Quotes in pieces

[ahmedito]

Im still laughing.... Id read and heard in history class about Debussy's famous Tristan quote in Golliwog's Cakewalk. I played it after having sat through the whole opera (in history class... ugh, too much Wagner at a time is very tiring), Im still laughing its so funny and fresh and great!
(listen to the first few measures of tristan, then play he middle section of Golliwogs Cakewalk, youll see what I mean)

Theres a lot of "dramatic" or programatic quotes (especially in 19th century music, like Schumman) but what other quotes have you found that tickle you like that one?

[joell12068]

Although I'm not a fan of Erik Satie, one piece tickles me. It's the Sonatina Bureaucratique.  It's full of quotations from Clementi's Sonatina Opus 36 no. 1.  Only those of us who had the pleasure of learning the Clementi Sonatina when while we were young piano students will recognize the quotations used in the Satie piece.

[ahmedito]

The sonatine burocratique is hilarious, have you ever read he commentary written along with the score? about the guy who goes to work to his office and arranges his pencils etc, etc?

[Tash]

i played golliwog's cakewalk a few years ago except i hadn't listened to tristan und isolde and thus did not get the whole parody in the middle and to put it briefly, i sucked at it

any other quotes, i cannot think of at this moment- sunday night what can you expect

[Motrax]

The theme from Rachmaninoff's Corelli Variations (I don't know where Corelli himself used the theme) is quoted in Liszt's Rhapsody Espagnole.

Supposedly, the theme from Rachmaninoff's 3rd piano concerto is taken from a Russian folk melody, though I shouldn't be held accountable for this possibility.  

A friend and I joke that due to Bach's proliferation of music, every possible melody one could produce has already been written, so any music after those two is just variations on a theme by Bach.  

[ahmedito]

The theme used by Rachmaninoff is the famous "La foglia", a Spanish theme that has been used in variations since the 15th century. Rachmaninoff misakenly thought it was Corelli's. To name other famous composers who have used it: Monteverdi, Vivaldi, Corelli, Salieri, Paganini, Liszt and of course, Rachmaninoff...