Sonata for saxophone by P. Craston in the aspect of universals for the instrumental sonata genre in the XX century

The purpose of article is consist of opening processe concerning the development trends of the sonata genre for saxophone – a new generation instrument that emerged in the postclassical period, after the heyday of the sonata genre in the works of classical composers. This instrument entered the symphony and wind orchestras much earlier than the number of solo instruments, so sonatas for saxophone appeared only in the twentieth century. The material for the analysis was a sonata for saxophone by P. Craston, created in 1937. The research methodology is to apply an analytical method that provides a basis for a comprehensive analysis of the sonata and to identify traditional and innovative features. The scientific novelty of this work is to identify traditional and innovative features in the content and musical style of this P. Craston’s sonata. It is proved that these features arise in the context of new musical universals of the instrumental sonata genre in the twentieth century. The specifics of their transformation in the musical text and the content of the analyzed work are indicated. The scientific article proves that P. Crаston’s sonata combines the features of the traditional sonata cycle with the musical language and style characteristic of the art of the twentieth century, and is quite complex for ensemble performance. The saxophone part is characterized by increased complexity due to extreme mobility, a large number of virtuoso passages, the use of wide jumps from one register to another, the presence of long musical constructions. It is pointed out that the complexity of the saxophone part is due primarily to the fact that in America the performing school of saxophone playing, in comparison with other countries, occupied a leading position in the 30s. The conclusions indicate that in the twentieth century the sonata genre underwent significant changes that distanced it from the classical invariant, as a result of which the analyzed sonata for saxophone organically synthesized a whole set of different stylistic features.