Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti (1685âÂÂ1757) wrote 555 solo keyboard sonatas throughout his career. Circulated irregularly in his lifetime, these are now recognized as a significant contribution which pushed the musical and technical standards of keyboard music. The works were probably most often performed in Scarlatti's time on the harpsichord, yet the Spanish royal court at which Scarlatti wrote them also possessed early versions of the piano (see fortepiano), which had been invented by Cristofori during Scarlatti's own lifetime. Modern performers may choose between the harpsichord, the fortepiano, or indeed the modern piano.
For discussion of the musical form and characteristics of the sonatas, see Domenico Scarlatti.
Editions
The list below can be sorted by any of the four sets of catalogue numbers:
Solo keyboard sonatas
See: Yanez Navarro, Celestino: Nuevas aportaciones para el estudio de las sonatas de Domenico Scarlatti. Los manuscritos del Archivo de música de las Catedrales de Zaragoza. Tesis doctoral, Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, 2015.
See also
- Barbara of Portugal: a Portuguese infanta and Scarlatti's only pupil during the time the Sonatas originated. She was skilled both as keyboard player and, in politics, as the Queen of Spain. The harpsichordist/scholar Ralph Kirkpatrick offered a theory, perhaps tongue-in-cheek, that Barbara was the true author of the Sonatas.
References
Notes
Citations
Sources
External links
- Domenico Scarlatti: The Keyboard Sonatas – Lists at Classical.net, sorted by Longo, Kirkpatrick or Pestelli numbers or key, time signature
- ; lists original sources for more than 600 keyboard sonatas including many not listed in this article; newly discovered ones and doubtful ones; other lists such as Fadini's edition. That link is now broken. The author died on June 17, 2014. Archived copy of the final May 30, 2014 revision is available here: https://web.archive.org/web/20140914095212/http://chrishail.net/catalogue.pdf Scarlatti Domenico: Catalogue]
- Scarlatti: Complete Keyboard Sonatas including a list of all beginnings as sheet music (PDF)
- An iTunes playlist of Scarlatti Sonata recordings (Select columns from Name to the right, Copy, Open a plain text editor, Paste, Save, Open iTunes, File > Library > Import Playlist)