Iacobus Leodiensis [Iacobus de Montibus, Iacobus de Oudenaerde]

(b) Free fantasies and other improvised pieces and passages.

By the Classical era solo improvisation was carried out mostly by keyboard players, and few excelled at it. Dittersdorf declared that he liked hearing only ‘Mozart, Clementi and other creative geniuses’, whose improvisation had been incompetently aped everywhere. The free fantasy occupies the final section of C.P.E. Bach's treatise. He made it clear that the key to successful improvisations of this kind is a solid knowledge of progressions and consistency of harmonic rhythm. The ametrical fantasy that illustrates his points recalls many of his compositions.

Mozart's and Beethoven's improvisatory abilities were celebrated; their concerts frequently featured solo improvisation. The fantasias composed by Mozart, which may represent revisions of pieces improvised in concert, are mostly metrical; despite their free declamation, they give the appearance of having been carefully worked out. In addition to such fantasies the most common types of keyboard improvisation were spontaneous variations on a given theme, and improvised preludes used either to try out an unfamiliar instrument before a formal performance or to link works in different keys. A number of Mozart's modulating preludes survive. These little-known works (all published in NMA) are mostly ametrical. Beethoven's Fantasia op.77 (which may be a revision of an improvisation at his Akademie at the Theater an der Wien on 22 December 1808) is primarily metrical, though it contains several striking ametrical passages. Schubert's fantasies are metrical.

Keyboard improvisation was not limited to solo performances. Walther Dürr suggested that the lack of piano introductions to many of Schubert's songs implies that the accompanist improvised a brief Vorspiel. Dürr theorized that many of the piano introductions in the posthumous lieder that are not known definitely to have been composed by Schubert were derived from his improvisations; Dürr characterized these not as forgeries (‘Fälschungen’) but as necessary complements (‘Ergänzungen’) to the text in a printed edition for dilettantes.

(c) Continuo in piano concertos.

There is considerable evidence that Classical composers expected the soloist to improvise from the bass – figured or unfigured – during the orchestral ritornellos of keyboard concertos. 18th-century published editions of the keyboard part usually contain a figured bass in those sections, and Mozart notated ‘col Basso’ (‘with the bass’) in the left-hand staff of the keyboard part on virtually every page of the score where the soloist does not have an obbligato part. The reasons for this practice are still debated. Such concertos were normally conducted from the keyboard; it has been argued that the keyboard played chords to keep the orchestra together or that the bass line was nothing more than a cue to prevent the soloist from getting lost.

The Badura-Skodas (pp.207–8), pointing out the obvious differences in timbre between fortepiano and modern piano and between Classical and modern orchestral instruments, adduced criteria for the discreet use of continuo in modern performance. Neumann (1986, p.255) was more categorical, rejecting its use except on old instruments, and Charles Rosen (2/1972, p.192) stated flatly, ‘In the concertos of Mozart there is absolutely no place where an extra note is needed to fill in the harmony’. Two documents pertinent to the controversy survive. The first is an autograph continuo part of Mozart's Piano Concerto in C k246. The Badura-Skodas and Szász argued that it shows how Mozart played continuo. The second is the carefully notated continuo part in the autograph to Beethoven's Fifth Piano Concerto op.73. The lack of similar explicit directions in the earlier keyboard concertos can be explained by the fact that Beethoven personally performed them; the fifth was the only one he never played. The continuo part contains scrupulous figuration and indications of tasto solo, a l'ottava and Telemann-Bögen, and occasionally doubles the bass in octaves. Even if these annotations served a purely pedagogical purpose as part of Beethoven's instruction of Archduke Rudolph, as argued by H.-W. Küthen in his edition, it seems unlikely that Beethoven would use the manuscript of one of his most important works merely to teach an art which had no practical use. Beside the debate about the applicability of continuo in Classical concertos lies the question of how it was played. Some present-day scholars consider continuo to be a purely functional element of 18th-century music: the player merely plays a chord at each change of harmony, so as to complete the texture and keep the orchestra together. However, purely chordal continuo playing would contradict both the tradition of thoroughbass and the treatises of the period. Quantz and C.P.E. Bach specifically suggested that the continuo player vary the number of upper voices and improvise linear and quasi-linear music when appropriate. All thoroughbass textbooks treat voice-leading as primary, dealing not merely with the interpretation of the figures but with their contrapuntal implications. It would be as fallacious for the Classical period as for the Baroque to assume a composer to be unconcerned with a chord's qualitative presence merely because it was not written down. Notated accompaniments were unnecessary because players were able to improvise them.

Improvisation, §II, 4: Western art music: The Classical period

(ii) Vocal music.

Instructional and theoretical works came, through their sheer quantity, to assume a new importance to the student of ornamentation as the Classical period began and music publishing flourished. Some 20 comprehensive vocal methods or critical studies appeared in the period between 1763 and 1825 (after which the Rossinian revolution begins to be reflected). Many contain extensive notated examples, and these are of especial value in a period both of operatic reform and of virtuoso vocalism. The latter was cultivated with care, ambition and respect, although its extreme manifestations found cogent and persuasive detractors. Most writers on the subject discuss questions of taste and judgment, balancing the claims of composer and virtuoso; there is much thoughtful argument, and subtle differences of emphasis are found between writers. But without matching such accounts to detailed, notated examples it is impossible to determine what might have sounded restrained and what daring, still more to establish what were considered the idiomatic ways of carrying out standard ornamental procedures.

Domenico Corri is probably the most valuable single theorist as far as the provision of practical examples is concerned: he printed details of execution that were normally left unwritten, over a wide range of music; he was more reporter than advocate; and he was respected by his contemporaries. Other important writers were Giambattista Mancini, J.A. Hiller, J.B. Lasser, A.M. Pellegrini Celoni, J.F. Schubert, Giuseppe Lanza, Alexis de Garaudé, G.G. Ferrari, J.B. Rocourt, Isaac Nathan and R.M. Bacon. Annotated performance materials are plentiful but not readily accessible for study; in London, following Corri’s lead, publishers began to issue arias with embellishments and nuances indicated by small note heads, and there and in Paris arias were published showing a particular performer’s ‘realizations’ on a separate staff.

Little or no ornamentation is advised for plain recitative; Hiller (1780) stated that ornaments should be confined to occasional mordents and Pralltriller, though he accepted the need for more in scenas in accompanied recitative. J.F. Schubert advocated ‘appropriate free embellishment’ for fermatas but cautioned that this should be avoided where the word to which it would be sung made it inappropriate. In slow arias, or the slower sections of two-part rondò arias, the use of portamento was advocated by Corri, with messa di voce on longer notes, and the line might be highly graced, with appoggiaturas (single or compound) and acciaccaturas as the most common ornaments; little running passages might bridge leaps or fill out long notes, and syncopation, echo effects and division-like passages might be used. The surviving examples embellished by Mozart show the use of such devices (ex.21). Allegro arias or sections were less subject to decorative ornament, largely because of their greater speed and stricter tempo. Passing notes, appoggiaturas and the like are found, but in less profusion, and unmeasured flurries of quick notes are rare. Staccato and syncopation are sometimes used as ornamental devices, and running passages of semiquavers may be constructed on the outlines of melodies in longer note values. Hiller (1780) explained the distinction: ‘in slow and pathetic arias, slurred and drawn-out ornaments are the most appropriate, just as thrusting ones belong more to the Allegro’. In both styles, ornamentation generally involves adding notes of quicker rhythmic denomination rather than rerouting existing semiquavers into another region of the voice or simply recomposing the melodies (a practice often followed in modern revivals). Some degree of thematic variation, however, was expected in the case of an aria with a recurring theme as it reappeared.

Many complete arias survive with ornamentation attributable to specific composers or singers. The Czech composer Václav Pichl noted, in Milan in 1792, the variants sung by Luigi Marchesi in different performances of Zingarelli’s Pirro (ex.22); its opening line gives some indication of what theorists meant when they decried ornamentation that overwhelmed the original. At least eight examples were published of the decorations sung by Angelica Catalani, which were equally florid. Mozart’s preferred style of ornamentation, ascertainable from ex.21 and from his elaboration of an aria from his Lucio Silla (1772), shows a number of features: (a) the use of passing notes and other small ornaments in the first statement, increased in the repeat; (b) the standard use of appoggiaturas on feminine line endings (and often elsewhere; the speed of their resolution should be noted); (c) the variety of pace in the passage-work, with the prevailing semiquavers often enlivened by a burst of demisemiquavers or uneven groups of quick notes; (d) the tendency to use embellishment to increase the complexity and speed of figuration (as opposed to altering melodic shape or tessitura: the idea of adding ‘excitement’ through high notes seems to play no part); (e) the use of syncopation and phrasing to vary the line, and (f) the increase in elaboration as cadences are approached. In the Lucio Silla aria it is worth noting, additionally, that the wide leaps in long notes are left unornamented.

Several theorists stress the importance of exactitude and curtailment of liberties when two or more voices are singing together. Pellegrini Celoni wrote:

Duets, trios, quartets etc. must be sung as they are written, and though it is permissible to vary this or that in the solos, in the remainder it is necessary to proceed with unanimity, and to pay close attention to forte, piano and pianissimo; to smooth out, connect and separate … in concerted pieces, … appoggiaturas, trills and mordents are still permitted, but always with moderation.

Others emphasized that cadenzas for two voices or for voice with obbligato instrument (which was expected when the accompaniment featured one) must be prepared in advance and were often written out by composers. Many examples survive, among them several for the duet for Susanna and Countess Almaviva in Le nozze di Figaro and for ‘Ah perdona’ from La clemenza di Tito.

Most of the foregoing discussion applies primarily to Italian music. Outside the Italian sphere, the application of italianate style decreased in proportion to the distance of the music itself from Italian models. Germans noted approvingly (and Italians complainingly) that sophisticated German accompaniments made vocal freedom and ornamentation less appropriate. J.F. Schubert admonished that the ‘compositions of Mozart, Haydn, Cherubini and Winter will bear fewer embellishments than those of Salieri, Cimarosa, Martín and Paisiello’. French singers seem to have carried from earlier generations some of their system of well-defined and differentiated ornaments which they preferred to the bolder manifestations of italianate passage-work, and to have applied them quite liberally to the ariettes and the strophic songs in their operas. In one kind of English song, where the voice moves predominantly in octaves with the bass, it is implied by Corri that the voice did not normally break the unison to add ornamentation; the basic shape of the vocal melody is retained, but passing notes and other smaller graces might be added. These, along with the gruppetto, or turn, and portamento, seem to have been regarded more as a part of tasteful execution than as ornamentation.

Improvisation, §II: Western art music.

5. The 19th century.

(i) Instrumental music.

(ii) Vocal music.

Improvisation, §II, 5: Western art music: The 19th century

(i) Instrumental music.

The early 19th century witnessed a meteoric rise in the popularity of improvisation and then its near-extinction post-1840 after suffering an ‘apotheosis of bad taste’ (Wangermée, 1950). The Romantic mind revelled in the spontaneous creativity of improvisation and its unique incarnation of musical genius. But improvisation also served more prosaic ends by pandering to a music-consuming bourgeoisie that craved brilliance and sensation, thus encouraging its rapid decline as trivialization threatened the artistic originality that had distinguished it in its 18th-century heyday. Other factors leading to the eradication of public improvisation included the rise of the performer as interpreter and the divorcing of composition from performance; the concomitant ascendancy of the ‘work concept’, itself inimical to the notion of music in flux so vital to improvisation; and an evolution in musical technique away from bass-orientated, syntactical structural outlines towards more melodically, generically or programmatically conceived frameworks which loosened the ‘inner thread’ (Schumann, 1854) that previously had held much extemporized music together.

In the first decades of the century, however, improvisation claimed a central role within musical culture – thanks to the pre-eminence of the piano, the instrument on which it was most commonly practised. Advances in design and construction thrust the piano on to centre stage in the concert halls of increasing importance in the era; greater virtuosity and expressivity resulted in particular from the instrument's enhanced sustaining powers, enriched timbral palette and repetition action (patented 1821). These were ruthlessly exploited by the ‘lions of the keyboard’ touring Europe, who inevitably included at least one improvisation in their concert programmes. Generally the last item to be heard, such an improvisation often featured popular melodies or operatic airs. Masters like Hummel and Liszt improvised on themes provided by the audience, partly to counter critics' charges that extempore performance was ‘little more than playing from memory’ (The Harmonicon, June 1830). Even Chopin – whose improvisations on Polish national melodies charmed audiences in Warsaw, Vienna and Paris – used this trick on occasion, once to please three clamouring princesses typical of the more private salon audiences, or Damenwelt (Moscheles, 1872), for whom improvisation was also de rigueur.

Another celebrated improviser was Beethoven, whose extemporizations, according to Czermy, were ‘brilliant and astonishing in the extreme’, ‘whether on a theme of his own choosing or on a suggested theme’ (ed. P. Badura-Skoda, 1963, trans. 1970). They generally took ‘the form of a first movement or rondo finale of a sonata’, a ‘free variation form’ or ‘a mixed form, one idea following the other as in a potpourri’ – formal procedures laid down in Czerny's own Systematische Anleitung zum Fantasieren auf dem Pianoforte (1829), perhaps the most important (certainly the most informative) improvisation treatise from the period. Others were published by the likes of Corri, Hummel and Kalkbrenner for the benefit of less skilled professionals and ‘conscientious amateurs’ (Kalkbrenner, 1849).

Czerny's treatise elucidates in turn the improvisation of preludes, cadenzas, fermatas and independent ‘works’ (fantasies, potpourris, capriccios etc.) but says little about their common characteristics. Dahlhaus (1979) argued that any improvisation – by definition spontaneous, though not necessarily original – involves the realization of one or more ‘models’, however defined. In the early 19th century, such models included chromatic bass progressions, discursive ‘nocturne’ accompaniments (usually supporting stylized vocal figuration), and harmonic sequences embellished by chord-outlining passage-work (arpeggios, scales, Rollfiguren etc.), all of which the hands might execute ‘almost without any consciousness of the mechanical operations which they perform’ (Hummel, 1881). Czerny too noted that the improviser frequently succumbs to ‘an almost subconscious and dream-like playing motion of the fingers' while nevertheless ‘adhering constantly to his plan’ (1829, trans. 1983; compare Fétis and Moscheles, 1840).

As Czerny indicated, improvisers also utilized higher-order plans refined through practice and experience to lend coherence to their extemporizing. In contrast to the simple figured-bass ‘skeletons’ (Gerippen) exemplified in C.P.E. Bach's Versuch, larger-scale improvisatory models after 1800 often comprised loose formal templates defined in thematic terms. The prevailing stile brillante offered a ready-made paradigm with its characteristic alternation between virtuoso and lyrical episodes, an approach also taken in countless ‘brilliant’ compositions by Hummel, Chopin, Liszt and lesser contemporaries. The cement binding successive phases of the occasionally sprawling improvisations that resulted from this and similar formal strategies was melodic and motivic ‘imitation’ – ‘a study of the utmost importance to a pianiste who is desirous of extemporizing’ (Kalkbrenner, 1849). Ironically, the requirement of ever-greater organic unity in improvisation hastened its demise by inhibiting an essential freedom (Dahlhaus, 1979).

Czerny insisted, however, that an improvisation, although ‘in a much freer form than a written work’, ‘must be fashioned into an organized totality as far as is necessary to remain comprehensible and interesting’ (1829, trans. 1983). Improvisations on a single theme were ‘the most difficult of all’ but could be crafted in an ‘interesting and orderly fashion’ simply by combining ‘several styles into one and the same fantasy’ (for instance, ‘Allegro’, ‘Adagio or Andantino’, ‘fugal’, ‘modulatory’, ‘lively rondo’) while avoiding ‘an eternal, wearisome, continuous repetition of the theme through all octave ranges and an irrational journeying back and forth among the keys’. A somewhat freer fantasy could be devised with several themes (the first – ‘the pillar on which all else is constructed’ – must ‘recur frequently between the remaining themes’ and again at the end); as a potpourri (a ‘combination of such themes that are already favorites of the public’); or as a capriccio (‘an arbitrary linking of individual ideas without any particular development’). Other possibilities included theme-and-variation and ‘strict, fugal’ formats.

Preludes had more practical functions than the fantasy, among others to test the instrument, establish an appropriate mood and warm up the fingers. Although mostly ‘introductory’, preludes were also improvised as links between pieces, a practice resurrected on occasion long after the demise of preluding mid-century. Typically restricted in motif and harmony, preludes might commence in a remote key but normally ended on the dominant 7th chord of the main tonality, thus resolving to the ensuing composition. Stylistic possibilities ranged from unmeasured recitative to bravura virtuosity, as demonstrated in the numerous collections published from 1810 to 1830 for both professionals and amateurs (e.g. by Hummel, Cramer, Haslinger, Moscheles and Kalkbrenner).

Recitative passages also infiltrated period compositions (for instance, Chopin's Nocturne op.32 no.1; Beethoven's Sonatas op.31 no.2, op.110), along with other improvisatory devices like cadenzas (i.e. in solo pieces) and embellishments (often vocally inspired). Ironically, the latter features lost their earlier improvisatory purpose in that cadenzas were increasingly notated by composers in concertos, while improvised embellishments (portamentos, fioriture etc.) came to be viewed as ‘concessions to bad taste’ and ‘sacrilegious violations of the spirit and letter’ of composed music (Liszt, 1837).

As for fantasies committed to paper, these reveal the evolution in the models used by improvisers even if they lack the spontaneity of live improvisation. Although dubbed a capriccio by Czerny, Beethoven's Fantasia op.77 (published 1810) amounts to a ‘Fantasy-Prelude’ preparing a theme-and-variations set with coda, this formal succession corresponding to a background bass motion (ex.23) from B/A (‘Fantasy-Prelude’) through B (theme and variations) and C (final variation) back to B (coda). This simple turning shape – recalling the structural foundation in Mozart's Fantasiak475 (see Rink, 1993) – may be typical of tonally conceived early 19th-century improvisatory models, likewise the starkly juxtaposed keys (f–f–f) in Schubert's Fantasia for piano duet d940 (1828; ex.24); the extended chain of 3rds (f–A–c–E–G–[B]–G–b–D–f–A) spanning Chopin's Fantaisie op.49 (1841); and, in Chopin's Polonaise-Fantaisie op.61 (1845–6), the linear bass ascent A–B–C–D–E uniting seemingly disparate thematic and virtuoso episodes (see Rink, 1993). In contrast, Liszt's Réminiscences de Don Juan (1841) derives structural logic through a reordering of Mozart's operatic plot: after a Grave opening intoning the Commendatore's music from Act 2 (D major) follows a lengthy theme-and-variations treatment of ‘Là ci darem la mano’ (A major), then a brilliant finale in B based on ‘Fin ch'han dal vino’ (typical of the ‘rousing, dazzling conclusions’ recommended by Czerny in longer fantasies). Liszt's dramatic conceit – whereby dissolution triumphs over virtue – controls the Fantasy, not an underlying tonal framework inherited from earlier improvisatory traditions. In contrast, his B minor Sonata (quasi una fantasia?) directly exploits tonally defined improvisatory models, a simple key progression b–D–F–b/B stabilizing the alternation between thematic and bravura passages.

The assimilation of improvisatory styles and procedures into formal composition (as shown in Liszt's Sonata) was yet another factor contributing to improvisation's decline, as the bold liberties or ‘stretched conventions’ (Carew, 1981) that once characterized it became compositional norms, thus undermining its special status. Improvisation did not however disappear altogether but became restricted to domains like organ playing, often in the ‘strict, fugal’ style described by Czerny and contemporaries. Thus pursued, its purpose was chiefly academic, although Bruckner's exceptional organ improvisations in concerts in Paris (1869) and London (1871) thrilled audiences.

Though dominated by the solo piano and, later, the organ, 19th-century improvisation was also practised by violin-piano duos (e.g. Clement and Hummel, Reményi and Brahms) and other instrumentalists, while Beethoven and Wölfl, Mendelssohn and Moscheles, and Chopin and Liszt improvised publicly on two pianos.

Improvisation, §II, 5: Western art music: The 19th century

(ii) Vocal music.

Pedagogical sources of the Romantic period tend to concentrate more on technical and physiological matters than on questions of performing practice; but the increasing publication of vocal scores provides a rich surviving body of annotated performance material. By the end of the period a far more specific and illuminating type of evidence is available in the form of sound recordings. Among many informative vocal methods may be singled out those of Lablache (for its brief, intelligent overview of ornamental practices), Duprez (for the new dramatic style and cadenzas), Garcia (the most comprehensive), Faure (valuable for the distinction between French and Italian practices) and Delle Sedie. Sieber, Lemaire and Lavoix, and Bach provided valuable stylistic information with emphasis on practices in their respective countries. There also survive, published and in manuscript, arias ‘realized’ or annotated by Rossini and Donizetti and by (or after) many of the leading singers of the time, as well as isolated ornaments by Verdi and various singers. Additional clues may be obtained from instrumental adaptations or fantasias.

In orchestrally accompanied recitative, cantabile, arioso elements and ornamental vocalization continued to be important; composers increasingly wrote the ornaments into the score. Ex.25 shows part of Tancredi’s opening recitative, as scored and then as realized by Rossini for a singer. Examination of this, along with recitative realizations by Rubini, Garcia and others, shows that the greater floridity and greater variety of note values observed in Verdi’s recitatives reflect an increase not so much in elaborateness of recitative style as in the specificity of notating it – indeed, the elaboration of execution probably decreased somewhat, in contrast to the notational practice.

The ‘aria cantabile’ continued to be the principal locus for melodic embellishment. Garcia, who is more explicit even than Domenico Corri, gives details of phrasing, dynamics and expression as well; ex.26 shows a section from one of his examples. A decrease in density of figuration across the first half of the century is easy to discern; extending the examples backwards to, say, Catalani, at the beginning of the century, and forward to the artists heard on early recordings, would show this to be a steady, continuous process.

The cabaletta, the fast final section of the aria from the time of Rossini until the dissolution of standard aria structures into the more flexible forms of the mature Verdi, consisted of a strophe, a ritornello, an exact repeat (occasionally abbreviated) and a coda whose length and complexity varied considerably. Rossini wrote to Clara Novello that ‘The repeat is made expressly that each singer may vary it, so as best to display his or her peculiar capacities’. The transitional passage from the slow section (sometimes in recitative) often concluded with a vocal flourish, which could recur between the strophes. These flourishes most often expressed a simple, unresolved dominant 7th. Surviving examples include variants by Pauline Viardot (for a pupil) for the lead-in to ‘Sempre libera’ (La traviata) and one in the role-book for Azucena used to launch ‘Deh! rallentate, o barbari’ in the French version of Il trovatore in Paris (1857).

Ornamentation in the cabaletta itself is of three kinds: elaboration of fermatas, most often at the end of each strophe or during the coda; variation of the basic stanza on repetition; and elaboration of the coda’s stock cadential sequences, whose similarity from piece to piece facilitated free improvisation. In contrast to the usual gracings of cantabile, cabaletta repeats took the form of genuine variations, freely altering the melodic shape at times. Orchestral doublings of the melodic line were often removed to facilitate ornamentation, as can be seen from numerous sets of 19th-century parts. Many examples of cabaletta variation (by Jenny Lind, Giuditta Pasta and others) survive; Rossini’s for several of his own cabalettas, and one each by Bellini and Nicolini, were published (with imperfect but decent fidelity) by Ricci.

In Rossini, Bellini and Donizetti, the coda is based on the same chord sequence observed at the end of the cantabile, but in tempo and usually with accelerating harmonic rhythm (ex.27); this portion was elaborately and freely varied. Garcia, Lanza and others give tables showing the multiple possibilities, and examples by Rossini and many singers exist. Cabalettas continued to be embellished in early Verdi (Giulia Grisi’s variations for I due Foscari survive in Rome). By the time he stopped writing them – his last orthodox solo cabaletta is in the 1863 version of La forza del destino – the repeat was commonly omitted in performance. It seems likely that cabalettas were ornamented only as long as they were repeated.

Up to, and probably throughout, Rossini’s time, the end of the coda seems to have been taken without rallentando and with a burst of florid virtuosity, often concluded in the low register. But as the excitement of the held top note gradually assumed a greater role in vocal expression, it became customary to add one just before the final note of the cabaletta while the orchestra pauses or sustains. This is sometimes found in Verdi’s scores, and occasionally earlier, although it became a universal practice only later. Increasingly, towards the end of the century, much or all of the coda was omitted; the singer proceeded from the final fermata of the strophe directly to the last few bars of coda or to the postlude. The conclusions in ex.27 clearly envisage an ending in tempo. Ex.28 shows two more cabaletta conclusions: one by Naldi, clearly ending in tempo, and one by Viardot from about 1880, showing a hold before the final note, now taken in the high register. Many sets of cabaletta variants break off at this point, suggesting a conclusion more or less as in the score or with conventionalized elaboration, and many sources that are specific about accompaniment practice (above all Garcia) show the conclusions of their cabalettas with no hint that the tempo was to be retarded.

It is clear from Rossini’s revisions of his Italian music for Paris that the norm there was less florid than in Italy (despite the fact that the Paris operas were still liberally embellished, as we know from Cinti-Damoreau and numerous other sources). The strong penetration of the Italian repertory in the 1840s and 50s by translated versions of Meyerbeer and Auber (to be followed by Gounod, Thomas and Massenet) led the way towards a simpler style of impassioned lyricism in Italian singing. Nevertheless, it was the French who maintained the old Italian skills of florid singing rigorously to the end of the century, while their Italian contemporaries had long simplified Rossini’s Otello and were beginning to do the same to the less demanding Barbiere. In Germany and eastern Europe, a tension between the dominance of Italians and emerging native styles was felt throughout the century, with the Italians essentially ranged on the side of more freedom for the soloist. By the middle of the century in Germany, and by its end throughout Europe, schools of singers had emerged as specialists in national repertory (eventually in Wagner).

Recordings provide valuable evidence on ornamentation. The first opera singer known to have made a surviving record is Peter Schram (1819–95), who in 1889 sang two excerpts from the role of Leporello into a cylinder machine; although it provides interesting testimony to the transmission of Classical music, the record has little bearing on the performance of Romantic music. Seven singers born in the 1830s, and 24 born in the 1840s, also recorded, as did several dozen born in the 1850s and 60s. This body of evidence brings the priceless opportunity to observe many aspects of vocal technique. Ornamentation was still practised, mostly by Italian singers but also by foreigners who made their careers in Italy or who became part of the budding ‘international’ scene in New York and London, and by some of the more old-fashioned artists based in France and Germany.

The ornaments are simpler and fewer than those in use earlier in the century. Most were staples of ornamental practice going back at least to the Classical period: gruppetti of four or six notes, acciaccaturas, two-note slides, and the accented reiteration of the antepenultimate note of a cadence that Garcia traces back to the castratos and that was popularized by Rubini. These ornaments were all started on the main note, even the acciaccatura: though notated with a single ‘small note’ above the main note, it was uniformly executed as what we would now call an inverted mordent (unless approached by step from below, in which case it was sometimes sung in the ‘modern’ one-note fashion). The only prominent ornament not found in earlier sources, and that seems to have developed in the second half of the century, is the extended acciaccatura figure (ex.27c); this was widely used in Verdi. French singers – less often Germans, almost never Italians – still introduced trills and executed the written ones with great clarity and elegant resolutions.

In early recordings, the preoccupation with interpolated high notes had not reached its peak; singers with good high notes often added them, but many recordings of favourite arias lack the familiar extra high notes. These, like the ‘standard’ coloratura variations of ‘Una voce poco fa’ and the Lucia Mad Scene, are mostly products of the earlier part of the 20th century, when Italian conductors and coaches set about the task of establishing more or less fixed texts for surviving Italian operas from the period of improvisation.

Improvisation, §II: Western art music.

6. The 20th century.

In addition to the continuing traditions of improvisation associated with functional music (e.g. social dance, organ playing in church), the early 20th century added a new kind, that of extempore piano accompaniment to silent films. But of course the richest new manifestation of improvised music was jazz. This had an influence on almost every composer from Debussy onwards, but not as improvisation. The first half of the 20th century was, on the contrary, a time of great emotional exactitude, except in the music of a very few composers, including Ives and Grainger, and even in their scores the performer’s freedom is limited to such matters as choice from among different versions, or how to achieve a compromise with idealistic demands. Composers’ performances of their own music (the recordings made by Stravinsky and Bartók, for example) reveal how much liberty could be taken in practice with music that looks, on paper, to be complete and precise in its requirements, but such liberty did not extend to improvisation. Where the term was used in a title (e.g. that of Bartók’s Improvisation on Hungarian Peasant Songs, 1920), it was to denote an impromptu style in music fully written out.

The lapsing of improvisation is understandable in a musical culture that was rapidly losing those elements of common practice on which improvisation depends: the idea of extemporizing cadenzas to, for example, Schoenberg’s Violin Concerto is almost unthinkable. However, composers who abandoned traditional culture in order to make up their own ways of doing things (e.g. Partch and Cage) found themselves bound to improvise, and sometimes let their performers do so too – although Cage consistently resisted this, and preferred to have his musicians follow exacting rules if not scores. Improvisation, as a spontaneous expression of intention, was just what he wanted to avoid.

Nevertheless, his influence may have contributed to the re-emergence of improvisation in composed music during the 1960s – along with other factors including the growth of live electronic music (and hence of unpredictable situations), the development of jazz to a point where it could embrace almost everything in the contemporary classical tradition (so that the definition of a performance as ‘free jazz’ or, from the classical standpoint, ‘free improvisation’ became arbitrary), the arrival of performers who wanted to go their own ways, composers’ growing knowledge of non-European music, their extension of Aleatory procedures, and a general movement in Western culture towards democratization and universal self-expression. Yet that movement did not extend so far, or for so long. Improvisation was rapidly reaffirmed as secondary to composition, in that improvising artists (except those also known as composers, such as Vinko Globokar, La Monte Young or Terry Riley) gained no broad platform, and composers (Stockhausen, for example) soon retracted the freedom they had permitted. Once the 1960s had passed, the old division between creative and performing musicians was restored.

In the performance of older music, however, that division came increasingly under attack, as musicians pressed forward their efforts at period style. Any attempt to perform, for example, troubadour song demands some contribution from the singer, although this is more likely to be prepared in advance rather than truly improvised. The same is true of ornaments and cadenzas, which gradually, though not everywhere, came to be expected in the performance of 18th-century music. However, some musicians (such as the keyboard player Robert Levin) began in the 1980s to emulate their colleagues of two centuries’ distance in improvising cadenzas and fantasias on the spot. The revival of silent-film accompaniment at the same time might suggest an acceptance, by the musical culture, of improvisation as a reawakened historical phenomenon.

Improvisation, §II: Western art music.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

treatises and methods

general studies

instrumental

vocal

Improvisation, §II: Western art music: Bibliography

treatises and methods

MersenneHU

V. Lusitano: Introducione facilissima et novissima de canto fermo (Rome, 1553, 3/1561/R)

G.B. Bovicelli: Regole, passaggi di musica (Venice, 1594/R); ed. in DM, 1st ser., Druckschriften-Faksimiles, xii (1957)

T. Morley: A Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke (London, 1597/R); ed. R.A. Harman (London, 1952, 2/1963/R)

S. Cerreto: Della prattica musicale vocale, et strumentale (Naples, 1601/R, 2/1611)

G. Caccini: Le nuove musiche (Florence, 1601/2/R); ed. in RRMBE, ix (1970)

A. Banchieri: L’organo suonarino (Venice, 1605/R1969 with selections from later edns, 4/1638)

A. Agazzari: Del sonare sopra ’l basso (Siena, 1607/R; Eng. trans. in StrunkSR1); ed. V. Gibelli (Milan, 1979)

P. Cerone: El melopeo y maestro (Naples, 1613/R)

A. Banchieri: Cartella musicale nel canto figurato fermo et contrapunto (Venice, 1614/R1968 in BMB, section 2, xxvi)

C. Simpson: The Division Violist (London, 1659, 2/1667/R as Chelys: minuritionum artificio exornata/The Division-Viol, 3/1712)

J. Millet: La belle méthode, ou L’art de bien chanter (Lyons, 1666/R1973 with introduction by A. Cohen)

B. de Bacilly: Remarques curieuses sur l’art de bien chanter (Paris, 1668, 3/1679/R; Eng. trans., 1968, as A Commentary upon the Art of Proper Singing)

J. Rousseau: Méthode claire, certaine et facile, pour apprendre à chanter la musique (Paris, 1678, 5/c1710/R)

J. Rousseau: Traité de la viole (Paris, 1687/R); Eng. trans. in The Consort, no.34 (1978), 302–11; no.36 (1980), 365–70; no.37 (1981), 402–11; no.38 (1982), 463–7

J. Mattheson: Exemplarische Organisten-Probe im Artikel vom General-Bass (Hamburg, 1719, 2/1731/R as Grosse General-Bass-Schule)

J. Mattheson: Kleine General-Bass-Schule (Hamburg, 1735/R)

M.P. de Montéclair: Principes de musique (Paris, 1736/R); Eng. trans. of section on ornamentation, RRMBE, xxix–xxx (1978)

F. Geminiani: The Art of Playing on the Violin (London, 1751/R1952 with introduction by D.D. Boyden)

J.J. Quantz: Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen (Berlin, 1752/R, 3/1789/R; Eng. trans., 1966, 2/1985, as On Playing the Flute)

C.P.E. Bach: Versuch über die wahre Art das Clavier zu spielen, i (Berlin, 1753/R, 3/1787/R); ii (Berlin, 1762/R, 2/1797/R); Eng. trans. (1949)

F.W. Marpurg: Anleitung zum Clavierspielen (Berlin, 1755, 2/1765/R)

L. Mozart: Versuch einer gründlichen Violinschule (Augsburg, 1756/R, 3/1787/R; Eng. trans., 1948, as A Treatise on the Fundamental Principles of Violin Playing, 2/1951/R)

J.F. Agricola: Anleitung zur Singekunst (Berlin, 1757/R) [trans., with addns, of P.F. Tosi: Opinioni de’ cantori antichi e moderni (Bologna, 1723/R)]; Eng. trans., ed. J.C. Baird (Cambridge, 1995)

J. Adlung: Anleitung zu der musikalischen Gelahrtheit (Erfurt, 1758/R, 2/1783)

J. Lacassagne: Traité général des élémens du chant (Paris, 1766/R)

J.S. Petri: Anleitung zur practischen Musik (Lauban, 1767, enlarged 2/1782/R)

G. Tartini: Regole per arrivare a saper ben suonar il violino (MS compiled by G.F. Nicolai, I-Vc); facs. of 1771 Fr. version, with commentary by E.R. Jacobi (Celle, 1961) [incl. Eng. and Ger. trans.]

J.A. Hiller: Anweisung zum musikalisch-richtigen Gesange (Leipzig, 1774, 2/1798)

J.A. Hiller: Exempel-Buch der Anweisen zum Singen (Leipzig, 1774)

V. Manfredini: Regole armoniche (Venice, 1775/R, 2/1797)

J.A. Hiller: Anweisung zum musikalisch-zierlichen Gesange (Leipzig, 1780/R)

H.C. Koch: Versuch einer Anleitung zur Composition, i (Rudolstadt, 1782); ii–iii (Leipzig, 1787–93/R)

J.C. Bach and F.P.Ricci: Méthode ou recueil de connaisances élémentaires pour le forte-piano ou clavecin (Paris, c1786/R) [attribution to Bach doubtful]

D.G. Türk: Clavierschule (Leipzig and Halle, 1789, enlarged 2/1802/R; Eng. trans., 1982)

F. Galeazzi: Elementi teorico-pratici di musica con un saggio sopra l’arte di suonare il violino analizzata, ed a dimostrabili principi ridotta, i (Rome, 1791, enlarged 2/1817); Eng. trans., ed. A. Franscarelli (DMA diss., U. of Rochester, NY, 1968); ii (Rome, 1796); Eng. trans. of pt 4, section 2, ed. G.W. Harwood (MA thesis, Brigham Young U., 1980)

J.G. Albrechtsberger: Kurzgefasste Methode den Generalbass zu erlernen (Vienna, c1791, enlarged 2/1792; Eng. trans., 1815)

J.A. Hiller: Anweisung zum Violinspielen (Leipzig, 1792)

N.J. Hüllmandel: Principles of Music, Chiefly Calculated for the Piano Forte or Harpsichord with Progressive Lessons (London, 1796)

J.P. Milchmeyer: Die wahre Art das Pianoforte zu spielen (Dresden, 1797)

C. Gervasoni: La scuola della musica (Piacenza, 1800)

C.F. Ebers: Vollständige Singschule (Mainz, c1800)

M. Clementi: Introduction to the Art of Playing on the Piano Forte (London, 1801, 11/1826)

J.P. Milchmeyer: Kleine Pianoforte-Schule für Kinder, Anfänger und Liebhaber (Dresden, 1801)

A.E.M. Grétry: Méthode simple pour apprendre à préluder en peu de temps avec toutes les ressources de l’harmonie (Paris, 1802/R)

J.F. Schubert: Neue Singe-Schule, oder Gründliche und vollständige Anweisung zur Singkunst (Leipzig, 1804)

D. Corri: The Singer’s Preceptor (London, 1810)

A.M. Pellegrini Celoni: Grammatica, o siano Regole di ben cantare (Rome, 1810, 2/1817)

P.A. Corri: Original System of Preluding (London, c1813)

J.N. Hummel: Ausführliche theoretisch-practische Anweisung zum Piano-Forte-Spiel (Vienna, 1828, 2/1838; Eng. trans., 1829)

L. Lablache: Méthode de chant (Paris, ?1829; Eng. trans., 1840)

C. Czerny: Systematische Anleitung zum Fantasieren auf dem Pianoforte, op.200 (Vienna, 1829/R); Eng. trans., ed. A.L. Mitchell (New York, 1983)

A. Calegari: Modi generali del canto (Milan, 1836)

F.-J. Fétis and I.Moscheles: Méthode des méthodes de piano (Paris, 1840/R)

M. Garcia: Traité complet de l’art du chant (Paris, 1840, 2/1851)

G.L. Duprez: L’art du chant (Paris, 1845, 2/c1850)

F. Kalkbrenner: Traité d’harmonie du pianiste: principes rationnels de la modulation pour apprendre à préluder et à improviser, op.185 (Paris, 1849; Eng. trans., 1849)

F. Sieber: Vollständiges Lehrbuch der Gesangkunst (Magdeburg, 1858, 2/1878; Eng. trans., 1872)

F. Lamperti: Guida teorico-pratica-elementare per lo studio del canto (Milan, 1865; Eng. trans., 1868)

J.-B. Faure: La voix et le chant (Paris, 1870)

E. Delle Sedie: Arte e fisiologia di canto (Milan, 1876)

E. Delle Sedie: Estetica del canto e dell’arte melodrammatico (Livorno, 1885)

Improvisation, §II: Western art music: Bibliography

general studies

BurneyFI

BurneyGN

BurneyH

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ReeseMMA

SchillingE

A. Maugars: Response faite à un curieux sur le sentiment de la musique d’Italie (Paris, c1640; Eng. trans. in MacClintock, 1979, and also1993); ed. J. Heuillon (Paris, 1991, 2/1992)

T. Mace: Musick’s Monument (London, 1676/R)

J.-J. Rousseau: Dictionnaire de musique (Paris, 1768/R; Eng. trans., 1771, 2/1779/R)

S. Arteaga: Le rivoluzioni del teatro musicale italiano dalla sua origine fino al presente (Bologna, 1783–8/R, 2/1785)

C. Ditters von Dittersdorf: Lebensbeschreibung (Leipzig, 1801; Eng. trans., 1896/R); ed. N. Miller (Munich, 1967)

H.C. Koch: Musikalisches Lexikon (Frankfurt, 1802/R, rev. 3/1865 by A. Dommer)

I.F. von Mosel: Versuch einer Ästhetik des musikalischen Tonsatzes (Vienna, 1813, 2/1910)

E.D. Wagner: Musikalische Ornamentik (Berlin, 1869/R)

E. Dannreuther: Musical Ornamentation (London, 1893–5)

E. Bücken: Die Musik des Rokokos und der Klassik (Potsdam, 1927)

R. Haas: Aufführungspraxis der Musik (Potsdam, 1931/R)

E.T. Ferand: Die Improvisation in der Musik (Zürich, 1938)

H. Stubington: Practical Extemporization (London, 1940)

P.C. Aldrich: The Principal Agréments of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (diss., Harvard U., 1942)

R. Fasano: Storia degli abbellimenti musicali dal canto gregoriano a Verdi (Rome, 1949 [recte 1947])

H.-P. Schmitz: Die Kunst der Verzierung im 18. Jahrhundert (Kassel, 1955, 4/1983)

R. Steglich: ‘Das Auszierungswesen in der Musik W.A. Mozarts’, MJb 1955, 181–237

E.T. Ferand: Die Improvisation in Beispielen aus neun Jahrhunderten abendländischer Musik, Mw, xi (1956, 2/1961; Eng. trans., 1961)

E.T. Ferand: ‘What is res facta?’, JAMS, x (1957), 141–50

W. Georgii: Die Verzierung in der Musik: Theorie und Praxis (Zürich and Freiburg, 1957)

W. Tappolet: ‘Einige prinzipielle Bemerkungen zur Frage der Improvisation’, IMSCR VII: Cologne 1958, 287–8

F.-H. Neumann: Die Ästhetik des Rezitativs (Strasbourg, 1962)

R. Donington: The Interpretation of Early Music (London, 1963, 4/1989)

A. Geoffroy-Dechaume: Les ‘secrets’ de la musique ancienne (Paris, 1964/R)

E.T. Ferand: ‘Didactic Embellishment Literature in the Late Renaissance: a Survey of Sources’, Aspects of Medieval and Renaissance Music: a Birthday Offering to Gustave Reese, ed. J. LaRue and others (New York, 1966/R), 154–72

W. Dürr: foreword to Franz Schubert: Lieder, Neue Ausgabe sämtlicher Werke, iv/1–2 (Kassel, 1968)

A. Geoffroy-Dechaume: ‘Du problème actuel de l'appogiature ancienne’, L’interprétation de la musique française aux XVIIème et XVIIIème siècles: Paris 1969, 87–105

E. Melkus: ‘Die Entwicklung der freien Auszierung im 18. Jahrhundert’, Der junge Haydn: Graz 1970, 147–67

M. Cyr: ‘A Seventeenth-Century Source of Ornamentation for Voice and Viol: British Museum MS. Egerton 1971’, RMARC, no.9 (1971), 53–72

C. Rosen: The Classical Style: Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven (New York, 1971, enlarged 3/1997) [incl. CD]

H.M. Brown: Embellishing Sixteenth-Century Music (London, 1976)

E. Derr: ‘Zur Zierpraxis im späten 18. Jahrhundert’, ÖMz, xxxii (1977), 8–16

J.C. Veilhan: Les règles de l’interprétation musicale à l’époque baroque (Paris, 1977; Eng. trans., 1979)

M. Morrow: ‘Musical Performance and Authenticity’, EMc, vi (1978), 233–46

F. Neumann: Ornamentation in Baroque and Post-Baroque Music (Princeton, NJ, 1978, 3/1983)

J.E. Smiles: ‘Directions for Improvised Ornamentation in Italian Method Books of the Late Eighteenth Century’, JAMS, xxxi (1978), 495–509

C. MacClintock, ed.: Readings in the History of Music in Performance (Bloomington, IN, 1979)

R. Donington: Baroque Music: Style and Performance (London, 1982)

F. Neumann: Essays in Performance Practice (Ann Arbor, 1982)

P. Alperson: ‘On Musical Improvisation’, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, xliii (1984–5), 17–30

F. Neumann: Ornamentation and Improvisation in Mozart (Princeton, NJ, 1986)

J. Spitzer and N. Zaslaw: ‘Improvised Ornamentation in Eighteenth-Century Orchestras’, JAMS, xxxix (1986), 524–77

P. Lescat: Méthodes et traités musicaux en France 1600–1800 (Paris, 1991)

M. Cyr: Performing Baroque Music (Portland, OR, 1992)

B. Dickey: ‘Ornamentation in Early-Seventeenth-Century Italian Music’, A Performer’s Guide to Seventeenth-Century Music, ed. S. Carter (New York, 1997), 245–68

S. Feisst: Der Begriff Improvisation in der neuen Musik (Sinzig, 1997)

Improvisation, §II: Western art music: Bibliography

instrumental

ApelG

F. Liszt: ‘Lettres d'un bachelier ès musique’, RGMP, iv (1837), 97–110

R. Schumann: Gesammelte Schriften über Musik und Musiker (Leipzig, 1854/R, rev. 5/1914/R by M. Kreisig; Eng. trans., 1977–80; selective Eng. trans., 1946/R)

C. Moscheles, ed.: Aus Moscheles’ Leben (Leipzig, 1872–3; Eng. trans., 1873)

‘Johann Nepomuk Hummel on Extemporaneous Performance’, MMR, xi (1881), 214–15

C. Reinecke: Zur Wiederbelebung der Mozart’schen Clavier-Concerte (Leipzig, 1891)

H. Schenker: Ein Beitrag zur Ornamentik als Einführung zu Ph. Em. Bachs Klavierwerken (Vienna, 1903, 2/1908/R; Eng. trans. in Music Forum, iv, 1976, 11–140)

A. Schering: ‘Zur instrumentalen Verzierungskunst im 18. Jahrhundert’, SIMG, vii (1905–6), 365–85

J. Chantavoine, ed.: F. Liszt: Pages romantiques (Paris, 1912)

J.P. Dunn: Ornamentation in the Works of Frederick Chopin (London, 1921/R)

A.M. Richardson: Extempore Playing (New York, 1922)

M. Pincherle: ‘De l'ornementation des sonates de Corelli’ Feuillets d'histoire du violon (Paris, 1927), 133–43; (2/1935)

F.T. Arnold: The Art of Accompaniment from a Thorough-Bass (London, 1931/R)

M. Rinaldi: Il problema degli abbellimenti nell'op. V di Corelli (Siena, 1947)

P. Aldrich: ‘Bach's Technique of Transcription and Improvised Ornamentation’, MQ, xxxv (1949), 26–35

P. Aldrich: Ornamentation in J.S. Bach’s Organ Works (New York, 1950/R)

R. Wangermée: ‘L'improvisation pianistique au début du XIXe siècle’, Miscellanea musicologica Floris van der Mueren (Ghent, 1950), 227–53

A. Kreutz: ‘Ornamentation in J.S. Bach's Keyboard Works’, HMYB, vii (1952), 358–79

W. Emery: Bach’s Ornaments (London, 1953/R)

E. Badura-Skoda: ‘Über die Anbringung von Auszierungen in den Klavierwerken Mozarts’, MJb 1957, 186–98

E. and P. Badura-Skoda: Mozart-Interpretation (Vienna, 1957; Eng. trans., 1962/R, as Interpreting Mozart on the Keyboard)

A. Gottron: ‘Wie spielte Mozart die Adagios seiner Klavierkonzerte?’, Mf, xiii (1960), 334 only

I. Horsley: ‘The Sixteenth-Century Variation and Baroque Counterpoint’, MD, xiv (1960), 159–65

P. Aldrich: ‘On the Interpretation of Bach's Trills’, MQ, xlix (1963), 289–310

P. Badura-Skoda, ed.: Carl Czerny: Über den richtigen Vortrag der sämtlichen Beethoven’schen Klavierwerke (Vienna, 1963; Eng. trans., 1970)

F. Neumann: ‘A New Look at Bach's Ornamentation’, ML, xlvi (1965), 4–15, 126–33

G. Rose: ‘Agazzari and the Improvising Orchestra’, JAMS, xviii (1965), 382–93

P. Badura-Skoda: Kadenzen, Eingänge und Auszierungen zu Klavierkonzerten von Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (Kassel, 1967)

S. Jeans: ‘English Ornamentation of the 16th to 18th Centuries (Keyboard Music)’, Music antiqua: Brno II 1967, 128–36

K. Polk: Flemish Wind Bands in the Late Middle Ages: a Study of Improvisatory Instrumental Practices (diss., U. of California, Berkeley, 1968)

P. Schleuning: Die Fantasie, Mw, xlii–xliii (1971; Eng. trans., 1971)

D. Boyden: ‘Corelli's Solo Violin Sonatas “Grac'd” by Dubourg’, Festskrift Jens Peter Larsen, ed. N. Schiørring, H. Glahn and C.E. Hatting (Copenhagen, 1972), 113–25

M.C. Bradshaw: The Origin of the Toccata, MSD, xxviii (1972)

M. Collins: ‘In Defense of the French Trill’, JAMS, xxvi (1973), 405–39

C.R. Suttoni: Piano and Opera: a Study of the Piano Fantasies Written on Opera Themes in the Romantic Era (diss., New York U., 1973)

Zu Fragen des Instrumentariums, der Besetzung und Improvisation in der ersten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts: Blankenburg, Harz, 1975

H.J. Marx: ‘Some Unknown Embellishments of Corelli's Violin Sonatas’, MQ, lxi (1975), 65–76

H.G. Mishkin: ‘Incomplete Notation in Mozart's Piano Concertos’, MQ, lxi (1975), 345–59

D.A. Lee: ‘Some Embellished Versions of Sonatas by Franz Benda’, MQ, lxii (1976), 58–71

B.B. Mather and D.R.G.Lasocki: Free Ornamentaion in Woodwind Music, 1700–1775 (New York, 1976)

C. Wolff: ‘Zur Chronologie der Klavierkonzert-Kadenzen Mozarts’, Mozart und seine Umwelt: Salzburg 1976 [MJb 1978–9], 235–46

C. Pond: ‘Ornamental Style and the Virtuoso: Solo Bass Viol Music in France c1680–1740’, EMc, vi (1978), 512–18

Zu Fragen der Improvisation in der Instrumentalmusik der ersten Hälfte des 18. Jahrhunderts: Blankenburg, Harz, 1979

C. Dahlhaus: ‘Was heisst Improvisation?’, Improvisation und neue Musik: Darmstadt 1979, 9–23

T. Mulhern: ‘Improvisational Avant-Garde Guitar: its History, its Proponents, its Future’, Guitar Player, xiii (1979), 36–8, 118 only, 120–22

I. Poniatowska: ‘Improwizacja fortepianowa w okresie romantyzmu’ [Piano improvisation in the Romantic age], Szkice o kulturze muzycznej XIX. wieku, ed. Z. Chechlińska, iv (Warsaw, 1980), 7–28

D. Carew: An Examination of the Composer/Performer Relationship in the Piano Style of J.N. Hummel (diss., U. of Leicester, 1981)

R. Hudson: Passacaglio and Ciaccona: from Guitar Music to Italian Keyboard Variations in the 17th Century (Ann Arbor, 1981)

L.F. Ferguson: ‘Col Basso’ and ‘Generalbass’ in Mozart’s Keyboard Concertos: Notation, Performance, Theory, and Practice (diss., Princeton U., 1983)

J. Paras: The Music for Viola Bastarda (Bloomington, IN, 1986)

J. Pressing: ‘Improvisation: Methods and Models’, Generative Processes in Music: the Psychology of Performance, Improvisation, and Composition, ed. J.A. Sloboda (Oxford, 1988), 129–78

T. Szász: ‘Figured Bass in Beethoven's “Emperor” Concerto: Basso Continuo or Orchestral Cues?’, Early Keyboard Journal, vi–vii (1988–9), 5–71

I. Cavallini: ‘Sugli improvvisatori del Cinque–Seicento: persistenze, nuovi repertori e qualche riconoscimento’, Recercare, i (1989), 23–40

J.S. Rink: The Evolution of Chopin’s ‘Structural Style’ and its Relation to Improvisation (diss., U. of Cambridge, 1989)

R.E. Seletsky: Improvised Variation Sets for Short Dance Movements, circa 1680–1800, Exemplified in Period Sources for Corelli’s Violin Sonatas, opus 5 (DMA diss., Cornell U., 1989) [see also idem, EMc, xxiv (1996), 119–30]

J.S. Rink: ‘Schenker and Improvisation’, JMT, xxxvii (1993), 1–54

T. Szász: ‘Beethoven's Basso Continuo: Notation and Performance’, Performing Beethoven, ed. R. Stowell (Cambridge, 1994), 1–22

V.W. Goertzen: ‘By Way of Introduction: Preluding by 18th- and Early 19th-Century Pianists’, JM, xiv (1996), 299–337

N. Zaslaw: ‘Ornaments for Corelli's Violin Sonatas, opus 5’, EMc, xxiv (1996), 95–115

H.D. Johnstone: ‘Yet More Ornaments for Corelli's Violin Sonatas, op.5’, EMc, xxiv (1996), 623–33

Improvisation, §II: Western art music: Bibliography

vocal

GroveO (‘Ornamentation’; A.V. Jones, W. Crutchfield) [incl. further bibliography]

P.F. Tosi: Opinioni de’ cantori antichi e moderni (Bologna, 1723/R; Eng. trans., 1742, 2/1743/R, as Observations on the Florid Song)

G. Mancini: Pensieri e riflessioni pratiche sopra il canto figurato (Vienna, 1774, 2/1777; Eng. trans., 1967)

T. Lemaire and H.Lavoix: Le chant: ses principes et son histoire (Paris, 1881)

A.B. Bach: On Musical Education and Voice Culture (Edinburgh, 1883, 5/1898)

M. Kuhn: Die Verzierungs-Kunst in der Gesangs-Musik des 16.–17. Jahrhunderts (1535–1650) (Leipzig, 1902/R)

H. Goldschmidt: Die Lehre von der vokalen Ornamentik (Berlin-Charlottenburg, 1907/R)

A. Della Corte, ed.: Canto e bel canto (Turin, 1933)

L. Ricci: Variazioni, cadenze, tradizioni per canto (Milan, 1937)

I. Horsley: ‘Improvised Embellishment in the Performance of Renaissance Polyphonic Music’, JAMS, iv (1951), 3–19

E.T. Ferand: ‘Improvised Vocal Counterpoint in the Late Renaissance and Early Baroque’, AnnM, iv (1956), 129–74

A. Heriot: The Castrati in Opera (London, 1956/R)

V. Duckles: ‘Florid Embellishment in English Song of the Late 16th and Early 17th Centuries’, AnnM, v (1957), 329–45

E.F. Schmid: ‘Joseph Haydn und die vokale Zierpraxis seiner Zeit, dargestellt an einer Arie seines Tobias-Oratoriums’, Konferenz zum Andenken Joseph Haydns: Budapest 1959, 117–30

D. Bartha and L. Somfai, eds.: Haydn als Opernkapellmeister (Budapest, 1960); corrected and updated in New Looks at Italian Opera: Essays in Honor of Donald J. Grout, ed. W.W. Austin (Ithaca, NY, 1968), 172–219

C. Mackerras: ‘Sense about the Appoggiatura’, Opera, xiv (1963), 669–78

A.B. Caswell: The Development of Seventeenth-Century French Vocal Ornamentation and its Influence upon Late Baroque Ornamentation Practice (diss., U. of Minnesota, 1964)

K. Wichmann: Der Ziergesang und die Ausführung der Appoggiatura (Leipzig, 1966)

E. Melkus: ‘Zur Auszierung der Da-capo-Arien in Mozarts Werken’, MJb 1968–70, 159–85

W. Dean: ‘Vocal Embellishment in a Handel Aria’, Studies in Eighteenth-Century Music: a Tribute to Karl Geiringer, ed. H.C.R. Landon and R.E. Chapman (New York and London, 1970), 151–9; rev. in W. Dean: Essays on Opera (Oxford, 1990), 22–9

H.C. Wolff: Die Oper, ii, Mw, xxxix (1971; Eng. trans., 1971)

H.C. Wolff: Originale Gesangsimprovisation des 16. bis 18. Jahrhunderts, Mw, xli (1972; Eng. trans., 1972)

A.B. Caswell: ‘Mme Cinti-Damoreau and the Embellishment of Italian Opera in Paris, 1820–1845’, JAMS, xxviii (1975), 459–92

D.H. Till: English Vocal Ornamentation, 1600–1660 (diss., U. of Oxford, 1975)

G. Buelow: ‘A Lesson in Operatic Performance Practice by Madame Faustina Bordoni’, A Musical Offering: Essays in Honor of Martin Bernstein, ed. E.H. Clinkscale and C. Brook (New York, 1977), 79–96

A. Ransome: ‘Towards an Authentic Vocal Style and Technique in Late Baroque Performance’, EMc, vi (1978), 417–18

W. Dürr: ‘Schubert and Johann Michael Vogl: a Reappraisal’, 19CM, iii (1979–80), 126–40

M. Cyr: ‘Eighteenth-Century French and Italian Singing: Rameau's Writing for the Voice’, ML, lxi (1980), 318–37

F. Neumann: ‘Vorschlag und Appoggiatur in Mozarts Rezitativ’, MJb 1980–83, 363–84

M. Cyr: ‘Performing Rameau's Cantatas’, EMc, xi (1983), 480–89

W. Crutchfield: ‘Vocal Ornamentation in Verdi: the Phonographic Evidence’, 19CM, vii (1983–4), 3–54

G. Durosoir: L’air de cour en France, 1571–1655 (Liège, 1991)

J.W. Hill: ‘Training a Singer for Musica Recitativa in Early Seventeenth-Century Italy: the Case of Baldassare’, Musicologia humana: Studies in Honor of Warren and Ursula Kirkendale, ed. S. Gmeinwieser, D. Hiley and J. Riedlbauer (Florence, 1994), 345–57

E. van Tassel: ‘“Something Utterly New”: Listening to Schubert's Lieder, i: Vogl and the Declamatory Style’, EMc, xxv (1997), 702–14

For further bibliography see Cadenza; Continuo; and Performing practice.

Improvisation