Beethoven's Early Works for Violoncello and Pianoforte: Innovation in Context

Popular history being what it is, we should not be surprised that Beethoven's early works for violoncello and piano, especially sonatas, have been undervalued. For, in traditional Beethoven biography and criticism, his early works in all genres have often been portrayed much more as forerunners of later greatness than as significant products of their own time and circumstances. Linked to this has been tendency to stress heroic and monumental qualities of many of middle period and later works, at expense of discerning a persistent and lifelong strain in Beethoven's musical imagination towards modes of expression we can characterize as restrained, elegant, and graceful. Yet these tendencies emerged from matrix of his first period quite as much as did elements efforce and power for which he became legendary. In all, what Beethoven wrote between ages of fourteen (1785) and twenty-nine (1800) justifies view that if he had never composed beyond String Quartets, Opus 18, and First Symphony, Opus 21, he would still rank as one of fundamental figures of late eighteenth century and of Classical style altogether. To forge a major career in Vienna in 1790s was not easy, even for a widely heralded young composer and pianist who had come from Rhineland in 1792 to make his way in musical capital of central Europe. Armed with prophecy, entered into his album by a friend at Bonn, that he would receive the spirit of Mozart from hands of Haydn, he continued to learn from Haydn as composer during these years despite difficulties with Haydn as counterpoint teacher and mentor.1 And in wake of Mozart's death in 1791, he continued to enrich knowledge of Mozartian canon that he had already strongly developed at Bonn, and to apply what he learned. By 1796, his first published works (the Piano Trios, Opus 1, and Piano Sonatas, Opus 2) showed mastery of formal and tonal procedures, along with enough unorthodoxy to alarm musical conservatives but deeply impress open-minded patrons and connoisseurs. In this context two Sonatas for violoncello and piano are innovative in genre and structure. Published in Vienna in 1797 as Opus 5, these two matched works had been written previous year, during Beethoven's visit to Berlin in late spring of 1796. Historically they are first true sonatas for 'cello and piano in fully developed Classical tradition, at best remotely and tangentially related to earlier sonata literature for this instrument that had been produced by numbers of Italian and French virtuosi during period of rise of violoncello as a solo instrument, beginning about 1740. The tradition of such works was abundant by 1790s and mainly included works by performer-composers, exemplified by Boccherini. But for young Beethoven, working at a higher level of compositional intensity, important fact was that neither of his central artistic models, Haydn and Mozart, had ever had occasion to adapt their accompanied sonata styles to this instrumental combination. Looking ahead, we can see that Beethoven in these works founded 'cello sonata genre in modern sense, then turned to writing of violin sonatas from 1797 to 1802-03 (the year of Kreutzer Sonata, Opus 47) as well as to other major works and projects. But it is also striking to see that he returned to writing of 'cello sonatas at two very different turning points in his later career - in 1809, with A major Sonata, Opus 69 (which coincides with composition of Fifth and Sixth Symphonies); and in 1815, with two Sonatas of Opus 102, which are last of all Beethoven's sonatas for piano and a single instrument. They virtually belong to domain of his last piano sonatas and last quartets.2 In 1796, in Berlin, his opportunity to write these two 'cello sonatas came up readily enough. The Prussian court orchestra then included two major French 'cellists of time - brothers Jean Pierre Duport (1741-1818) and Jean Louis Duport (1749-1819). …