Goetschius - Serious Composer Vol 4: The Larger Forms of Musical Composition - PDF eBook

This book is a sequel to both The Homophonic Forms of Musical Composition, and Counterpoint Applied. The aim of Percy Goetschius for this volume was to give students of musical analysis and practical composition a guide through the successive stages in the evolution of the larger and largest forms of musical structure.

The Larger Forms of Musical Composition pulls its examples from the classical repertoire, not only because they provide the most reliable basis of technical habit, but also because the thorough knowledge of these older forms must precede the inevitable and desirable advance into the modern ones. As Goetschius states, "the classic designs are not lightly to be overthrown, for they are the cumulative product of a gradually dawning recognition of nature's laws, steadily progressing and crystallizing through the gathering and eliminating experiences of master-minds during many past centuries. It seems reasonable, therefore, to assume that true structural progress cannot be achieved by abandoning them, but rather by building on them."

Goetschius advises students of composition to master these classic forms through the exercises given in the book. Once mastered, these musical forms will give you a solid technical basis upon which to explore your own creativity and increase the power of your genius!

What You'll Learn in The Larger Forms of Musical Composition

Chapter 1: The Ground-Motive
Chapter 2: The Ground-bass, or Basso Ostinato
Chapter 3: The Passacaglia
Chapter 4: The Chaconne
Chapter 5: The Small (or simple) Variations-form
Chapter 6: The Large (or Higher) Variation-Form
Division Two: The Rondo-Forms: Introduction
Chapter 7: The First Rondo Form
Chapter 8: The Second Rondo Form
Chapter 9: The Third Rondo Form
Division Three: The Sonata-Allegro Forms: Introduction
Chapter 10: The Sonatina-form
Chapter 11: The Sonata-Allegro Form
Division Four: The Fugue
Chapter 12: Miniature Sonata-Allegro, as Expanded Three-part Song-Form
Chapter 13: Irregular Forms: Introduction
Chapter 14: Isolated Unique Designs
Chapter 15: The Overture
Chapter 16: The Compound Forms

303 pgs.

Please click on the Contents tab above for a detailed Table of Contents for this book.

With The Serious Composer^™ series, four of Dr. Goetschius' major works have been re-published and re-edited for easier reading of the material. His recommended order of study is as follows:

1. Elementary 18th-19th Century Counterpoint
2. The Homophonic Forms of Musical Composition
3. Counterpoint Applied
4. The Larger Forms of Musical Composition

A good working knowledge of beginning harmony and counterpoint as covered in Applied Professional Harmony 101 and 102 is recommended to get the most out of the books in this series.

About Percy Goetshcius

Richard Rodgers (of Rodgers & Hammerstein) said that Percy Goetschius was to harmony what Gray was to anatomy. Rodgers should know, as Dr. Goetschius was Richard Rodgers' teacher at the school that later became Juilliard.

Dr. Goetschius' list of students was a true Who's Who of composers - and composers whose lives spanned into the early 21st Century. Included among them are: Richard Rodgers, Howard Hanson, Leo Ornstein, Wallingford Riegger, Samuel Gardner, Arthur Loesser, and more. Outside of Nadia Boulanger, it's doubtful that any other single music teacher has had such a profound impact on his students as Percy Goetschius did.

What we know of Dr. Goetschius was found online through the Passaic County Historical Society, Lambert Castle, in Paterson, NJ, USA.

Percy Goetschius is a native Patersonian who has won international fame in the teaching of the theory of composition. Born in this city in 1853, he was a piano pupil of Robert E. H. Gehring, a prominent teacher of that era. Mr. Goetschius was the organist of the Second Presbyterian Church 1868-1870 and of the First Presbyterian 1870-73, and pianist of Mr. Benson’s Paterson Choral Society. He went to Stuttgart, Wurtenberg, in 1873 to study in the conservatory, and soon advanced to the teaching ranks. The King conferred upon him the title of royal professor. He composed much, and reviewed performances for the press. In 1892 he took a like position in the New England Conservatory, Boston, and four years later opened a studio in that city. In 1905 he went to the staff of the New York Institute of Music and Art, headed by Dr. Frank Damrosch. Prof. Goetschius has published nine textbooks on theory, which are accepted as standards in the musical world.