Diabelli Variations op. 120
Diabelli was a guitarist and publisher in Vienna . He sent out a melody to composers requesting their variation.
Fifty composers responded with pieces, including Schubert, Franz Liszt and Johann Nepomuk Hummel . Carl Czerny was recruited to write a coda , and they were published as Vaterländische Künstlerverein .
Instead of providing just one variation, Beethoven provided thirty-three, which were published in separately 1824. They are regarded as one of Beethoven's piano pieces and the greatest set of variations of their time.
He broke the theme up into many fragments and incorporated fragments into a melody, trill or figure. The motives of the theme become the basis so it is difficult to hear the entire theme.
Basis for variation:
He colored harmonies which prefigures later Romantic composers and influential to Brahms in his variation on a theme by Handel.
Moonlight Sonata Op. 27 No. 2 C sharp minor 1801
The sonata has three movements:
This piece made a powerful impression on Berlioz.
Titled by Beethoven as a ‘quasi una Fantasia.' The first movement doesn't follow the traditional sonata form and the movements are not ordered in the standard fast-slow-fast tempos. Sonata's in the late 18 th century emphasized formal qualities associated with beauty; order, coherence, and comprehensibility. In the fantasy, expressing feelings was the primary goal in order to achieve what the sublime.
The Adagio sostenuto belongs to the tradition of trauermusik (mourning music) and Beethoven employs devices typical of this music à Lament bass, melodic shapes derived from plainchant, repetitive accompanimental figures and chromatic figures. He uses these devices with much flexibility.
He also uses the mourning topic, the monotone and dotted anacrusis that are prevalent in many of the melodic phrases.
The monotone recalls the tolling of the bell.
The dotted anacrusis recalls the Marcia sulla morte section from the Sonata in A flat Op. 26 and anticipates the Eroica Symphonys Marcia funegre.
The accompaniment triplets resemble the Commendatore's death in the introduzione To Act I of Mozart's Don Giovanni. It also anticipates the maggiore section of the funeral march in the “Eroica.”
Either a modified sonata form or as an irregular song form. Reasons it is difficult to “label” this structure à identifying the second subject, whether the development begins in the ‘correct' key, no dynamic polarity is established between the tonic and relative major and the music is free of thematic contrasts that denote boundaries of the exposition.
All the phrases sound like permutations of one or two motives.
As seen as a strophic song form à phrase groupings and large scale proportional symmetries labeled as prelude, central sections and coda. Seen as a prototypical “song without words.” But this plays down the overall tonal function which climaxes in the coda rather than in the central section.
The form can also be looked at as a two part form where the first section modulates freely and the second stays in the tonic. This would resemble the II movement ‘Fantasia' of Haydn's string quartet in E flat op. 76 no. 6. However, Beethoven goes through a circle of fifths where Haydn emphasizes the mediant.
The Allegretto à is a conventional minuet and trio in D flat major where the key signature is equivalent to the enharmonic key signature of C sharp minor à tonic major for the work as a whole. The piece unexpected starts in A flat major.
The Presto agitato à is in sonata form and the weightiest of the three. This is an example of his experimental side (also Opus 27 no. 1 and in Opus 101 ) where the most important movement of a sonata is last. The overall dynamic is marked piano but Beethoven places sforzandos in areas which give a great deal of power to the overall piece. It is full of arppegios and accented notes.
His late piano sonatas
Op. 106 (1817-18) and op. 110 (1821-2)
These pieces rely on drama and counterpoint for effect (also occurs in his Missa Solemnus ). Both end with substantial fugues, which refer to the learned and sacred style.
Op. 111 1821-22
In this piece he combines drama and counterpoint in the first movement. The opening of the slow introduction comes as a shock with the initial leap downward of a diminished 7 th into the lowest register of the piano. Then the loud diminished 7 th chord follows and resolves into a soft tonic chord. These dynamic alternations persist until the main theme is presented. The head motive sounds like a fugue theme but actually begins as an irregular satz. However, in the transition, he treats this motive contrapuntally and then extends into a fughetta in the development.
He departs from the usual number of movements as he concludes with an extended variation set that encompasses all the moods of what would be in the remaining movements.
Hammerklavier Sonata No. 29 B flat major op. 106 1817-1818
One of the defining works his third period and considered one of the greatest piano sonatas.
The sonata was composed towards the end of a stark period in Beethoven's compositional career, and represents the stunning emergence of many themes that recurred in Beethoven's late period à the reinvention of traditional forms, such as sonata form ; an abrupt humor; and a return to pre-classical compositional traditions, including an exploration of modal harmony and reinventions of the fugue within classical forms.
The title comes form Beethoven's insistence on using German rather than Italian words for musical terminology.
The piece contains a rather unconventional four movements for a typical piano sonata (most sonatas had three) and plays for an average of 45 minutes. In addition to the thematic connections within the movements and the use of traditional Romantic formal structures, Charles Rosen has described how much of the piece is organized around the motif of a descending third (major or minor). It is perhaps the first major piano work to thoroughly incorporate a baroque contrapuntal style (the fugue ) within an originally Classical structure (the sonata form ).
2 types
“Wanderer” Fantasy in c major op. 15 D760
This is considered Schubert's most technically demanding piano pieces.
The whole work is based on a single basic motif, from which all themes are developed.
The theme is derived from the second movement.
The second movement à C sharp minor is a sequence of variations on a melody taken from the lied Der Wanderer written in 1816.
All four movements follow each other without a break à considered the first cyclic piano work.
Allegro con fuoco ma non troppo à Adagio à Scherzo presto à finale
The finale begins with a fugue then later becomes virtuosic in style.
He writes in orchestral like chords, tremolos and thick texture to show virtuosity.
I. allegro
C major
2 nd key is E major à the mediant rather than the dominant
Employs other third related key areas.
II. Adagio
C# minor which was fairly rare
The theme is presented in new character and mood in Thematic transformation à non developmental technique, changes the theme so it has different musical meaning.
Theme and variation and resembles his lied.
III. Scherzo presto
A flat major. 3 rd relation is unconventional. Landler version, Thematic transformation.
IV.
Fugal and returns to C major. The theme is presented in octaves in an orchestral fashion.
Liszt transcribed this piece into a concerto.
There is an alternative sonata form found in his music: development occurs in the exposition.
First theme à transition à 2 nd theme à closing material is standard. Schubert's version (also found in the C major symphony). First theme à amplification and expansion of cadences in the tonic à short transition à 2 nd theme in the mediant key and is expanded and amplified à closing material in the dominant.
From his first maturity consists of collected miniatures and many of these drew inspiration from extramusical sources such as Davidsbündlertänze, Phatasiestücke, Kinderszenen op. 15 1839, Kreisleriana op. 16 1838, and Carnaval; scenes mignonnes sur quatre notes op. 9 1837.
His piano sonatas are modular in approach like his programmatic pieces where individual movements are composed at different times and substituted for another à his sonata in f minor, 1835 was written initially as an independent fandango dance.
12 pieces make up the cycle and represent the fusion of literary inspiration and musical illustration.
Inspired by Jean Paul's Flegeljahre . The scenes and characters of this novel were represented musically in this composition.
Carnaval was one of Schumann's most amiable and characteristic pianoforte works.
Schumann begins almost every section of Carnaval with the musical notes signified in German by the letters that spell Asch (A, E-flat, C, and B, or alternatively A-flat, C, and B), the town in which Ernestine was born, and are also the musical letters in Schumann's own name.
Schumann named sections for both Ernestine von Fricken ("Estrella") and Clara Wieck ("Chiarina").
Eusebius and Florestan, also appear, along with imitations of Chopin and Paganini.
The work comes to a close with a march of the Davidsbündler —the league of the men of David against the Philistines may be heard in the clear accents of truth in contest with the dull shouts of falsehood.
In Carnaval , Schumann went a step further than in Papillons , in that he conceived the story that was to be musically illustrated.
Schumann proved to be an excellent mimic in his Chopin by using Chopinesque arpeggiations, the flatted subtonic and chromatic ornamentations for his characterization.
Fantasiestücke , Op. 12, 1837
Eight pieces for piano.
In the series Fantasiestücke , Schumann gives a sublime illustration of the fusion of literary and musical ideas especially in such pieces as Warum and In der Nacht . Des Abends in D-flat major
Davidsbündlertänze op. 6 1837
18 character pieces written by his “Eusebius and Florestan.”
Written after Clara accepts his proposal and he quotes a mazurka in G from her Soirées musicales op. 6.
Schumann's harmony is forward looking with his non chord tones to evoke the expression. His music is very dissonant but is broken up and goes by quickly such that the listener is not obviously aware of it.
Lieder Ohne Worte 1842 op. 62
His piano music does not have counterpoint.
#1Sectional form typical of character pieces ABA .
#4 The hunting song, horn usings 5ths often used in orchestral pieces. Jogging 16 th notes evoke riding.
Represents another avant garde genre cultivated by Mendelssohn. It was Biedermeier art (middle class parlor music).
#6 The “Venetian Gondola Song” was a standard genre written by many composers of this time (eg. Chopin, or barcarolles of operas à Tales of Hoffmann). Mendelssohn adopts many features, 6/8 accompaniment, cantilena in the right hand. However he displaced typical arpeggiation by an eighth note and leaves the listener unclear as to the downbeat. The initial cry of the boatman is on the first beat but later it is on the fourth beat and an octave lower. The tune enters on beat 4 in the fourth measure à shifting rhythmic currents of the piece. This is an example of how he used conventional features in a new way.
The second “stanza” returns through chromatic motion that moves directly from the secondary dominant of E (the dominant) to a second inversion A chord (the tonic).