Keyboard fantasies by Georg Philip Telemann in the context of stylistic trends of the time

Abstract

The relevance of the study. It consists of considering the keyboard fantasies TWV 33 by Georg Philipp Telemann in the context of the author's creative searches, as well as of the stylistic trends in German music of the first half of the eighteenth century. The main objective of the study is to identify the main features of Georg Philipp Telemann's compositional style on the example of his 36 fantasies for keyboard. The methodology includes biographical (to highlight the main stages of Telemann's life and work), historical (to find out the evolutionary processes in the culture of the first half of the eighteenth century), genre-stylistic and structural-functional (for a comprehensive analysis of musical works), comparative (to compare Telemann's fantasies with each other and with examples of the genre in the works of his predecessors and contemporaries). 
 Results and conclusions. The cycle of keyboard fantasies TWV 33 by Georg Philipp Telemann is considered as an example of the embodiment of a new stylistic trend in German music of the first half of the eighteenth century. The reflection in these works of the influence of the "mixed taste" trend prevailing at that time is emphasized. The main stages of the formation and development of Telemann's creative guidelines are traced and the factors that directly contributed to the formation of his compositional style are identified. 36 fantasies included in the collection and differentiated by the author into "Italian" and "French" are analyzed. The main differences in their compositional organization and stylistic manner are revealed. On the basis of a detailed analysis of Fantasy No. 28 from the third part, the conclusion is drawn that the composer has a perfect command of the French and Italian styles of writing and their organic combination within one work. The author also points to the reflection in Telemann's keyboard fantasies of the "gallant style" that was formed in the music of the first half of the eighteenth century as opposed to the counterpoint and polyphonic style of the late Baroque. The features of the gallant style in Telemann's cycle TWV 33 are manifested in the elegance of melodic lines richly decorated with melismatics, the involvement of song themes, the dominance of homophonic composition, transparent, mostly two-voice texture, and the syntactic structure of themes by combining a number of small contrasting motifs. It is emphasized that the eighteenth-century understanding of the gallant style as a synonym for the "free style" resonates with the main vector of the evolution of the fantasy genre — from the centuries-old tradition of creating plays of this type within the strict framework of counterpoint writing to the natural manifestations of creative imagination.