The question of form of the final movement in the keyboard sonatas by Joseph Haydn in the 1770s
The 21 keyboard sonatas that Haydn composed from 1771 to 1780 demonstrate his special interest for this genre during this particular period. Apart from the variety of sonata types with three or only two movements and their specific order, in this repertory a clear tendency is also observed towards the gradual replacement of sonata and minuet forms by other structural choices for the final movements. Therefore, in the present study the structural characteristics of each separate final movement are exhaustively examined in the frame of ternary sonata form (Hob. XVI: 18, 20, 21, 23, 32 and 39 / WU 20, 33, 36, 38, 47 and 52), minuet form with or without trio (Hob. XVI: 36 and 38 / WU 49 and 51, Hob. XVI: 25-26 / WU 40-41), experimental “hybrid” forms (Hob. XVI: 24 and 29 / WU 39 and 44), “simple” or “strophic” variations form (Hob. XVI: 27-28 and 30-31 / WU 42-43 and 45-46), “double” or “alternating” variations form (Hob. XVI: 22, 33 and 44 / WU 37, 34 and 32), as well as rondo form (Hob. XVI: 35 and 37 / WU 48 and 50), and finally the question of form in general – regarding the final movement in Haydn’s keyboard sonatas of the 1770s – is considered in its historical perspective.
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