The Sonate auf Concertenart: A Postmodern Invention? David ...

Sonate auf Concertenart, p. 25
73 m. 8b. The eventual restatment of a sequential passage from the ritornello, in mm. 61-2, thus has
no clear articulatory significance. It confirms the return to the tonic key area that has occurred by
this point, but it carries none of the force of of a closing ritornello or "tutti" passage in a solo
concerto.
More fundamental than the supposed "tutti" or "solo" character of any instrumental part
may be the mere presence of some sort of contrast between the types of material associated with
each of the upper parts, at least in their initial entries. Thus, as Swack has observed, in the Amajor
sonata BWV 1032 (ex. 2) the flute enters with a contrasting lyrical theme, and nowhere in
the surviving fragment does this part play the virtuoso passagework characteristic of the mature
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solo concerto. That this was a normal procedure emerges from such instances as the Graun
sonata (ex. 1), in which the flute entrance is marked Cantabile, and from the first movements of
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the doubtful sonatas for flute and keyboard BWV 1020 and 1031. In some works, such as the
Graun sonata in A (ex. 1), the original dichotomy between the two melody instruments is retained
throughout the movement; the violin never plays the flute's new theme, and the flute plays only
material from the later portions of the violin's opening (ritornello) passage. Bach allows a greater
amount of interplay in most such movements, but in the extant portion of BWV 1032/1, as in
Wendt 8, the harpsichord never plays the flute's opening gesture.
This, incidentally, creates a dilemma for reconstructers of the missing portion of the Bach
movement: whether or not to transfer the flute's opening line to the keyboard at some point, in
keeping with Bach's usual practice of exchanging significant thematic material between the
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principal parts. Giving the keyboard a solo statement of the flute's opening line, in emulation of
73 Cf. Williams (The Organ Music, 15): in the first movement of BWV 526, "sections
could follow each other in various orders"; he cites the instance in which "the passage built on
sequential trills" leads first to passage "B" (m. 22) and later to "A" (mm. 70-1).
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Swack, "On the Origins," 404-5.
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Other examples occur in Telemann's quartet sonatas or concertos TWV 43:g2, 43:G12,
and 43:A4. Mary Oleskiewicz, "Quantz and the Flute at Dresden: His Instruments, His Repertory,
and Their Significance for the Versuch and the Bach Circle" (Ph.D. diss., Duke University, 1998),
245, finds that in about a quarter of Quantz's concerto movements the flute enters with material
"more lyrical than the ritornello"--but the solo episodes of quick movements usually still proceed
to virtuoso writing.
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For a survey of some of the numerous reconstructions of BWV 1032, see Gerhard
Kirchner, "Ein Schnitt und seine Folgen: Zum ersten Satz der Sonate BWV 1032," in Festschrift
Hans-Peter Schmitz zum 75. Geburtstag, ed. Andreas Eichhorn (Kassel: Bärenreiter, 1992),
117-34. I am grateful to Walter Mayhall for bringing this article to my attention. Marissen
describes his own reconstruction (unknown to Kirchner) in "A Critical Reappraisal." In my
unpublished version--which is similar in broad outlines to that described by Marissen--the passage
first heard in mm. 9-33 is recapitulated a fifth lower and with the upper parts exchanged to
conclude the movement.