What Is Sonata Theory?

This chapter lays out the most foundational, generative concepts behind Sonata Theory. These include: the role of the listener or analyst in helping to produce a “meaning” or reading for the work; genre theory and dialogic form (individual works in dialogue with implicit or conceptual norms); differences between generic types and individual exemplars (tokens) of those types, the latter linked with the rise of aesthetic perception; successive action zones (in the exposition, P, TR, S, and C—primary theme, transition, secondary theme, and closing zone) within a musically narrative journey; the structural role of cadences and cadence attainment; keys, layouts, and tonal confirmation; rotation theory (themes and their ordered succession); Sonata Theory’s outreach to other, differing methodologies as complements; the importance of not reducing Sonata Theory to an inelastic or mechanical method.