stylistic imitation: practical procedures

I'm missing the point, do you mean to create a sort of historical forgery? I ask because you start by saying that you want to do a stylistic imitation, therefore the most faithful copy of Beethoven, but then you conclude by saying "managing them freely in an elastic way". If you are in the field of stylistic reconstruction, then freedom is limited to Beethoven's cage; in this specific case, to a certain period of his.

Or are you only interested in the sonata form, which you mention at the beginning of the post?

I might be wrong, but I believe Feldman's purpose is the assimilation of early Beethoven's style. Exactly as one does in a Conservatory with Palestrina when studying the Motet, with Bach when studying the Fugue, with Brahms when studying the Piano Romance...

That being said, beyond the comparative analysis that Feldman already speaks of, I wouldn't know what else to suggest. Perhaps the study of musicological literature on the subject. Ideally, if one plays a string instrument, it would be to try playing these Quartets: practicing the repertoire is—in my opinion—one of the best means for acquiring the necessary stylistic sensitivity. As far as I am concerned, I actually found the experience of singing Palestrina's Motets in a choir, and playing Bach's Fugues on the piano, to be extremely useful... Of course, with the Quartet it is much more complicated!

Yes, as you say, it is a historical forgery, so fundamentally it is a comparative analysis between the quartets of op. 18...

I have already performed in-depth analyses of Haydn and Mozart quartets (Haydn's op. 33 and op. 74), but with op. 18 I found myself facing something more complex, even if it is the "first Beethoven," obviously influenced by classical composers.

More than anything, I am trying to understand which compositional processes Beethoven put into action to "arrive" at each formal section, therefore the procedures for developing the initial thematic material. I noticed a particular detail: while in Bach, Haydn, Mozart, and Clementi one often finds oneself facing the so-called "Grundgestalt," i.e., the continuous development of an initial cell that is manipulated and subjected to conventional contrapuntal techniques, such as inversion and retrograde, in Beethoven these techniques continue to exist but in a completely different form! In op. 18 no. 3 in D Major, for example, the initial theme does not present a generating cell/motif that is then developed (as happens instead in the 5th Symphony) but a cantabile melody in the first violin, changing in its surface structure... I thus tried to look for what is commonly defined in Bachian melodism as "virtual" or "hidden" counterpoint and I identified two melodic lines, both ending with a whole-tone turning note (upper melodic line) and a semitone turning note mi# fa# (lower melodic line, tail of the thematic phrase)... immediately after a long subdominant in the second phrase reveals an arpeggiated substructure of E minor, then embellished with many semitone turning notes.

Coincidentally, the second theme begins with a semitone turning note and continues with a whole-tone turning note and an A major arpeggio, practically the "retrograde" of the first theme... but not at the level of notes, as in strict counterpoint, rather at the level of intervallic relationships; the content, rhythm, articulation, phrasing, duration, and phraseological structure are contrasting!

This makes me think that Beethoven no longer acts at the level of simple motifs as his predecessors did, but that he sought to develop musical figures that contrast with each other yet at a deep level, united coherently through the use of very simple and I would dare say "skeletal" melodic and intervallic structures, such as turning notes and arpeggios.

Now, this can certainly help me, but what I meant by "elastic method" is the agility of writing in imitation: I know well that it is the "Beethoven Cage circumscribed to 1797/1800," but within this cage I cannot shamelessly copy from the op. 18 quartets and do a copy-paste; I must achieve precisely that writing elasticity whereby I am able to write directly in Beethoven's style any type of phrase, from the theme's consequence to the modulating bridge, to the second theme, to the end codas of the exposition, to the development.... so almost "empathizing" with him, otherwise it would result in simply copying something already existing without possessing its real contents...

RedScharlach wrote:

As far as I am concerned, I actually found the experience of singing Palestrina's Motets in a choir, and playing Bach's Fugues on the piano, to be very useful... Of course, with the Quartet it is much more complicated!

One could opt to write reductions and anyway, aside from what Red has already suggested, even if it apparently seems like a useless thing, copying is a way to assimilate something of a composer's style (and Bach knows a thing or two about that).

Another way is to adopt the same compositional methodology of a certain composer; in your opinion, how did Beethoven compose in his first period? Adopting the same method increases the possibility of success for the "historical forgery."

Feldman wrote:

what I meant by "elastic way" is the writing agility in imitation:

The point is not to analyze, but what to observe during the analysis. If, for example, you look at the mere harmonic sphere, you will notice that it insists on certain chords, on certain connections; some harmonic solutions are practically underutilized. Already having a clear map of the most frequently used chords allows you to identify the colors. In this phase, it is very useful to trace how they manage the harmonic progression, which is quite different from the aforementioned Bach and so on, expanding the discussion to rhythm, form, management of periods, orchestration, etc.