III. Recapitulation (or Reprise)

Consisting essentially of the same subdivisions found in the exposition, but differing from this first section in one essential point, viz., that instead of stating the secondary theme in a related key, the entire recapitulation is in the principal key. This third section is always followed by a coda (which may either be very short or quite extended), bringing the whole movement to a more definite close.

The second part of sonata-form (the development section) is sometimes the longest and most intricate of the three divisions, and it is at this point that the composer has an opportunity of displaying to the full his originality and inventive skill. It is principally because of this development section that the sonata is so far superior as a form to its predecessors. For an analyzed example of sonata-form, see [Appendix E]. The student is advised to take other sonatas and go through the first movements with a view to finding at least the three main divisions mentioned above. In some cases the form will of course be so irregular that all the parts indicated cannot be discovered, but the general outlines of the scheme will always be present.

158. A sonatina, as its name implies, is a little sonata. It differs from the sonata proper principally in having little or no development, the second section being of slight importance as compared with the corresponding section of a sonata.

A grand sonata is like an ordinary sonata in form, but is of unusually large dimensions.

159. Program music is instrumental music which is supposed to convey to the listener an image or a succession of images that will arouse in him certain emotions which have been previously aroused in the composer's mind by some scene, event, or idea. The clue to the general idea is usually given at the beginning of the music in the form of a poem or a short description of the thing in the mind of the composer, but there are many examples in which there is no clue whatsoever except the title of the composition.

Program music represents a mean between pure music (cf. the piano sonata or the string quartet) on the one hand, and descriptive music (in which actual imitations of bird-calls, whistles, the blowing of the wind, the galloping of horses, the rolling of thunder, etc., occur), on the other. Most program music is written for the orchestra, examples being Liszt's "The Preludes," Strauss' "Till Eulenspiegel," etc.

[160.] A symphonic poem (or tone poem) is an orchestral composition of large dimensions (resembling the symphony in size), usually embodying the program idea. It has no prescribed form and seems indeed to be often characterized by an almost total lack of design, but there are also examples of symphonic poems in which the same theme runs throughout the entire composition, being adapted at the various points at which it occurs to the particular moods expressed by the program at those points.

The symphonic poem was invented by Liszt (1811-1886) and has since been used extensively by Strauss, Saint-Saëns and others. It came into existence as a part of the general movement which has caused the fugue and the sonata successively to go out of fashion, viz., the tendency to invent forms which would not hamper the composer in any way, but would leave him absolutely free to express his ideas in his own individual way.