A practical guide to Extempore Embellishments, based on Telemann Methodic sonatas

After Historically Informed Performance Practice movement in 1950, Extempore embellishments have attracted lots of interests in this style of performing and after some time, it became one of the mandatory and important abilities for all stylesof music performing. The extempore embellishments that a musician applies to the music being performed represent a good understanding of music and also the ability of performer to arise the feeling of listeners. A good and sensitive extemporization needs lots of knowledge and ability of understanding of the sense of musicians during the era which music has been composed. In other hand a musician should seek for a good balance between the personal feelings or characteristics and being faithful to the sense of the music and composer. It’s not an easy task to think in the same way that a musician did some 200 years ago because the cultures are different and the traditions and taste about music and music performing has changed a lot especially during romantic and modern era. Because of these issues, musicologists always try to use the primary sources which have been written by music composers of that time or musical theorists. George Philip Telemann's Zw?lfmethodischeSonaten, is among one of the most interesting and famous sources to study for understanding of the free ornamentation in Baroque era. Telemann(b Magdeburg, 14 March 1681; d Hamburg, 25 June 1767) is of curse on of the most important composers of baroque era, he is a self-taught composer and instrumentalist he has traveled a lot during his life time, giving concerts and observing musicians in different parts of Europe.He has such a taste that can be a good example of "mix-tasted" composer of his time since he was affected by different styles of music such as German, French, Italian and Polish while he was open to some aspect of galant style. Zw?lfmethodischeSonaten is a combination of 12 sonatas for flute or violin which has been written in Hamburg between 1728 and 1732,on one hand a music being composed and extemporized by a composer such as Telemann and on the other hand a realistic way of presentation of extemporized line and basic line together makes these sonatas a perfect case to study. In this essay I've tried to classify the un-ornamented line based on the aesthetic role that a note or a phrase have with in the music to make it easier to compare and understand the approach of the composer. Although I've tried to focus more on Telemann's methodic sonatas, I've also compared it with examples of other composerssometimes to give more general schema of extemporization. The other aim of mine was also Not only to show a single way of extemporization but also to emphasize on the different way of extemporization in the similar basic ideas with the same music. Although this essay does not try to give a certain answer, it would be a guide to start understanding improvisation in baroque era.