More on the Op. 136

My original outline for the Clarinet Sonata was as follows:

i. Another Think Coming [ Allegro ]

ii. Boulez est mort [ Adagio ]

iii. Ambiguity & Overlap (Something or other, if not something else entirely) [ Vivo ]

iv. Unanticipated Serenity [ Allegretto grazioso ]

v. After a Reading of “The Mysterious Stranger” [ Andante — Vivace assai — Andante ]

The third movement was meant from the start — well, from the start of work on the second movement, which begins with an extended piano solo — to be clarinet solo.  However, as I started composing the material for the third movement, my marking was Grazioso.  So:  movement 3 became instead Unanticipated Serenity, and a further change is that there light, very light, piano (with a preference expressed for plucking the strings).

One change was, a friend had requested a March, and having music of such character runs athwart the idea of Vivo in the fourth movement.  (We may observe that it arguably jars with Allegretto grazioso, as well, so some adjustment in The Plan was already indicated.)  The March was a welcome idea, additionally, because given the space I wanted the fourth  movement to occupy, and its recasting as the Vivo movement, making it a hybrid Vivo + March was both an excellent solution to my time requirements, and lo! fit very nicely the subtitle upon which I had long ago settled (Something or other, if not something else entirely).

The state of the outline on 25 April was:

i. Allegro (9:45)

ii. Grave (9:45) [as in the original plan, the two movements of roughly the same duration]

iii. Grazioso (2:30) – attacca

iv. Vivo – Marziale ma amabile (3:45) – attacca

v. Andante — Vivace assai — Andante (6:45)

I have since struck the attacca after the fourth movement, and composition of the third & fourth movements (quite within expectations) overshot the timing plan slightly.