Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book illustrates various formal typologies that occurred in improvised instrumental and vocal pieces in Italy, France and Germany, offering information as to the rules established by theoreticians and performers to provide such pieces with a coherent layout. It outlines the tangencies between theoretical-compositional thought and improvisational practice are furthermore confirmed by a number of autograph documents: the music which was extemporaneously played or sung was often the result of memorised formulas and corresponded to an elaboration in real time of ideas. The book discusses the new formal concepts that emerged in the post-Beethoven era show significant tangencies with the contemporary approach to the concept of time, developed by Romantic thinkers. It explains that composers could alter and 'open' a standardised formal structure, if only for an isolated moment, for example in violin caprices written in sonata-rondo form and 'thematically open-ended'.