Analysis of "Form for Piano" by Ralph Shapey
Ralph Shapey, Patricia Morehead, Stefan Wolpe, Carl Fischer · 2016
Both form (1959) by Ralph Shapey and Form (1959) by Stefan Wolpe were composed for the same New York concert (Example 1). The circumstances for this concert were explained to me by Ralph him self. Stefan and Ralph were planning a concert exclusively of their own compositions. Stefan felt that the program was too short and suggested that they should each write a short piano piece for this concert using cer tain musical parameters in common. According to Ralph, they had a dis cussion and decided that they would both use the same parameters but write their compositions independent of one another. However Ralph no longer remembers what these parameters were. (Having analyzed both Forms, I think the parameters of a pitch series and the idea of symmetries