Schenker’s late theory in overview



Heinrich Schenker : Der freie Satz (1935)
Part III of Neue musikalische Theorien und Phantasien, the others being his Harmony (1906) and his
Counterpoint. “Der freie Satz” is translated into English as “Free Composition”, though a more
traditional translation would be “Free Counterpoint”.

Heinrich Schenker : Der freie Satz (1935)
Schenker outlines a hypothesis that the structure of great tonal compositions is governed by an
Ursatz, a paradigmatic “background” framework of contrapuntal voices, that successively generates
elaborations in “middleground” and “foreground”.

Heinrich Schenker : Der freie Satz (1935)
The Ursatz (usually translated “fundamental structure”) combines an upper-voice Urlinie
(“fundamental line”) and a bass Bassbrechung (“bass arpeggiation”, I-V-I, regarded both
harmonically, as chords on tonic and dominant, and melodically, as an arpeggiation of the tonic
triad). It can take three main forms, all with stepwise descents in the upper voice, from the
third, fifth and eighth degrees of the scale respectively (these are also constituent notes of the
tonic triad).

Heinrich Schenker : Der freie Satz (1935)
In the following examples, taken from his first chapter dealing with the middleground, Schenker
systematically shows the various possibilities for elaborating each of these three patterns at the
first middleground level (i.e. the level closest to the background).




Possible elaborations of the 3-2-1 Urlinie at the first level



Possible elaborations of the 5-4-3-2-1 Urlinie at the first level



Possible elaborations of the 8-7-6-5-4-3-2-1 Urlinie at the first level



Heinrich Schenker : Der freie Satz (1935)
The supplementary volume with the extensive music examples has no comprehensive analyses. The
fullest example illustrates three levels of the second song of Schumann’s cycle, Dichterliebe. It
was chosen by Allen Forte for his article introducing Schenker’s theory.




“The song is remarkable in several respects:
1)the note B is left unresolved in the voice part at the ends of phrases 1, 2, and 4;
2)the middle of the song contains an unusual harmonic progression: E major – B minor – C# major – A
major7 – D major – A major; and
3)while the melodic ‘recapitulation’ occurs at the beginning of phrase 4, the harmony at that point
tonicizes D major, rather than A major.”
Arthur Komar, “The Music of Dichterliebe: The Whole and its Parts”, in Arthur Komar, ed., Robert
Schumann: Dichterliebe, Norton Critical Scores, London: Chappell, 1971, pp. 63-94 (p. 71)

Heinrich Schenker, Der freie Satz (2nd revised ed., 1956, appendix, fig. 22b, p. 8)



Schenker’s Conception of Interruption
•Schenker came to regard the interruption structure he finds in the Schumann song as basic to the
generation of form, and to sonata form in particular. It is the most powerful middleground
elaboration of the Ursatz in its capacity to generate form. •The following models show how it
typically functions.

Interruption structure in the major



Interruption structure in the minor



Case study: Mozart Minuet K255



Mozart Minuet K355



“Mixture” (i.e. mixture of major and minor mode) as another essential form-generating technique
“Mixture” is Schenker’s concept for explaining the relationship known in German theory since Hugo
Riemann (1880s) as the “third relationship” (Terzverwandtschaft).

Mixture I



Mixture II



Mixture III



Case study: Schubert Trauerwalzer op. 9 no. 2



TRAUER.gif



TRAUGRPH.gif
Schenker‘s graph of the waltz,
illustrating its use of mixture
NB: The text he used has a variant in the bass

Case study: Schubert Nacht und Träume D827















Graph.jpg
Nacht und Träume, rough graph