Johann Joseph Fux (1660-1741) und die Kontrapunktlehre

Der strenge Satz wurde als Voraussetzung für einen geregelten Kompositionsunterricht betrachtet und diente als Grundlage für den freien Satz - zum Beispiel bei Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, Joseph Haydn. Die Verleugnung der Einheit von strengem und freiem Satz führte seit dem Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts zu einer zunehmenden Entfremdung von Theorie und Praxis. Heinrich Schenkers Bemühung, dem Zusammenschluß von Kontrapunkt und Harmonielehre eine theoretische Begründung zu geben, führte wieder zu Fux "Gradus ad Parnassum" zurück. (Autor)

Biography of a Book

This chapter traces the progress towards publication of Keats’s collection which eventually appeared in 1820, its title page reading, ‘LAMIA, ISABELLA, THE EVE OF ST AGNES, AND OTHER POEMS. | BY JOHN KEATS, AUTHOR OF ENDYMION || LONDON: PRINTED FOR TAYLOR AND HESSEY, 1820’. Stung by the savage reviews and commercial failure of his previous efforts, Poems (1817) published on 10 March, 1817, and Endymion: A Poetic Romance published in early May, 1818, Keats was understandably disheartened when contemplating further publications. However, by September 1819 he was, according to Woodhouse, writing to the publisher John Taylor, willing ‘to publish the Eve of St Agnes & Lamia immediately: but Hessey told him it could not answer to do so now’. On 10 October he had spoken of writing ‘Two or three’ poems in which he wishes ‘to diffuse the colouring of St Agnes eve throughout a Poem in which Character and Sentiment would be the figures to such drapery’. He hopes that writing such poems ‘in the course of the next six 3 years, would be a famous gradus ad Parnassum altissimum—...’. Writing on 17 November, 1819, he asserted ‘I have come to a determination not to publish Anything I have now ready written’, a corpus which in fact included all the poems which were to be included in 1820. The definite decision to put together the ‘Lamia’ collection was made between the date of the letter to Taylor (17 November, 1819) and a relatively buoyant letter to his sister Fanny written on 20 December, 1819. The collection was published in late June, 1820. The result was one of the greatest poetry collections of all time, though it has rarely been considered in this integrated light since editors and critics invariably consider each poem in the chronology of its composition rather than their contribution to a unity which is greater than the sum of the parts.

FOUR STEPS TOWARDS PARNASSUS: JOHANN DAVID HEINICHEN'S METHOD OF KEYBOARD IMPROVISATION AS A MODEL OF BAROQUE COMPOSITIONAL PEDAGOGY

Johann David Heinichen's treatise Der General-Bass in der Composition (Dresden, 1728) is the most comprehensive study of thoroughbass ever written, yet it has been continually overshadowed in historical accounts by works published in the same decade by Jean-Philippe Rameau (Traité de l'Harmonie) and J. J. Fux (Gradus ad Parnassum). Despite Heinichen's nuanced treatment of a wide variety of musical subjects, Der General-Bass has yet to receive wide acclaim, in large part because it lacks a reductive pedagogical framework that can rival Rameau's basse fondamentale or Fux's species in simplicity and immediate appeal. Yet fortunately, the ‘partimento renaissance’ of the last decade has brought renewed scholarly attention to the centrality of thoroughbass is the only acceptable break in eighteenth-century music-making. Thus the time is ripe for a reappraisal of Heinichen's monumental work. On at least one occasion, Heinichen does indeed outline a pedagogical method of eminent simplicity: his four-step instruction in how to improvise a prelude at the keyboard. According to Heinichen, this method, which seems to be completely unknown today, is to be understood not only as instruction in improvising, but also as training for beginning composers. In explicating the pedagogy of one of eighteenth-century Europe's leading composer-theorists, this article contributes to both the historically informed analysis and the practical teaching of baroque music today.

Muzio Clementi

Mutius Philippus Vincentius Franciscus Xaverius Clementi (b. 1752–d. 1832) was an Italian composer, a pianist virtuoso and conductor, a teacher, a publisher, and a musical entrepreneur. Son of Niccolò Clementi and Magdalena (née Kaiser), he was educated in Rome with, among others, Antonio Boroni and Gaetano Carpani. An oratorio (disp 1, old WO1), now lost, is dating from 1764. In 1766 he moved to Dorset (United Kingdom), following the English nobleman Peter Beckford (b. 1740–d. 1811), which assured him a solid continuity in the study of composition and the practice of the harpsichord. From around 1774 and 1780, Clementi settled in London, where he appeared in piano performances and composed his first works for piano, comprising solo and accompanied sonatas (Opp. 1–4 and the Op-sn 17, old WO2). Between 1780 and 1785, Clementi traveled for his first European trip between Paris, Lyons, and Vienna, where he appeared before the Emperor Joseph II for the famous piano competition with Mozart on 24 December 1781. During these years, Clementi composed the Opp. 5 and 6 (published in Paris by Bailleux) and the so-called “Viennese” sonatas Opp. 7–10 (published by Artaria, Castaud and Torricella), also comprising the Toccata Op. 11, the Op. 12, and other pieces. Back to London, Clementi continued his career as a performer (until around early 1790) and as a teacher. Belonging to this period is the largest part of Clementi’s musical production (from Op. 13 to Op. 39) made of solo and accompanied piano sonatas, the two symphonies Op. 18, also comprising his first musical tutor, the Introduction to the Art of Playing on the Piano Forte (Op. 42, 1801) and the Practical Harmony (Op-sn 38, old WO7, 1801–). Following the bankruptcy of Longman & Broderip, on 1 November 1798 Clementi became a senior partner in Longman, Clementi, and Co. and from 1801 onwards he founded Muzio Clementi & Co., establishing a successful business activity as a music publisher, as a piano maker and a music dealer for around thirty years. He started business relationships with Pleyel in Paris, Breitkopf and Härtel in Leipzig and Artaria in Vienna, reaching important goals as the contract with Haydn and the one with Beethoven of 1807. From the summer 1802 until 1810, Clementi traveled to the continental Europe, dealing mainly with the sponsoring of his business firm. His compositions for this period limit to Opp. 40 and 41, the Op-sn 12, old WO8, the Op. 50 (though published later in 1821), plenty of arrangements for piano and a huge number of revisions aimed at the inclusion within Breitkopf & Härtel’s important project of the Œuvres Complettes (1803–1819) and for his own firm. In the last period of his life, Clementi focused on the composition of his four major symphonies (remained unpublished), the Appendix Op. 43, the three volumes of the Gradus ad Parnassum Op. 44 (1817–1826), and the Opp. 46–49, the Opp-sn 25, 1 and 2 (old WO9, WO10, and WO11). Beyond being published by Clementi’s own publishing firms, Clementi’s works and revisions were reissued extensively by Welcker, Preston, Dale, Longman & Broderip, Bailleux, Sieber, Imbault, Porro, Castaud, Artaria, André, Breitkopf & Härtel, and Hoffmeister.