The Contrabass Sonatas of Johann Matthias Sperger

Abstract

The solo contrabass works of Johann Matthias Sperger, the most accomplished and prolific composer of contrabass concertos, have only ever been examined in studies of the larger body of Viennese contrabass works. Even with rising interest in the 18th-century concertante repertory for contrabass, no study has yet focused on Sperger's contrabass sonatas despite their unique place in the contrabass repertory as the first works of their kind. This thesis instigates a new approach to the study of Sperger's works by considering the sonatas on their own terms and not as part of an esoteric virtuoso school. For this reason, the study engages with Sperger's sonatas at varying levels: the circumstances that surrounded and potentially influenced their composition are addressed through references to the composer's life; structural analyses at both movement and phrase level are presented and the relationship between the last sonata and Sperger's two final concertos is considered. It is only through patient scrutiny of Sperger's works that the finer details of his characteristic musical language reveal themselves. The final chapter of the work addresses the composer's idiosyncratic use of articulation markings and what these tell us about his style of playing. The four works that are the focus of this thesis mark the beginning and the end of the 18th-century Viennese contrabass sonata. The failure of Sperger's contemporaries, and even his immediate successors, to compose works of a similar kind suggests that either the sonatas were not well known to them or that they were to such a degree Sperger's private art, that none of them felt confident to follow his brilliant example.