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Chopin's Piano Sonata in B Flat Minor Opus 35 - The early analyses - Leichtentritt and Reti

 
CHAPTER 1

 

first four bars. His observations in connection with the latter have been examined in further detail in more recent writings such as those of Réti, Walker and Leiken.

 

Leichtentritt also examines the issue of thematic unity in the sonata. He observes that derivatives of the first subject manifest themselves in the second subject, as well as the accompaniment to the melody of the second subject.[111] As shown in Example 2, the second subject grows organically out of the first through the rhythmic change of the first subject. Example 3 shows how the accompaniment of the melody of the second subject makes use of a new rhythmic variant of the first subject. A further link is shown in Example 4, where the material in the right hand of bars 81 to 82 also derives from the first subject. Leichtentritt calls this phenomenon of thematic integration the "principe cyclique", and notes that it was used by Beethoven in his Piano Sonata Opus 81a and last quartets as well as by Liszt in his sonatas.

 

[111] ibid., p. 212.

 

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