78: William Caplin

My guest today is the great Professor of Music, William Caplin!

Caplin specializes in the theories of musical form and musical cadence. His extensive investigations into formal procedures of late-eighteenth-century music culminated in the 1998 book “Classical Form: A Theory of Formal Functions for the Instrumental Music of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven (Oxford University Press), which won the 1999 Wallace Berry Book Award from the Society for Music Theory. A textbook version, Analyzing Classical Form: An Approach for the Classroom (Oxford University Press), was published in November 2013.

In addition to writing many scholarly articles, Caplin served as President of the Society for Music Theory from November 2005 to November 2007. In March 2015, he was the Robert M. Trotter Visiting Professor at the School of Music, University of Oregon; In March, 2008, he was Visiting Professor at the University of Rome-Tor Vergata.  

He is currently writing a large-scale book project entitled “Cadence: A Study of Closure in Tonal Music.”

-----

1:55 How do we make sense of all the different theories of harmony? 3:46 On the lack of analysis on musical form 5:41 The different traditions music theory 8:03 Why did you select the “classical” period as the basis for your theoretical work? 10:04 Why did you not use German functional theory? 12:27 How is fundamental bass theory different from figure bass theory? 13:49 Do chords or bass notes have inner urges or functions to move? 16:42 Does the plagal cadence exist? 19:26 Where did the term plagal cadence come from? 20:03 Is it hard to find this plagal cadence in the 18th century? 22:08 Could you give an example of such a thing? 22:53 What are the different types of cadences? 24:17 Where does an evaded cadence go? 25:39 What about the abandoned cadence? 27:38 Do you depart from Ratz and Schoenberg in your theoretical work? 29:20 How would you analyze a Mozart or Haydn Piano Sonata differently from Ratz or Schoenberg? 30:56 Where have you found difficulty in applying your theory? 32:30 How about examples where the theory works great and one where it’s harder to use 36:10 Could you elaborate on the missing form functionality of Gjerdingen’s Galant Schema theory 38:43 Did Leonard B. Meyer have an influence in your work? 39:54 What are the differences in form between Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven? 41:43 How did Beethoven break the tradition of form? 43:14 What do you find are the common challenges for students tackling your work? 45:13 Does counterpoint have a place in this theoretical framework? 46:09 What music that you like, that has great form? 46:35 What does Sibelius do with form that intrigues you? 47:15 Talking about Simon Sechter 48:02 Talking about Robert Wason’s “Viennese Harmonic Theory from Albrechtsberger to Schenker and Schoenberg” 49:38 Kirnberger’s contradictory position on fundamental bass theory 51:42 Have you dipped into non-German theories of harmony and music analysis? 52:58 If you could reform music education, what would you do? 55:17 Could you recommend any harmony text books? 56:04 Mentioning the Analyzing Classical Form Website 56:56 Wrapping Up