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ROBERT SILVERMAN
PLAYS BEETHOVEN
Presented by Music on Main at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club
3611 West Broadway, Vancouver BC Concert One Concert Two Concert Three Concert Four Concert Five Concert Six Concert Seven Concert Eight Monday, September 27, 2010 Tuesday, September 28, 2010 Monday, November 1, 2010 Tuesday, November 2, 2010 Tuesday, February 15, 2011 Wednesday, February 16, 2011 Monday, April 4, 2011 Tuesday, April 5, 2011
www.robertsilverman.ca www.musiconmain.ca
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Beethovens incredible brain always lurks in the background, even in his most farcical moments. Consider that the tantrum is in B flat major, the key that plays an important role in the first movement.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 13 Grande Sonate Pathtique composed 1798, published 1799
In 1793, the German poet, Friedrich Schiller, wrote an essay entitled ber das Pathetische. Musicologist William Kinderman, in his book, Beethoven, lucidly states Schillers thesis: Pathos or tragedy arises when unblinkered awareness of suffering is counter-balanced by the capacity of reason to resist these feelings. Beethovens understanding of this affect was undoubtedly close to Schillers. Defiance of suffering and a single-minded determination to surmount it lie at the heart of virtually all his C minor compositions. By the late 18th century, that keys strong association with a sense of tragic drama was firmly established: Mozart had cast several of his most dramatic works in that key, while Beethoven had recently composed the first of three dramatic C minor sonatas (Op. 10/1). However, the C minor as pathos identification probably was cemented with the Grande Sonate Pathtique, one of only two sonatas whose nickname was actually provided by Beethoven. This trait is found most obviously in the first movement, with its conflict between the solemn Grave, which is so reminiscent of the opening of Bachs C minor Partita, and the hugely defiant Allegro. Only four of the sonatas have an introduction, and this, his first, is the lengthiest and most elaborate. It does far more than merely set the mood: it is heavily integrated with the rest of the movement. A famous point of dispute between musicians occurs in the opening movement: some early editions of this sonata seem to indicate that the Introduction as well as the Allegro be repeated. The late Rudolf Serkin performed the sonata in this manner, as does at least one of his former students. I sympathize with anyone's desire to hear (or play) the introduction a second time. However, the overwhelming momentum of the Allegro suffers by the resulting interruption, and the devastating shock of the return to the introduction in G minor at the outset of the Development is completely lost. More importantly, how are we to handle Beethovens contemporaneous Piano Quartet/Quintet, Op. 16, with its even longer introduction and identical ambiguity about the repeat? In that work, repeating the introduction sounds ludicrous. Doing so in the Pathtique is equally wrong. Was the famous slow movement consciously or unconsciously influenced by the very similar middle section of the slow movement of Mozarts C minor sonata? Was it deliberately echoed, in turn, by Beethoven himself in the Adagio of his Ninth Symphony? We can never know such things: When someone pointed out to Brahms the resemblance between the finale of his first symphony and Beethovens Ode to Joy, he responded Any idiot knows that. However, when I intrepidly asked Aaron Copland about a striking kinship between the closing measures of The Cat and the Mouse and the introduction to Dukas The Sorcerers Apprentice, he acknowledged the resemblance, but then added that hed never heard the Dukas piece when hed composed his own work as a young man. Like so many of Beethovens adagios, this one has a troubled inner section in the minor key. His piano sonatas often contained textures associated with string quartet writing; here, one can easily envision a duet between the first violin and cello, accompanied by the nervous triplets in the second violin and viola parts. It is also characteristic of the composers slow movements that some aspect of the contrasting middle sectionin this case the triplet figuresremain present when the song-like opening theme returns. The Finale may be the lightest of the three movements, but its thematic connections to the rest of the sonata run deep. The rhythm of the main theme is identical to that of the second theme in the opening movement. The middle section contains two links to the second movement: not only do they share the key of A flat major, but the melodic skeleton of Adagio is also maintained. Throughout the movement Beethoven also plays a teasing game with us: on four occasions there occurs a brilliant descending scale, beginning from the topmost F of the keyboard as he knew it. However, only in the last measure does he finally resolve it in the home key of C minor.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 12 in A flat Major, Op. 26 Funeral March composed 1800-01, published 1802
In 1802, any musician or educated music-lover who had been tracking Beethovens career would have come to expect a thematically unified work consisting of a dramatic, cogently-argued opening movement, followed by an intensely lyrical Adagio, possibly a witty minuet or scherzo, and finally, a relatively light closing movement. Against such expectations, the appearance of the suite-like Sonata in A flat, Op. 26 and the two sonatas quasi una Fantasia of Op. 27, would not merely have been surprising. With their unorthodox ordering of movements, and the use of genres not normally associated with sonatas, they must have seemed as shocking as Beethovens final sonata trilogy, Op. 109-111, composed two decades later. The opening movement is a leisurely set of variations, based on an Andante that seems far more appropriate to a slow movement than to the beginning of a sonata. Although the relationship between the theme and each of the five variations is clear, there is little connection between the variations themselves, nor is there much of a cumulative effect when all are heard together. (Beethoven tacitly acknowledges each variations separateness by concluding each with a full double bar, a practice not encountered in any of his other variation sets.) For the first time in his four-movement piano sonatas, the Scherzo appears as the second movement rather than the third. The change of order was virtually a necessity here, given the slow pace of the opening movement. Nevertheless, Beethoven must have been satisfied with the result, because this was the order to which he would frequently return in many of his instrumental works. A heroic funeral march serves as the slow movement. All the elements that characterize the genre are presentthe lumbering dotted rhythm, a minor key, and a military salute featuring trumpets and drums. Beethoven must also have been satisfied with this idea, because he soon was to repeat the procedure in his Eroica. (Incidentally, it is not generally known that in 1815 he orchestrated this movement and included it in his incidental music to the now forgotten play Leonore Prohaska.) Op. 26 is the first sonata to feature a perpetuum mobile finale, a technique he would employ in seven of his nine subsequent sonatas. The themes gentle character is interrupted throughout the rondo by jarring syncopations in the second theme, and a middle section whose ferocity anticipates the finale of the Moonlight. The coda, while losing none of its momentum, quickly and effectively dissolves the sonata into nothingness.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 13 quasi una Fantasia in E flat Major, Op. 27/1 composed 1800-01, published 1802
This work, like the Moonlight, its better known bedfellow, represents one of the earliest attempts by Beethoven to create a succinct, unified sonata in which, for the first time in his piano music, individual movements are linked together without a break. A reprise of the slow movement following the finale likewise contributes to the works unity, as does the fact that Beethoven derives virtually all the important themes in this sonata from two ideas: a falling third, and a rising arpeggio. The most notable innovation in this piece is the dramatic shift in the works centre of gravity. Until this point, the classical sonatas weightiest moments generally occurred in the two opening movements. However, this sonata breaks that tradition by intensifying as it progresses, with the Finale serving as its climax. In order to underscore the importance of this structural change, and make it obvious, Beethoven may have deliberately composed as innocuous an opening theme to the sonata as he could. The subsequent variation even borders on silliness: this is one of the few places in Beethoven where the music is not, as Schnabel was fond of saying, greater than it possibly can be played. The two intervening episodes and the coda are by far the most interesting sections of this rondo movement. The work then deepens dramatically and suddenly. The second movement is the first example we have of Beethovens dark, almost sinister scherzi. A songful slow movement is interrupted by the perpetual motion, driven Finale. Brilliant as it is, however, the Finale lacks the stamina to make it all the way to the finish line. It stops suddenly, and while pausing for breath, the Adagio returns for one final reprise. A short Coda resumes the activity, and brings this unjustifiably neglected sonata to a brilliant conclusion.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 14 quasi una Fantasia in C sharp minor, Op. 27/2 Moonlight composed 1801, published 1802
This work, the most famous sonata in existenceand one of the most atypicalowes its nickname not to Beethoven or any ingenious publisher. Rather, the credit goes to the German poet and critic Ludwig Rellstab, who wrote that the first movement reminded him of a boat visiting, by moonlight, the primitive landscapes of Lake Lucerne. One is tempted to wonder whether the sonata would have achieved its popularity without that evocative nickname, and also to lament that the first movement is by now so hackneyed that its magnificence is often overlooked. Moreover, the entire piece, surely one of Beethovens finest creations, is all-too-seldom performed in recital. (Interestingly, when the sonata was first published, it was the finale that gave the work its almost instant popularity.) This work and its less-known companion, the Sonata in E flat, Op. 27/1, represent Beethovens earliest attempts to create works whose continuity spreads over all the movements, with the weightiest moments occurring toward the conclusion, rather than the opening. The dividing lines between movements are clearer here than in Op. 27/1. Still, the Moonlights effect is also cumulative, leading us from the utmost solemnity of the first movement, through the gracious, ultra-brief respite provided by an untitled minuet (termed by Liszt as a flower between two abysses) to the passionate, unremittingly tragic Finale. Interestingly, there is little contrast within any of the movements: each seems to be cut from only one piece of cloth. Theoretically, the opening movement can be parsed into a structure containing all the elements of Sonata allegro form. However such an analysis barely describes this wondrous composition, which sounds more formless than possibly any other movement he wrote. Two characteristics of the final movement, which is in a far more recognizable sonata-allegro form, bear noting. The first three notes in the right hand are identical to the accompanying triplet figure in the opening movement. Also, as in several other of his sonatas, the movement seems to run out of steam shortly before the conclusion of the work, and pauses briefly before heading for the final bar.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 17 in D minor, Op. 31/2 Tempest composed 1802, published 1804
The sonatas of Op. 31 continue the exploration of new paths that Beethoven had begun with Op. 26paths that include formal and harmonic experimentation. The D minor sonata, Op. 31/2 is his first work in which the main theme (seemingly) begins in a key other than the tonic. A mysterious A major arpeggio, ostensibly the introduction, immediately attracts and holds our attention through a lengthy pause. Suddenly, a rush of twonote figures momentarily identifies the correct key of the piece, but again stops on the dominant A, rather than on the tonic D minor. The mysterious arpeggio is again heard, but in the distant key of C major. After another pause, a second, longer rush of two-note figures leads to triumphant statement of the arpeggio in the home key, pounded out in the bass, alternating with a plaintive gesture in the treble. Here, even the most experienced listener would be justified in presuming that we have finally arrived at the main theme. However, from the outset of the piece, Beethoven has kept several steps ahead of us. After only eight measures he begins modulating to the secondary key. This is a transition: what we had thought was an introduction was actually the main theme. [Interestingly, whenever this theme is quoted again--in the repeat of the exposition and the recapitulation--the previous material elides effortlessly into it, so that Beethoven never again allows us to hear it as a beginning. Those pianistsstudents and professionals alikewho make a big ritardando in order to emphasize the return of the main theme have not a clue about Beethovens narrative sense.] The remainder of the movement is devoted to a working out of the three ideas already introduced. In the recapitulation, the initial slow arpeggio is followed by a recitative that, consciously or otherwise, anticipates the well-known baritone recitative that opens the choral portion of the finale to Beethovens 9th Symphony. The sublime Adagio also begins with a slow arpeggio. All the important themes are peaceful, but running through the movement is a series of ominous, short drum rolls in the bass, that remind us, as Beethoven so often likes to do, that tranquility is at best transitory. The finale is another of those moto perpetuo movements that so obsessed Beethoven in his middle period. Beethoven may (or may not; see my notes to Sonata No. 18) have originally been inspired by hearing a horseman galloping by his window, according to his student Karl Czerny, but he ultimately moved well beyond that image, as evidenced by the Allegretto and piano markings at the outset. A single melodic pattern predominates throughout, with subsidiary sections featuring jarring cross-accentuation. Like the two preceding movements, the finale ends quietly, with the incessant rhythmic pattern playing itself out to the point of exhaustion. As for Beethovens famous response to a question posed by his amanuensis Anton Schindler regarding this works (and the Appassionatas) meaning, it is possible that Beethoven indeed saw some particular connection between both pieces and Shakespeares The Tempest. Given Schindlers less than brilliant mind, however, it is possible that the composer just threw out the first answer he could think of.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 18 in E flat Major, Op. 31/3 composed 1802, published 1804
This work was to be Beethovens final four-movement sonata aside from the Hammerklavier. Its layout is quite unusual. There is no slow movement: instead, the composer provides both a Scherzo and a Minuet. (Had Beethoven appeared on the late-night Dietrich Leitermann TV show, the gap-toothed comic might have quipped: Whats the matter, Lou? After composing 17 sonatas, you still cant make up your mind?) Like the other two Op. 31 sonatas, this one begins unusually. Instead of positing a thesis or statement, Beethoven asks a question. Moreover, throughout the movement, like an insecure child, he asks the same question over and over again, even though the answer is provided on each occasion by a parent whose patience exceeds that of anyone else listening to (or performing) the piece. The Scherzo is equally unorthodox. Until now, Beethovens scherzi have essentially been fast, triple-metered minuets, with contrasting Trios. This one breaks with both traditions: it is a quick march in 2/4 time, and is cast in a sonata form, complete with a repeat of the opening section. Its most distinguishing characteristics are the perpetual-motion accompaniment in the left hand, and the sudden explosive chords that temporarily halt the movements continuous motion. The surprise ending is truly one of the composers masterstrokes. The MinuetBeethovens final free-standing one for solo pianois characterized by a complete absence of the vigour and rhythmic thrust of most classical minuets by Haydn and Mozart, as well as those by Beethoven himself. Instead, this beautiful piece is filled with nostalgia and sentiment, as though the composer is reluctantly taking his leave of the eighteenth century.2 Beethovens student, Karl Czerny, claimed that the composer told him that he was inspired by the sound of a horseman riding wildly outside his window as he composed the finale to the D minor Sonata, Op. 31/2. There may have been a breakdown of communication between them, due either to Beethovens deafness or a lapse in Czernys memory. It requires a stretch of the imagination to hear the last movement of Op. 31/2 (marked Allegretto) in that manner. However, very few pieces better evoke the image of a furious gallop than the Finale of Op. 31/3. It begins breathlessly with the sound of hooves clattering on the cobblestones. Later on, hunting horn calls are added to the mix, and the movement continues to a joyous conclusion with only a tiny break just before the final phrase.
Later, in his Symphony No. 8, he would return to the minuet form to parody it, rather than, as in this sonata, to pay homage to a beloved genre that he realized had outlived its time. Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 19 in G Minor, Op. 49/1 composed 1797, published 1805 Sonata No. 20 in G Major, Op. 49/2 composed 1795-96, published 1805
Despite their opus number, the two Op. 49 sonatas are early works, published without the composers consent at his brothers instigation. One can readily understand Beethovens annoyance: they are quite unfinished, especially with respect to their unusually sparse dynamic markings, which Beethoven invariably treated not simply as expression marks, but as an important aspect of a works structure. More importantly, for all the sonatas allure, they no longer reflected his compositional skills in 1805, and he would not have wanted them regarded as representative of his current work. It is for those reasons that some pianists and commentators argue that these pieces should be excluded from the canon of Beethovens piano sonatas, and grouped instead with the remainder of his juvenilia. Still, they were composed very shortly before Beethoven launched his career in earnest, and are much closer in quality to his earliest published works than to the student pieces he had written previously. Occasionally, they even exhibit a surprising degree of sophistication. The opening movement of the G minor sonata is a tragic Andante. This in itself is unusualslow first movements were rare in the classical erabut more interesting is the fact that both themes share a common rhythm. In the first movement of the G major sonata, the relationship is even subtler: the second theme is derived from the latter portion of the first. Both finales are light rondos. The first combines a formal scheme that is characteristic of Mozart, blended with a humorous quality reminiscent of Haydn. The final movement of No. 2 opens with the theme that Beethoven subsequently used in the minuet of his Septet, Op. 20. Considering that he virtually disowned the Septet, imagine his anger at seeing what is tantamount to a sketch of one of its movements published several years later without his knowledge. For all their youthfulness, the Op. 49 sonatas are delightful, charming pieces. It is small wonder that they are so often used as an introduction to Beethoven for young pianists. Nevertheless, they do deserve a more serious outing every so often
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 26 in E-flat, Op. 81a Das Lebewohl composed 1809-10, published 1811
Op. 81a is a transitional work: the sonic landscape of the introduction presages some of his late compositions, while other portions could easily have been written a few years earlier. This sonata is also unusual in three respects that have nothing to do with the music itself. Of all the sonatas, this is the only one with an explicit program. Archduke Rudolph, a close friend and sponsor of Beethoven, was forced to leave Vienna due to the imminent Napoleonic invasion, and Beethoven composed this work with the movements representing, respectively, his friends farewell, his absence, and their reunion. (He even delayed completion of the finale until Rudolph actually returned to Vienna). It is also no coincidence that this is also the first sonata in which the original titles and principal tempo indications are in German. To employ even common musical terms such as Allegro and Andante was politically incorrect at this time because Italian was the Napoleons native language.3 Lastly, the work owes its unusual opus number to the fact that it was bound with a sextet for two horns and string quartet (Op. 81b) which Beethoven had composed much earlier. Although the grouping of several similar compositions under a single opus number was still relatively common (although no longer so for Beethoven, whose works were in such demand that he could sell each one individually), this type of dogs breakfast publication was always a rare occurrence. The sonata is not only programmatic, but also highly pictorial. The first three notes of the introduction bring to mind a post-horn call. One can almost imagine the Archdukes horses neighing in the flourish immediately preceding the main theme, following which, the left hand imitates the clattering of coach wheels while the sharp, rising three notes in the right hand depict the cracking of the drivers whip. Also, in the coda, it is not hard to picture, in the winding down of the tempo and the spreading of the hands, the Archdukes coach disappearing from view. The second movement wonderfully evokes a sense of loneliness, while the third, complete with fanfare, conjures up the joy and excitement of seeing a close friend after a lengthy absence. Yet, for all the programmatic content, the sonata is rigorously constructed, beginning with the Introduction, which is totally integrated with the rest of the composition. Indeed, the opening three notes are the source of virtually all the important material of the first movement. In various transformations, that motto also plays a meaningful role in the remainder of the sonata. All three movements are in fairly standard sonata forms, except for the deeply expressive Andante, which lacks a development section. The Finale, with its E-flat major scales and arpeggios, is highly reminiscent of the Emperor Concerto, written around the same time.
3 'Les Adieux' was the last name Beethoven would have chosen, and not simply because of anti-French sentiment. Beneath the important descending three-note motto with which the Sonata begins, the composer wrote the syllables, Le-be-wohl, whose meaning in German - 'live well' - is quite different than the French 'good-bye,' or 'God be with you'.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
So seamlessly does the first movement follow the final measures of the previous sonata (No. 27) that perhaps, in an offbeat way, it has been going on for a while! Just possibly, this is another of Beethovens attempts, in his later works, to elucidate his creative process: in this case, he could consciously be guiding us from his previous world into his new one.
4
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 29 in B-flat Major, Op. 106 Hammerklavier composed 1816-17, published 1819
In addition to the Hammerklaviers5 enormous demands upon a performers technique and his/her powers of concentration, the work also poses unusual problems for the serious interpreter. It was published in both Vienna and London under Beethovens supervision, but the autograph has never been found. Unfortunately, the two sources contain many divergent readings, sometimes in important places. There is also an incomprehensible reversal of the order of second and third movements in the London edition. Ironically, the area of tempo, where Beethoven ostensibly went out of his way to be as explicit as possible, is equally problematic. Although Op. 106 is the only piano sonata with metronome indications, some of these markings are simply ludicrous. Pianists who can manage the first movement at the proscribed 138 to the halfnote (I freely admit to not being among them) succeed only in making as strong a case as possible against the validity of such a notion 6. Even if Beethovens primitive metronome was accurate, two other facts must be taken into consideration. Composers often hear their music faster than anyone else: they do not require the time the rest of us need to absorb it because they have digested it so thoroughly during the process of creating it. Furthermore, with Beethoven now virtually deaf, it is likely that he had lost the spatial sense that music requires in order to be cogent, and for its nuances to be adequately conveyed. It is commonly known that the Hammerklavier is by far his longest sonata. This is due mostly to the vast landscape of the slow movement. The outer movements are only moderately lengthy, while the Scherzo is one of his briefest creations. The piece is also sonically huge, sounding extraordinarily symphonic.7 There is no sidestepping the fact that the Hammerklavier is also as tough, gnarled, and uncompromising as anything Beethoven wrote, except perhaps for the Grosse Fuge. Above all, it is relentlessly obsessive. A single interval, the third, permeates all the movements at the motivic, melodic and harmonic levels. In fact, that interval forms the basis of virtually every principal theme in the sonata. Similarly, although the dominant note F might be expected to play a key role, with large-scale areas of the piece in that key, just as it does in all other works of the classical era, its role here is extremely limited. Beethoven frequently uses the dominant chord as a brief resting-place before returning to the tonic. However, never once does he actually modulate to the key of F. Instead, all important modulations are to a key that is a third higher or lower than the immediately preceding one. 8 In other words, as early as 1816, Beethoven was attempting to do nothing less than re-define the concept of tonality by casting aside the traditional role of the dominant key (the second most fundamental entity in the tonal system), and elevating another notethe thirdto that level of importance. It is not too great an exaggeration to state that we must look almost a century ahead, to Debussy and Schoenberg, in order to find so radical a transformation of musical thought. 9 For the sonatas layout, Beethoven reverted to the four-movement Grande Sonate model that he had used so frequently in his youth. The opening movement is in sonata form, complete with a (very) necessary repeat of the Exposition. Immediately following the recapitulation, Beethoven jarringly introduces the theme in B minor, which he is known to have regarded as a dark key. From that point on, B minor serves as B flat majors antithesis, with the struggle between the two keys occurring at various points throughout the sonata, most obviously at the conclusion of the Scherzo. The first movement also contains the most disputed reading in all of Beethovens piano music. Just prior to the return of the main theme there is a progression of notes in the bass line, in which an A-sharp becomes the
5 There is no single instrument called a Hammerklavier. Rather, it refers, in German to a keyboard instrument with hammers. Romance language terms even for something as common as piano were out of favor in the immediate postNapoleonic era. Beethoven himself had also indicated that the Sonata Op. 101 was written for the Hammerklavier, but the nickname has stuck only to this work. 6 Solomon being the notable exception. I was referring to everyone else, of course. 7 Paradoxically, the sense of a piano (and perhaps the pianist as well) straining at its limits is required in order for that effect to be felt. The conductor Felix Weingartner actually made an orchestration of the sonata; the third movement is remarkably successful, but overall, at least in his own recording with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the piece sounds smaller than it does in the hands of any competent pianist. 8 Ironically, B flat major is only peripherally related to the intricate system of four keys he constructs around it, and returns to time and time again. Three of them, G, D, and F sharp, are separated from B flat by, almost predictably, the interval of a third. I believe that these unorthodox ground rules are one of the chief elements that make the piece such a tough nut to crack. The sonata superficially sounds as if it is in a traditional key, but its internal workings are markedly different. 9 In this respect, he was ahead of the late 19th century composers like Liszt and Wagner, who, by exploiting and thwarting our expectations of traditional harmonic practice, were still acknowledging its traditions.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
tonic B-flat. The first editions are explicit, but controversy exists nonetheless, partially because a sketch in Beethovens hand indicates a more conventional A-natural. More importantly, the music sounds extraordinarily strange as printed, even to late 20th century ears. Pianist Alfred Brendel believes that an A-sharp robs the recapitulation of a sense of triumph, and that the natural is therefore correct. I agree with Brendels observations, but not his conclusions. Throughout his career, Beethoven often went out of his way to deemphasize the moment when the main theme returns. This is particularly true in the Hammerklavier, where the left-hand accompaniment ensures that the power of the sonatas opening cannot possibly be duplicated in the recapitulation. (He is setting up the important B minor shock just ahead.) Since the A-sharp eliminates the dominant-tonic progression leading up to the recapitulation, one of this sonatas fundamental goals is achieved by playing the music as printed.10 Very few compositions in the canon of Western music start or conclude as tragically as the slow movement, but elsewhere, vastly different states of mind are evoked. Beethoven indicates at the outset that the entire movement is to be played Appassionata e con molto sentimento, and subsequently directs that certain sections be performed espressivo, and on two occasions, con grand espressione. In other words, unlike the slow movement of the Sonata Op. 10/3, this movement is not a depiction of uninterrupted desolation. Central to the movementcast in Sonata form with an expansive codais an extended passage where descending thirds are chained together melodically. The resemblance to the opening of Brahms fourth symphony can hardly be called a coincidence. Elsewhere, there are moments where embellishments in the right hand sound uncannily like those found in Chopin nocturnes. It is only in the final movement that traditional sonata procedure is abandoned. As in the Finale of the composers ninth symphony, the composer begins by searching for an appropriate conclusion to the work. A slow, introspective, seemingly rhythm-less series of descending thirds in the bass voice is heard, sounding somewhat like the awakening from a deep slumber. The composer interrupts the process three times in order to try out a new idea. (Of course, something similar happens in the ninth symphony, but there, Beethoven auditions themes from previous movements. In the Hammerklavier, the material is always new and each idea is faster and more contrapuntal than the preceding one.) Suddenly, he hits upon the idea of ending the sonata with a fugue. He is elated: those chained thirds become faster, louder, and more excited. Then he calms down, and the fugue itself begins. Beethoven had included fugal sections in several of his earlier works, but writing a fugue as an entire movement was new for him. And what a weird, grotesque fugue it is! Not only does it begin with a trill, which ordinarily is a concluding ornament, but in sharp contrast to greatest fugues of the Baroque masters, it uses every known manner of fugal writingeven the very rare technique of stating the theme backwards (set in B Minor, B flat major's sinister alter ego) instead of only one or two. Finally, I offer without comment a quotation from a letter that Beethoven wrote to Ferdinand Ries, the pianist who played the first London performance of this, his most complex and ingeniously structured sonata:
Should the sonata not be suitable for London, I could send another one; or you could also omit the Largo and begin straight away with the Fugue, which is the last movement; or you could use the first movement and then the Adagio, and then for the third movement the Scherzo, and omit entirely No. 4. Or you could take just the first movement and the Scherzo and let them form the whole sonata. I leave it to you to do as you think best.
10 Perhaps Donald Tovey, the esteemed British musicologist, came closest to the truth in suggesting that Beethoven probably meant an A-natural, but would have been ecstatic had anyone pointed out that he had actually written an A-sharp. (The passage in question, by the way, lasts two seconds at most. Nonetheless, its importance cannot be overstated.)
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
Sonata No. 31 in A flat Major, Op. 110 composed 1821, published 1821
Like so many of Beethovens later works, this sonata reaches backward as much as it looks forward. The influence of the classical style is evident in the rapid figurations and Alberti accompaniments that appear in the first movement. A subsequent counter-melody in the left hand is a direct quote, in the minor, of the opening theme of Haydns Sonata No. 47. The Baroque period is reflected in the final movement, a complex mix of recitative (complete with a stock operatic cadence of that era), aria and fugue, the quintessential Baroque form. The general influence of Beethovens own previous music is also present: the re-statement of the slow movement following the first fugue echoes a somewhat similar event in the Sonata, Op. 27/1. Throughout history composers were fully aware of the emotive power of music, and exploited it regularly. Still, insofar as the range of emotion is concerned, Beethovens music represents a sharp break with that of his immediate predecessors. In Op. 110, the spiritual journey through which Beethoven guides us over the course of the final movement is as profound as any he conceived. An intense recitative leads to a grief-laden aria. A fugue (whose subject is a variation of the sonatas opening theme) attempts to console and uplift, but at the last moment it fails, and the key of the piece appropriately sinks from A-flat major to G minor. A variation of the aria follows, marked lamenting, exhausted, in which, as clearly as one can attribute an external event to abstract music, the grief-stricken protagonist dies, gasping for breath. A series of repeated chords signals some sort of transfiguration; as the sound fades away, the second fugue begins imperceptibly. (This fugues principal theme is a mirror image of the first, another common Baroque device.) Soon the original fugue theme reappears, but this time it does not falter. Instead, the music quickly gathers momentum and ends triumphantly and suddenly, like a rocket disappearing into space. Although eclecticism and the inclusion of vulgarity is an entirely legitimate aspect of great art, some people have difficulty dealing with it. Particularly troubling are such occurrences as cowbells in Mahler symphonies, or the medley of tunes, including one entitled "Cabbages and Turnips," with which Bach's Goldberg Variations conclude. I must therefore apologize for noting that the sublime concluding movement of Beethoven's Sonata No. 31 is preceded by a scherzo that quotes two popular tavern-tunes of the time: Unsa Ktz hd Katzln ghabt ("Our cat had kittens") and Ich bin lderlich, du bist lderlich which, politely translated, is "I'm a slob, you're a slob").
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman
It is interesting that, as with the middle movement of the Appassionata and the slow movement of the Archduke Trio. Beethoven never entitled this type of composition a set of variations. He reserved that designation only for movements such as those in the Sonatas Op. 26 and 109, in which each variation is far more of a distinct entity.
Music on Main presents Silverman plays Beethoven. September 27, 2010 April 5, 2011 at the Cellar Restaurant & Jazz Club. www.musiconmain.ca Programme notes by Robert Silverman. Robert Silverman