SONATA AS A DIARY: PIANO SONATA NO. 3 IN C MINOR BY GUO ZURONG

Guo Zurong is one of the greatest Chinese composers of the late 20th - early 21st centuries. This article is the first attempt to specifically address his Piano Sonata No. 3 (1951). This is one of the most artistically significant and valuable works of the composer in terms of repertoire, bringing the history of the Chinese piano sonata to new frontiers. As the analysis shows, the composer asserts the type of non-programmatic sonata in national music, deviates from the canonical interpretation of the cycle, introduces bright tragic emotionality and subjectivity of tone into Chinese piano creativity. The sonata became a reaction to the events of the composer’s life, musical impressions and creative passions of the early 1950s. It can be considered as a diary of the personal and creative development of the young composer and, at the same time, as one of the most striking phenomena in the evolution of the Chinese piano sonata.