Movement I: Allegro con brio: Exposition

In looking at the various themes in this piece, I notice how one of two things happen. The first situation is this. The theme is stated definitively and then its importance in the musical texture is lessened before the new theme is introduced. The second scenario is this: The theme sneaks in through on of the voices and then finally is picked up and played tutti by all the voices, before being discarded. Lets call them Situation I and situation II

From mm 1 – 29 (Situation I) that theme A is stated strongly in all voices and then its passed from the two upper voices until it becomes light and airy and less integral. Then theme B comes in at mm 30, and theme A is relegated to the bass line. This theme B then is strongly stated by the Violin I and carried through until mm. 48. Situation II comes in when theme C, the sequence of ascending 16ths actually starts out softly by the Violin I and then is gradually picked up by all the instruments at mm 54. Situation I is back again when at mm 57-59, the new theme D is played tutti and then given to the viola., but it comes back again tutti at mm 67 briefly.

At mm. 74, theme A comes back again, but again, tossed playfully between voices until the 16th note runs come back again at mm., 78, with a vengeance. (situation II)

At mm. 85, we have a strongly stated theme E from the top three voices that only briefly stops to give a passing reference to theme A in mm 89 before being picked up again.

Finally, there is the 16th notes frenzy that is again started in the violin I, briefly passed to the bass in mm. 107 and then picked up fiercely by all voices in mm. 111-112 before ending the exposition.

This expository section of the piece seems to mix and match these two situations quite well. It’s impressive to break something that sounds so complex into somewhat simple building blocks of harmony, texture and scoring.


as soon as I figure out how to put up a tabular analysis, I will