# Piano Sonata (Barber)

The Piano Sonata in E-flat minor, Op. 26, by the American composer Samuel Barber, was commissioned for the twenty-fifth anniversary of the League of Composers by American songwriters Irving Berlin and Richard Rodgers. Composed from 1947 to 1949, the sonata is in four movements. It was first performed by Vladimir Horowitz in December 1949 in Havana, Cuba, followed by performances in Washington, D.C. and New York City in January 1950. The sonata is regarded as a cornerstone of American piano literature and one of Barber's most significant achievements. Critics hailed it as a defining moment in mid-20th-century music, with The New York Times describing it as the "first sonata truly to come of age by an American composer of this period".
Barber began composing the work in September 1947, completing the first movement later that year. However, progress was slow due to his demanding schedule, which included preparations for his ballet Medea and Knoxville: Summer of 1915. A planned retreat to the American Academy in Rome to focus on the sonata proved unproductive, as Barber was distracted by the postwar social scene and his interactions with intellectuals, Vatican insiders, and Italian culture. Barber returned to the United States in 1948 and completed the second movement by mid-August. Initially, Barber envisioned a three-movement work, but after sharing his progress with Horowitz, the pianist suggested a four-movement structure with a "flashy last movement". This advice led Barber to compose a virtuosic four-voice fugue as a final movement.
Horowitz premiered the sonata in Havana, Cuba, on December 9, 1949. He followed this premiere with a private performance in New York in early January 1950 attended by prominent composers including Aaron Copland and Gian Carlo Menotti. The official US premiere took place at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C., later that month, followed by a performance at New York's Carnegie Hall. The sonata was met with immediate widespread acclaim, and has since been performed and recorded often.

## History

In September 1947, the American songwriters Irving Berlin and Richard Rodgers, on the League of Composers' recommendation, announced a commission for a piano sonata by Barber to mark the 25th anniversary of the League. Berlin and Rodgers provided funding for the commission. Barber began writing the sonata that month, completing the first movement by December 1947.
However, Barber's progress on the sonata was interrupted by a hectic schedule that demanded his focus, including rehearsals for his ballet Medea and plans for Knoxville: Summer of 1915. Barber planned to complete his sonata during his stay at the American Academy in Rome, initially planned from February to July. The composer was wary of the academy's crowded conditions and disgruntled atmosphere but hoped to work in isolation. However, once in Rome, he found it hard to focus, with the change of scenery and the charm of Italy's culture and people distracting. Barber was distracted by the postwar social and political scene, engaging with intellectuals, Vatican insiders, and historical interests like an excavation near Cosa. Despite attending inspiring concerts, including programs of newly discovered Vivaldi pieces, Barber struggled to accomplish much during his stay.
Barber returned to the United States early in the summer, sooner than planned, and finished the second movement in mid-August of 1948. Upon completing the first two movements, Barber initially planned that a slow movement would conclude the piece, and played the completed movements for Vladimir Horowitz, who later premiered the work, at Horowitz's house. Horowitz then suggested Barber include a "very flashy last movement, but with content"; Barber added a fugue after the slow movement in response to this request.
The composer finished the sonata in June 1949, and Vladimir Horowitz began to prepare it for performance, spending five hours a day practicing it. Barber later commented that Horowitz had been playing it "with a surprising emotional rapprochement which I had not expected". Horowitz premiered the sonata in Havana, Cuba, on December 9, 1949. This was followed by a private performance in New York at the former G. Schirmer headquarters on January 4, 1950. Gian Carlo Menotti, Virgil Thomson, Douglas Moore, William Schuman, Thomas Schippers, Aaron Copland, Lukas Foss, Myra Hess, and Samuel Chotzinoff all attended. The official United States premiere was in Washington, D.C., on January 11, 1950, at Constitution Hall; Horowitz then publicly played the work in New York on January 23, 1950 at Carnegie Hall. It received ubiquitous praise from music critics. By April 1950, plans were in place for Horowitz to record the sonata for a Christmas release that year; Horowitz made the recording in May, for RCA Victor. This recording remained Barber's preferred version for at least a decade.

## Structure and music

The sonata is in four movements, and usually takes twenty minutes to perform:
* Allegro energico
* Allegro vivace e leggero
* Adagio mesto
* Fuga: Allegro con spirito
The sonata is very difficult to play; Barber, himself a pianist, was unable to adequately play it, and the Music Library Association noted in 1986 that the sonata was "once considered almost too demanding a work". Structurally, the sonata adheres to traditional designs for each movement. Musicologist Hans Tischler writes that the sonata fuses modern compositional technique—such as contemporary harmonic materials and twelve-tone technique—with techniques from the preceding three centuries, such as sonata form, passacaglia, and fugue. Tischler also notes that the sonata follows Beethoven's example in terms of motivic development, seriousness, and concentration. American folk idioms are included in at least the second and fourth movements of the sonata. Despite forays into twelve-tone technique, and its chromaticism and dissonance, the sonata is based on a key center, that of E-flat minor. Some of the twelve-tone melodic patterns resemble examples from Nicolas Slonimsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns, a book that was reportedly on Barber's piano while he was composing the sonata.

### Allegro energico

The first movement is in "fairly traditional" sonata form and in $^4$ $_4$ meter. Musicologist Barbara Heyman writes that in this movement "the sonata form is more aptly delineated by melodic design than by harmonic structure". Barber worked several twelve-tone aggregates into the movement's texture. The composer prioritizes the musical motive over strict adherence to a twelve-note structure, allowing flexibility in note repetition, omission, and grouping to enhance the piece's expressive quality. According to musicologist Nathan Broder, the entire movement is based on four distinct themes, all introduced in the exposition; three of these themes are explored further in the development section.
The second section of the bipartite development marks a significant shift in the overall atmosphere of the piece. Up until this point, the music has been characterized by constant chromaticism. However, for the first time, the key signature aligns closely with the music itself, with no chromatic alterations for twelve measures. The section begins with a bass ostinato featuring a reworked quintuplet motive, creating a striking effect. The recapitulation begins with a climactic restatement of the first theme, now intensified by octave doubling and richer harmonies; the very first chord of the recapitulation incorporates the notes of both the German and French augmented sixth chords in E-flat minor, alongside the tonic chord. Although the recapitulation is slightly condensed compared to the exposition, it still presents all major thematic groups. The coda that follows is where the home key of E-flat minor is fully ascertained in the movement.

### Allegro vivace e leggero

The second movement is in rondo form, tonally centered in G major and in $^6$ $_8$ time. The rondo is a five-part ABACA, with each section featuring complex thematic development influenced by such features as chromaticism and metric modulations. For instance, the initial tonal framework initially suggests a G major backdrop, yet chromatic elements such as C# and F-natural subvert its stability. Section A introduces two primary themes, one in G major and one in the subdominant key of C major. Section B adopts a waltz-like character and is in C major. Within its distinctive atmosphere are complex syncopations, bitonalities, and blue notes. Following a return of section A, section C introduces a new theme in B-flat major, which has rhythmic and intervallic similarities to the second primary theme. The final return of the A section involves further chromatic shifts, ultimately resolving into a coda where melodic fragments from earlier sections are revisited and resolved.

### Adagio mesto

Often described as a passacaglia, the third movement is in ternary ABA form, and Broder describes it as "the most tragic of all of Barber's slow movements". Despite its chromaticism and twelve-tone writing, the movement is tonally centered in B minor, and often throughout the movement Barber enriches chords constructed from twelve-tone rows with notes independent from the rows. The movement opens with six dyads which constitute "a vertical statement of twelve tones" and serves as the first of two twelve-tone rows that comprise the entire movement's bass ostinato. The three sections of the movement are bridged by brief cadential passages that have no relation to the twelve-note aggregates. Tischler notes that "the employment of the twelve-note rows in this movement is quite original and a real contribution to contemporary technique", and is a reinterpretation of the traditional passacaglia through a 20th-century lens.
After the six dyads are repeated twice, with each repetition taking up one measure, the ostinato is transformed to an arpeggiated form in the third measure and then repeats in the fourth measure transposed up a half-step. The next two measures—numbers five and six—are where the second twelve-tone row is introduced in arpeggiation. The melody, though highly chromatic, does not constitute a row. Section B begins with a similar introduction to that of the opening A section. This section develops the opening melody by including a variant of it in faster thirty-second notes. The return of the A section also includes added counterpoint, with fragments of the melody in canon in a middle voice.

### Fuga: Allegro con spirito

The fourth movement is a four-voice fugue that is very difficult to play, and it has been widely considered one of the greatest examples of the fugue in the 20th century. While conventional in structure, syncopated rhythms and "blue note" harmonies, characteristic of American jazz, are woven into the fugue's fabric. The subject resembles old Italian fugue subjects in its sectional composition; there are three distinct motives in the subject. Tischler describes the fugue as having five development sections, each separated by episodes, and concluding with a coda. After the full subject and its borderline real answer are presented at the start of the piece, the entire subject henceforth reappears only twice: once in the second development section and again in stretto during the final episode. However, unlike those, Barber's subject does not distinguish between the head motive and the rest through contrasting note lengths.
The fugue's first countersubject is derived from the main theme of the first movement, and can also be divided into three motives. The first episode following the fugue's exposition includes a development of the countersubject canonically. The second episode includes fragments of both the subject and the first countersubject and includes rhythmic augmentation. The third episode, in E major, has been described by Broder as having an American folk-dance flavor. It develops the countersubject's first motive and presents it in augmentation and inversion. Throughout the episode, there are allusions to American Western folk music and Barber's earlier piano composition Excursions, and it provides a lyrical contrast to the intense momentum driving the rest of the movement. This episode is followed by another developmental section that opens with a peculiar stretto effect. The fugue eventually climaxes in a massive four-voice stretto over a dominant pedal point. The coda begins with a sinister gallop leading way to a passage where the right hand arpeggiates a German augmented sixth chord in E-flat minor, but with an added dominant (B-flat). A brilliant octave passage concludes the fugue and the sonata.

## Reception

Heyman stated that perhaps no other piece by Barber "has had as stunning an impact on the American musical world as his Sonata for Piano". The sonata's acclaim by music critics following its first performances was immediate. Richard Keith wrote in The Washington Post following Horowitz's January 11, 1950, Constitution Hall performance that the fugue is "one of the most musically exciting and technically brilliant pieces of writing yet turned out by an American"; Glenn Gunn of the Washington Times-Herald said "the sound of the instrument has not been exploited in a similar manner by any twentieth-century composer". Following the official New York premiere at Carnegie Hall, Olin Downes of The New York Times noted the sonata had a "prodigious success", declaring it "the first sonata really come of age by an American composer of this period."
The sonata was also praised by fellow composers, including Francis Poulenc, who wrote:
   This sonata, which I had already read, gives me unrestricted pleasure. It is a remarkable work from the musical point of view as well as the instrumental. By turns pathetic, cheerful, or lyric, it ends with a fugue of fantastic difficulty. We are far from the dull, scholastic fugues of the pupils—I repeat, the pupils—of Hindemith. This sparkling finale knocks you out in some five minutes.
Gian Carlo Menotti, Barber's romantic partner, said in 1981 about the sonata: "I don't know a single piano sonata in the modern repertoire that has that strength and power." George Walker praised the fugue as "exceptional".
The sonata has also received occasional criticism, primarily from musicologists. H. Wiley Hitchcock said that he considered the sonata "uneven and dangerously flawed", saying that it had "a kind of unevenness of inspiration or level of compositional skill, a kind of contrived quality to each of the movements that attempt something in fact not quite achieved". Charles Rosen expressed a dislike for the sonata, preferring Elliott Carter's Piano Sonata, which he found "terrific".

## Notable recordings

The world premiere recording of the sonata was made by Vladimir Horowitz in May 1950 at New York's Town Hall for RCA Victor. It was initially released on LP later that year; the LP's other side included Horowitz's recording of Chopin's Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-flat minor (Op. 35), a fact that delighted Barber: "anyone who wants to hear Horowitz play the funeral march [of Chopin's sonata]—and many will—will be forced to buy my sonata as well." This recording remained Barber's preference for at least ten years. A live recording of Horowitz playing the sonata at a Carnegie Hall recital on March 20, 1950, was also commercially released by Sony Classical Records. Moura Lympany performed the sonata for the first time on BBC in December 1950, a performance that Barber heard. The recording was subsequently released commercially by Decca Records. A live recording by Van Cliburn at the 1964 Salzburg Festival was released by Orfeo on CD; he subsequently made a studio recording in Rome in 1967 for RCA Victor. Marjorie Mitchell's recording of the sonata was released on Decca's Gold Label Series in 1966. Terence Judd's October 1977 live recording of the sonata from London was released on Chandos Records. John Browning's first studio recording of the sonata for Desto Records was made in 1970. Marc-André Hamelin made a studio recording of the sonata for Hyperion Records, which was released in 2004. Joel Fan's recording of the sonata was released in April 2009 by Reference Recordings. Leon McCawley also recorded the sonata in January 2010 for Warner Classics.