Time for a CONTROVERSY!!!

I had a revelation the other day, and since this is the age of instant communication I decided to post it on Facebook immediately.  I knew that it was going to drive some people, many of them good friends of mine and respected colleagues, completely insane, but occasionally one has to open up the floodgates to get a good conversation going.  I was not disappointed.  This is what I said: “In order to understand Beethoven you have to play the piano.  And in order to play the piano you have to understand Beethoven.”  Let the games begin!

The second part of my statement should be self-evident to anyone.  The piano music of Beethoven is at the very core of the piano repertoire.  There are, of course, the 32 sonatas for piano, works which span his entire artistic output.  I would be surprised indeed to find any pianist who didn’t wrestle with Op. 2, #3 early in life, and hacked their way through many of the ensuing sonatas later.  The five concertos are staples of the rep as well, and I would bet my life that the vast majority of pianists making the circuit of orchestras today have at least one of them in their standard offerings.  Beethoven is the the next natural stop on the pianistic shelf after Mozart and these works are at the foundation of the piano oeuvre.

It is the first part of my statement which is the more radical by far, and boy did it have people up in arms!  String players, especially, seemed to take offense.  “What about the quartets?  Are they chopped liver?”  Certainly not.  “What about the ‘Cello sonatas?  Are they trash?” Not at all.  At least one flautist and a trumpet player chimed in about the symphonies.  All great works, I quite agree.  But, my friends, you miss my point.

The fact is that of all the “Great” composers Beethoven is the one most inextricably linked to one instrument – the piano.  No matter from which angle one looks at it, the piano completely dominated his life and his entire compositional output.  Look at it first by sheer numbers.  The master wrote 9 Symphonies; a half dozen overtures; 14 or so quartets plus several other chamber works for strings and/or woodwinds; an opera; a couple masses; incidental music for plays.  Not an exhaustive list but it covers the basics, and please keep in mind that I’m leaving out the WoO’s.

Compare that to the works that use piano – first there are the 32 sonatas, the single greatest cycle in all of music.  Add to that the 5 Concerti, the dozen or so sets of Variations, the Bagatelles, the Polonaise , the Fantasy, the Rondos, the Choral Fantasy, and the works for piano 4-hands.  That’s just the list for solo piano.  In the chamber music category you have the Sonatas for Piano and Violin, the Sonatas for Piano and Violoncello, a whole host of Trios for Piano and string and/or wind instruments, and the myriad Sonatas, Trios, Quartets for Piano + Horn/Flute/Clarinet/Strings/Whatever.  I need not even mention the Serenades, Variations, Rondos, Dances, etc. that are in that same category.  No matter how you slice it, whether you talk about the number of compositions or the amount of performance time required, the works with Piano as the main instrument dominate the works without.

But there are many more factors here – notice that when I listed all those chamber works I gave them their original titles.  In every single instance that I could find (and I spent a good hour randomly running through the photo archives of the Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, a tremendous resource) the first instrument listed on the title pages for every single chamber work is the piano.  In the case of the Op. 5 sonatas the title page goes so far as to say “Piano…. with Violoncello obligato.” The same can be said for the early Sonatas for Piano and Violin.  Pride of place in these works goes to the piano every time.  Indeed, the autograph for “Kreutzer” makes a clear distinction – “Sonata for Piano and obligato Violin, written in an extremely concertante style, almost like a concerto.”  This is the first time that Beethoven ever even considered another instrument to be on par with the piano in one of his chamber compositions and he was cognizant enough of that fact to acknowledge it on the title page.

One could easily dismiss all of that as an aberration but there is much more to the argument.  From a musical standpoint most musicians I know would say that there were three main musical idioms in which Beethoven had an unparalleled impact – the Piano Sonatas, the Symphonies, and the String Quartets.  As great as those last two idioms are, the naked truth is that for every major advance that they encompass Beethoven made his great artistic leaps in the Sonatas first!  Before we even get to the second Symphony Beethoven had churned out 18…. yes, that’s 18 solo sonatas, encompassing everything from the early Op. 2 trilogy through the incredible Tempest sonata.  Before the great expansion that is heralded by Eroica there is the equally astonishing run of Waldstein, the F Major Op. 54, and the Appassionata, three works that herald an immediate break with his past compositional techniques. It is those three sonatas which directly led to the great trio of symphonies – #s 4, 5, and 6.  Sturm und Drang indeed, but a style thought out first in the sonatas.

Once again, immediately preceding the great duo of symphonies #7 and 8 there is a another sudden burst of sonata writing, culminating in the fantastic Les Adieux sonata.  At this important moment of his life, when his chief supporter the Archduke Rudolph had fled Vienna, he turned to this idiom to express his feeling.  Beethoven himself referred to it as a  “characteristic sonata”, referring to it not so much as programme music but more as an expression of his state of mind and feelings with musical means.

What, then, of the 9th symphony?  How to explain this complete busting of the boundaries?  In one word – HammerKlavier.  Without the incredible expansion found in this greatest of all sonatas the scope of the 9th symphony would have been unattainable.  But wait… did I say one word?  I meant to add another – Diabelli.  Although it is not a sonata it is the master’s last great piano work.  Based on a theme that Beethoven originally called “Schusterfleck” (no translation necessary) the master managed to spin out 33 of the most astonishing variations imaginable encompassing everything from simple folk dances through proto-jazz.  And lest we forget – before the 9th symphony there is the Choral Fantasy, the basis for the 4th movement of the symphony, a work for PIANO, Choir, and Orchestra. (Admission – I am one of those who believe that the Choral Fantasy is proof positive that Ludwig had an evil twin brother, Skippy van Beethoven, who occasionally snuck in and wrote such dogs as this piece and Wellington’s Victory.  I’m no big fan of the 9th symphony but I actively despise the Choral Fantasy.  It’s dreck.)

Similar arguments can be made about the string quartets.  Before we even find a quartet in the Beethoven oeuvre there are 10 piano sonatas, including the wonderfully inventive Pathétique.  Between that first set of quartets (Op. 18) and the second set, the fabulous Razumovskys (Op. 59), there are another 13 sonatas, which take us from the early style of the lovely E Major (Op. 14, #1) right through the high Sturm und Drang of the aforementioned Appassionata.

What then, one might ask, of the late quartets of Op. 130-132, and Op. 135?  Once again, before he bust the boundaries in these late masterpieces it was necessary for Beethoven to work out the stylistic DNA found in them though the composition of the last 3 piano sonatas, Ops. 109, 110, and 111.  As inventive and gender-bending as those late quartets are it is the fantasy style found in those late piano sonatas, especially the colossal Op. 111, that heralds the genius of late Beethoven.  And before anyone objects that the Grosse Fuge would certainly be an exception to my argument you must take into account the fugal writing found in the sonatas of Op. 101, Op. 110, the fugue in the Diabelli variations,  and the incredible closing fugue of HammerKlavier.  That is where Beethoven cut his teeth, and it is those pieces which lead directly to the Grosse Fuge and make it possible.

Even with all these arguments in favor of my original premise there is still a couple more which may be even more important, and for this one must look at the historical impact that Beethoven had on the piano, and vice versa.  Up through the time of Mozart the keyboards in use were the Forte-Piano, the Clavichord, and their cousin the Harpsichord. If Mozart had lived to be twice his age he would have seen that Forte-Piano change into the PianoForte and change further into the proto-modern Piano.  (Pet Peeve alert: Please, people, can we remember that the forerunner of the Piano is NOT the Harpsichord.  The Harpsichord belongs to that category of keyboard instruments where the string is plucked.  It is the Clavichord which is the direct forerunner of the modern Piano – the category of keyboard instruments where the string is hammered.)  In less than thirty years this instrument had progressed from the lovely instrument of Mozart’s time straight towards an instrument where Der Grosse Sonata für das Hammer-Klavier was conceivable.  No instrument had ever come so far, so fast.

And this is the critical point – the person immediately responsible for the development of this most universal of all instruments is Beethoven.  It was his writing for the instrument that forced the change from the Viennese style of Forte-Pianos of Erard and Stein to the larger, more robust English instruments of Broadwood, developments quickly adopted by the Viennese company Graf. Everything about the piano changed in 30 years – the number of pedals, the compass, the tone, the action – and many of these changes were forced by Beethoven’s own compositional style.  The critical moment comes when Beethoven received his fabulous Broadwood in 1817.  He wrote to Thomas Broadwood:

“My very dear friend Broadwood – I have never felt a greater pleasure than your honour’s intimation of the arrival of this piano, with which you are honouring me as a present. I shall look upon it as an altar upon which I shall place the most beautiful offerings of my spirit to the divine Apollo. As soon as I receive your excellent instrument, I shall immediately send you the fruits of the first moments of inspiration I spend at it, as a souvenir for you from me, my very dear Broadwood; and I hope that they will be worthy of your instrument.”

The result in 1818 – HammerKlavier.

And this is it -Beethoven was the UR-Pianist.   As much as Beethoven was critical to the development of the modern piano, the development of the piano is critical to the musical development of Beethoven.  It was a vicious cycle of the master exploring the limits of the instrument, forcing the builders of the time to explore the limits of piano development, and forcing Beethoven to explore those limits, and back and forth.  It is through the prism of Beethoven’s genius that the piano must be admired, and it is through the piano works where we gimpse all the seeds of Beethoven’s genius.  To play Beethoven on his instrument is to understand his approach to form, phrasing, dynamics, touch, and everything that makes Beethoven Beethoven.

Having said all that, let me make clear what I have not said.  I have never said that one cannot admire, nay, even adore Beethoven without playing the piano.  In the Pantheon of music for all western Classical musicians Beethoven has very, very, very few peers.  I have also not claimed that one cannot play incredible Beethoven without playing the piano.  Many of the great conductors who made their names on their cycles of the Symphonies did not play the keyboard, but that does not lessen the power of their interpretations.  And when it comes to the Quartets?  Well, I grew up in Buffalo in the ’60s and ’70s, and attended Eastman in the ’80s.  I grew up hearing the Budapest, Guarneri, and Cleveland quartets playing the Beethoven cycles. One does not easily forget those moments. Indeed,  Mischa Schneider, the great ‘Cellist of the Budapest, was the first professional musician I ever met, and I shall be forever proud of that fact.

But no matter how great the Symphonies are, or the how much the Quartets move you, those of you who do not play the piano will never know that moment when you are backstage, and in a few short minutes you know you will walk through that door to go on stage where, God help you, there is nothing but a piano and an expecting audience waiting to hear your take on the colossal genius that is the HammerKlavier.  There is the joy, the expectation, and yes, the sheer terror of knowing that you are about to perform the one work which changed your instrument forever.  At that moment in time you are now the musical equivalent of the biblical David, for you are about to go out there, all alone, and attempt to beard the greatest of all the Lions of music in his own den.  To be in that moment is to truly, instinctively, understand Beethoven.