Analysis on Beethoven' S Piano Sonata No3, Op 2
Analysis on Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No 3, op. 2, Allegro con brio
Composers since the early classical era have used sonata form to express through music ideas which are at once complex and unified. This form contains a variety of themes and permutations of these themes, but is brought together into a comprehensible whole when these excerpts reappear. Beethoven, in the first movement of his Piano Sonata Opus 2 Number 3 utilizes this form to its full potential, modifying the typical structure in his characteristic way. The sonata begins softly but with unmistakable energy. The trill like sixteenth notes on the third beat of this motif surge the piece forward into the next bar. The two bar motif appears again, and is then varied and expanded upon for four bars, revealing a sentence. A short tag draws attention to itself with the opening motif in the bass as well as szforzando hits and driving syncopation. By measure 13 the principal theme has already passed and the sonata rushes ahead with sixteenth note arpeggios and alternating octaves. The transition at measure thirteen is the first curiosity of Beethoven’s handiwork. The first eight bars go by the book, quite unmemorable and making a clear modulation to G Major. At measure 21 the listener hears a melody high in the register which returns again later in the development, and no longer modulates. At first this may appear as a new section of the piece, but the discriminating listener will hear that this theme is in the dominant, ruling it out as a second principal theme inserted after the transition. This melody ends with a long fall down two octaves to a strong cadence in G, followed by a pause; the medial caesura in the dominant. Although typically the medial caesura would cadence on V of the dominant, this cadence is the most common stray from the norm that Beethoven uses in this work.
A striking shift in dynamics marks the flowing subordinate theme at measure 27. This piano section begins in g minor but
Composers since the early classical era have used sonata form to express through music ideas which are at once complex and unified. This form contains a variety of themes and permutations of these themes, but is brought together into a comprehensible whole when these excerpts reappear. Beethoven, in the first movement of his Piano Sonata Opus 2 Number 3 utilizes this form to its full potential, modifying the typical structure in his characteristic way. The sonata begins softly but with unmistakable energy. The trill like sixteenth notes on the third beat of this motif surge the piece forward into the next bar. The two bar motif appears again, and is then varied and expanded upon for four bars, revealing a sentence. A short tag draws attention to itself with the opening motif in the bass as well as szforzando hits and driving syncopation. By measure 13 the principal theme has already passed and the sonata rushes ahead with sixteenth note arpeggios and alternating octaves. The transition at measure thirteen is the first curiosity of Beethoven’s handiwork. The first eight bars go by the book, quite unmemorable and making a clear modulation to G Major. At measure 21 the listener hears a melody high in the register which returns again later in the development, and no longer modulates. At first this may appear as a new section of the piece, but the discriminating listener will hear that this theme is in the dominant, ruling it out as a second principal theme inserted after the transition. This melody ends with a long fall down two octaves to a strong cadence in G, followed by a pause; the medial caesura in the dominant. Although typically the medial caesura would cadence on V of the dominant, this cadence is the most common stray from the norm that Beethoven uses in this work.
A striking shift in dynamics marks the flowing subordinate theme at measure 27. This piano section begins in g minor but