Double-function form is a musical construction that allows for a collection of

movements Movement may refer to: Generic uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Movement (sign language), a hand movement when signing * Motion, commonly referred to as movement * Movement (music), a division of a larger c ...

to be viewed as elements of a single larger

musical form In music, ''form'' refers to the structure of a musical composition or musical improvisation, performance. In his book, ''Worlds of Music'', Jeff Todd Titon suggests that a number of organizational elements may determine the formal structure of a ...

. The most famous example of this is

Franz Liszt Franz Liszt (22 October 1811 – 31 July 1886) was a Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor and teacher of the Romantic music, Romantic period. With a diverse List of compositions by Franz Liszt, body of work spanning more than six ...

Piano Sonata A piano sonata is a sonata written for a solo piano. Piano sonatas are usually written in three or four movements, although some piano sonatas have been written with a single movement (Liszt, Scriabin, Medtner, Berg), others with two movemen ...

in B minor (1853). The sonata is composed as a single movement with about a half an hour's duration. The piece introduces some themes at the very outset of the piece which are manipulated and recapitulated over twenty minutes later.

Charles Rosen Charles Welles Rosen (May 5, 1927December 9, 2012) was an American pianist and writer on music. He is remembered for his career as a concert pianist, for his recordings, and for his many writings, notable among them the book '' The Classical St ...

believes that the work as whole fulfils his criterion for a

sonata form The sonata form (also sonata-allegro form or first movement form) is a musical form, musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of t ...

. Moreover, within the one long sonata form, there exists a short sonata form, followed by a slow ternary, followed by a

scherzo A scherzo (, , ; plural scherzos or scherzi), in western classical music, is a short composition – sometimes a movement from a larger work such as a symphony or a sonata. The precise definition has varied over the years, but scherzo often r ...

and

fugue In classical music, a fugue (, from Latin ''fuga'', meaning "flight" or "escape""Fugue, ''n''." ''The Concise Oxford English Dictionary'', eleventh edition, revised, ed. Catherine Soanes and Angus Stevenson (Oxford and New York: Oxford Universit ...

, followed by a finale. Thus, the single movement fulfills the standard of both a classical sonata form and a classical four movement

piano sonata A piano sonata is a sonata written for a solo piano. Piano sonatas are usually written in three or four movements, although some piano sonatas have been written with a single movement (Liszt, Scriabin, Medtner, Berg), others with two movemen ...

. There are several other composers to whom the use of double-function forms is attributed. It is largely accepted that

Schubert Franz Peter Schubert (; ; 31 January 179719 November 1828) was an Austrian composer of the late Classical period (music), Classical and early Romantic music, Romantic eras. Despite his short life, Schubert left behind a List of compositions ...

's ''

Wanderer Fantasy The Fantasie in C major, Op. 15 ( D. 760), popularly known as the ''Wanderer Fantasy'', is a four-movement fantasy for solo piano composed by Franz Schubert in 1822. It is widely considered Schubert's most technically demanding composition for th ...

'' (1822) for piano is the first widely heard piece that demonstrates this form.

Arnold Schoenberg Arnold Schoenberg or Schönberg (13 September 187413 July 1951) was an Austrian and American composer, music theorist, teacher and writer. He was among the first Modernism (music), modernists who transformed the practice of harmony in 20th-centu ...

's first '' Chamber Symphony'' (1906) is an example of a major work that fulfills the criterion of a double-function form; this piece was modeled after

Beethoven Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. He is one of the most revered figures in the history of Western music; his works rank among the most performed of the classical music repertoire ...

's string quartet in C-sharp minor (#14), which consists of seven connected movements (these however do not combine to create a clear larger form, and thus the quartet is not an example of double-function form).{{contradiction, date=May 2016

Sources

*Saffle, Michael. “Liszt's sonata in B minor: another look at the 'double function' question.” JALS: the journal of the American Liszt Society, 11 (June 1982): 28-39. *Walker, Alan et al. "Liszt, Franz." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. 20 Nov. 2009. 17. B minor Piano Sonata. *Winklhofr, Sharon. Liszt's Sonata in B minor; A Study of Autograph Sources and Documents. Ann Arbor, MI. UMI Research Press 1980. Musical form