Penny Suzanne Schwarze, Ph.D. 1983

Advisor: James Haar

Dissertation Title: Styles of Composition and Performance in Leclair’s Concertos

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Dissertation Abstract:

Leclair’s twelve concertos for solo violin, ripieno strings, and basso continuo–first published in Paris in 1737 and 1745–mark a rare use of the Vivaldian concerto idiom by a French composer. The concertos have been cited therefore as manifesting a union of French and Italian tastes. Previous writers have pointed to such obvious factors in this union as Leclair’s occasional use within a Vivaldian framework of movements deriving from French theater genres.

The first part of the study focuses on manifestations in Leclair’s compositional style of a subtler but much more fundamental union of national styles, one that has not been explored previously. Leclair’s treatment of musical materials and of each of the three movements in the concerto cycle reveals an underlying hierarchy of symmetries that, in quintessentially French fashion, imposes order at all levels of the musical process from the smallest thematic idea to the concerto cycle as a whole. Thus even the most Italianate of materials and structures are subjected to a French aesthetic of imposed order. The union of a French compartmentalization with the Vivaldian idiom draws attention to individual, often brief musical moments rather than generating an Italianate thrust of energy. The compositional style gives only a partial impression of the concertos; the performance style completes the impression. The second part of the study therefore explores clues to Leclair’s performance style revealed by contemporary accounts, Leclair’s own instructions, 18th-century instruments, treatises on performance, and special performance conventions. These clues reveal that although Leclair’s style of performance shares more in common with that of his Italian contemporaries than with that of the earlier French orchestral style of violin playing, a strong French influence persists. This influence persists not only in such specific practices as notes inégales and ornamentation but also in the general attention to expressive shaping at the small scale. Such shaping complements and indeed gives meaning to the musical details that are so vital to Leclair’s compositional style.

Dr. Schwarze became a professor of music at the College of Saint Scholastica in Duluth, Minnesota.