Sapp: Violin Sonatas I–IV and Viola Sonata
Series: American Music Publisher: A-R Editions
Violin Sonatas I–IV and Viola Sonata
Edited by Alan Green
A092 Sapp: Violin Sonatas I–IV and Viola Sonata
978-1-9872-0887-0
Full Score (2024)
9x12, xi + 114 pp.
$330.00
In stock
SKU
A092
Performance Parts (Available Separately)
A092P1
A092P2
The five sonatas in this edition exhibit Allen Sapp’s characteristic expansive lyricism and depth of expression. Violin Sonata I was composed in 1942–43 while Sapp was studying with Nadia Boulanger and Aaron Copland. Following his service in Europe during World War II, he composed his Violin Sonata II and Viola Sonata in 1948. Klaus George Roy, in his review of a Boston performance by Joseph De Pasquale, called Sapp’s Viola Sonata “a work of beauty and immediate emotional appeal. There is a genuine lyric line and warmth of expression, carried by a real mastery of the polyphonic medium. . . . Who says the moderns can’t write a melody?” While these first three string sonatas were cast in a neoclassical style, Violin Sonatas III (1960) and IV (1981) are written with more chromatically complex harmonies and employ serial composition techniques, yet still exhibit a strong tonal orientation. Sapp considered Violin Sonata IV as the beginning of his late phase of composition, and possibly the most memorable of his works.
Violin Sonata I
I. Lento
II. Allegro
III. Andante
Violin Sonata II
I. Allegro ma non troppo
II. Larghetto
III. Presto
Violin Sonata III
I. Allegro energico
II. Adagietto
III. Presto
Violin Sonata IV
I. Roughly
II. Slowly
Viola Sonata
I. Commodo
II. Adagio
III. Allegro molto
Alan Green is Professor and Head of the Ohio State University Music and Dance Library. He is the author of Allen Sapp: A Bio-Bibliography (Greenwood Press, 1996), and was executive producer for a CD titled Allen Sapp (Composers Recordings, Inc., 1998, now in the New World Records catalog), which contains three orchestral works performed by the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra conducted by Keith Lockhart.