four
movements, but that does not affect the argument, neither does the
fact, that after Beethoven are to be found several remarkable sonatas
with the same number. The process of evolution of the sonata was
gradual; so also will be that of its dissolution. The title of
"sonata" given by Beethoven to his Op. 90 and Op. 111 does not affect
the music one jot; under any other name it would sound as well. You
might call the "Choral Symphony" a Divertimento, and the title would
be considered inappropriate; or a Polonaise, and the name would be
scouted as ridiculous; but the music would still remain great and
glorious. Yet taking into consideration the meaning of the term
"sonata" as understood by Emanuel Bach, Haydn, and Beethoven himself,
it can scarcely be the right one for these tone-poems in two sections.
The sonata-form of the first movement in each case may have suggested
the title. The two early sonatas Op. 27 (Nos. 1 and 2) are both styled
sonata, but with the addition _quasi una fantasia_. And in neither
case was the first movement in sonata-form; the one in E flat does not
even contain such a movement. There are other signs of the process of
disintegration in the later sonatas. Op. 109, in E, is peculiar as
regards the form of the movements of which it is composed; and the
fugues of Op. 101, 106, and 109--a return, by the way, to the
past--show at least an unsettled state of mind. The sonata in A flat
(Op. 110) was probably the germ whence sprang the sonata in B minor of
Liszt--a work of which we shall soon have to speak.

Beethoven departed from the custom of his predecessors Haydn and
Mozart, and the general practice of sonata-writers before him, in the
matter of tonality. In a movement in sonata-form the rule was for the
second subject to be in the dominant key in the exposition section,
and in the tonic in the recapitulation section, if the key of the
piece was major; but if minor, in the relative major or dominant minor
in the exposition, and in the tonic major or minor in the
recapitulation. Thus, if the key were C major, the second subject
would be first in G major, afterwards in C major; if the key were C
minor, first in E flat major, or G minor, afterwards in C minor or
major. In a minor movement the second subject is found more often in
the relative major than in the dominant minor. The first and third
movements of Beethoven's Sonata in D minor (Op. 31, No. 2) illustrate
the latter; in each case the seco