Sonata No. 1 (1st Movement: Allegro)
Sonata · in F minor · Op. 2, No. 1
Ludwig van Beethoven 1770–1827
F minor
Key
Sonata
Form
Allegro
Tempo
Op. 2, No. 1
Catalogue
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Difficulty
Our estimate Intermediate
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Themes & character
Opens his published sonatas·Dedicated to Haydn·Rocket theme·Composed 1795
At a glance
- Catalogue
- Op. 2, No. 1
- Key
- F minor
- Tempo / character
- Allegro
- Form
- Sonata
About the piece
The first movement of Beethoven's first published piano sonata, part of the set of three dedicated to Joseph Haydn, his teacher, and issued in 1796.
It opens with a "rocket" theme, a rapid upward-shooting arpeggio of the kind Beethoven had encountered in the Mannheim composers and in Mozart. Even at twenty five he is already using F minor for terse, hard-driven music, the same character that would later produce the Appassionata in the same key.
The composer
Ludwig van Beethoven
1770–1827
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer, conductor, and pianist. Regarded as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music, he was mentored during the Classical period, and his musical style was a key driver of the transition to Romantic music, and the expansion of instrumental forms such as the symphony, the piano sonata and the string quartet. His compositions have attracted extraordinary casual and scholarly interest, and remain among the most performed in the world.
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