On The Ferdinando Sor Variations On A Theme Of Mozart

As a plucked string musical instrument of long history, classical guitar has a position as important as other musical instruments in the international music stage. It is called one of the three major musical instruments in the western world, boasting of even longer history than the other two. Guitar music has large reservoir of works and is able to perform music ranging from Renaissance to modern times. Especially, during the first golden period of classicalism, there emerged a lot of talented composers and performers in the circle of guitar, among whom Ferdinando Sor is the most famous and prolific, creating large number of musical works of various types, leaving for humankind precious artistic fortune and settling the position hard to be surpassed by his posterior artists.His works are graceful and noble in style and rich in form of performance, inherited the musical tradition of classicalism in western world. As a guitar performer, the author is fond of his works, especially the piece of Variations on a Theme of Mozart, famed as the most difficult guitar works to be performed. The difficulty lies not in the complexity of performing technique but in the comprehension and mastery of the music. This thesis aims at analyzing the works from the perspective of musicology and have a discussion upon its performing technique.The first chapter is the introduction of the musician and the basic situation in which the works is created with the purpose of presenting a preliminary illustration of the musician and his works. The second chapter is the artistic analysis of the music itself from the various perpective of tune, mode of music, chord, texture and rhythm. The third chapter is the expounding of performing technique, integrated with the author's own performing experience and at the same time make comparison among the excercise music by the composer in order to achieve the efficient effect of performence. The fourth chapter is the comprehensive evaluation about the composer and zhe work. From the social and historical cultural background the composer lives in to the circumstances of its creation and in conection with the critics by the posterior artists, one can better understand the musical style of the composer.