16

Allegro.15 So often, student performers arrive at the false recapitulation at m. 42, after constant

running sixteenths in the development, and they can’t adjust back to the eighth note motor

rhythm. The addition or subtraction of pulses and other related errors by students are so

common that I’ve pondered the subject for several years and have come to some conclusions.

One night when I was helping my son with his practicing for band class, I noticed that he

was incorrectly counting a line of music that appeared to be quite simple. I asked him to count

the three measures that had the error, and to my surprise, this was his answer:

First, he said nothing on the initial quarter rest. He continued by counting a tie with the correct

number of beats but without any relation to the time signature and placement within the meter.

He then proceeded to count another tied note, again with the accurate number of beats, but

completely disassociated from the 4/4 time signature. Furthermore, he paused between the two

tied notes for one silent pulse. Because he didn’t verbally count anything during the pause, he

didn’t realize he had added the pulse. Interestingly, his unintentional pause made sense in some

small way because it made the second tied note start on the secondary strong beat of the measure

– beat three – a natural metric accent.

These types of errors, though containing some accuracy (the total counts within the tied

notes were correct), are so common among young students. Beginning musicians learn note

values (quarter = 1, half note = 2) in a very concrete way that does not account for any changes

in beat notes within time signatures (half notes as beat notes, for example) or awareness of the

15
Wolfgang A. Mozart, Sonata in C, K. 545, I: Allegro. (Munich: G. Henle Verlag, 1992), 266-269.