Sonata-Form Manipulations in Hensel’s Final Multi-Movement Works

Abstract

Fanny Hensel challenged the conventions of her time, not only by writing works outside of genres that were considered to belong to the domestic realm, but also by deviating from structural expectations within her compositions. This paper examines the first movements of the G-Minor Piano Sonata (1843) and the D-Minor Piano Trio (1846-7) in the context of the rest of each multi-movement work, and focuses on their dialogue with sonata-form norms, based on Hepokoski and Darcy’s conception of the latter. While the opening movement of the trio displays a skillful employment of a trimodular-block construction that interweaves with the work’s cyclicism, a phenomenological approach to the opening movement of the sonata reveals that Hensel pushes formal manipulations even further in this earlier work, resulting in a piece that has the audience constantly questioning which zone they are currently listening to, and whether the movement is in sonata form at all. Given the inventiveness shown in the sonata and earlier multi-movement works, Hensel’s scaling-back of structural experimentation in the trio raises questions as to her motivation, with potential connections to the possibility that she wrote the work with the intention of publication.