearing the G# because that would be, for me, the moment when the shift to the dominant starts (since I'm not trying to do what seems impossible for me right now, detect the shift to dominant by hearing a change in tonic). And I'm interested in hearing that shift because I'd like to be able to hear the parts in sonata form which are "home, away from home [shift to dominant in exposition], really far away from home [development], home again [recapitulation]." I may ultimately give up on being able to hear that, but for now I'm still curious about it.

How about ..... If Clementi decided to stick a new key signature into the middle of the measure at that point, there would no longer be an accidental. That's what we hear. It's the point of modulation.

I'm seeing this in colours for the moment. You could split a square in half, and colour one side red, and the other yellow. Or you could start smearing yellow and red together in the middle so that the red gets yellower and yellower, and the yellow gets redder and redder where they meet. There is a point where you can't tell whether it's red or yellow. (Of course we have a name for that combined colour - orange - reddish orange or yellowish orange). Is this nuts or does it make sense?

It is a good analogy for me KS. Accidentals will not be so apparent when they are not accidentals at all in the modulation that has taken place. Else, they may be very apparent when they are adding colour that is not in conformity with the key.

As a beginner student here, I would be more likely to notice (that is hear) a shift from Red to Yellow. But, when it is by way of Orange, I would be more likely to miss the smoother transition and then look back and say "what happened, how did I end up in this key?"

Meanwhile, are we ready to do the next two movements of sonatina 6? Is this the last one of Clementi being done?

Sonatina #6

I'm always game to go. I just see one more movement (Rondo) of this Sonatina. And, believe this is the first Sonatina we have come across with just two movements. Albeit the first movement was larger than most.

Perhaps, Mr. Clementi was running out of steam.

I had taken a look at the Rondo earlier in the week to identify the sections, and what I had marked was:

A - M1-M24 (I had thought of labelling M17 to M24 as something other then A, but changed my mind)

B - M25-M38

C (development) - M39-M63

A

Happy for someone else to take the lead from here on identifying more (correcting above) etc. I'll not have too much time to look at this more today as have some appointments to tend to. Also, my batting average has not been so great with the Rondo's.