The expansion of Time and Space in Franz Schubert's Sonata in A Minor D. 845

Abstract

While Franz Schubert was not the first Viennese composer to greatly expand the scope of the piano sonata, he introduced many innovations into the sonata form and cycle, broadening them and stretching their boundaries both internally and externally. In this paper I analyze Schubert’s Sonata in A Minor D. 845 (Op. 42), focusing on its first movement. This ambitious work, completed in 1825, was the first of only three sonatas published during the composer’s lifetime. In performance, this sonata, aptly entitled Premiere Grande Sonata, typically lasts about forty minutes, with the first (sonata) movement and the second (theme with variations) being of almost identical length when played in prescribed tempi. In my analysis of the first movement I will focus on methods employed by Schubert for the purpose of expanding musical time and space—resulting in what Carl Dahlhaus has dubbed the lyric-epic quality in Schubert.