Beethoven Cello Sonatas

The Cello Sonatas in Context

Early Period

Op. 1 - Piano Trios: E-flat, G, c (ca.1794-5)
Op. 2 - Piano Sonatas: F, A, C (1793-5)
Op. 3 - String Trio in E flat  (<1794)
Op. 4 - String Quintet in E flat  (1795)
Op. 5 - Cello Sonatas: F major, g minor  (1796, age 26)
Op. 6 - Piano Sonata in D, 4 hands. (1796)
Op. 7 - Piano Sonata #4, E flat  (1797)
Op. 8 - Serenade for String Trio  (1796-7)
Op. 9 - String Trios: G, D, c  (1797-8)
Op. 12 - Violin Sonatas, Nos. 1, 2, 3  (1798)
Op. 18 String Quartets  (1798-9)

Middle Period

Op. 57 - Piano Sonata in f minor “Appassionata” (1805)
Op. 58 - Piano Concerto #4  (1804)
Op. 59 - String Quartets “Razumovsky” (1806)
Op. 61 - Violin Concerto  (1806)
Op. 67 - Symphony #5  (1807)
Op. 68 - Symphony #6  (1808)
Op. 69 - Cello Sonata in A major  (1807, age 37)
Op. 70 - Piano Trios: Ghost, E-flat  (1809)
Op. 72 - Opera Fidelio and Overtures  (1804-5)
Op. 73 - Piano Concerto #5  (1809)
Op. 74 - String Quartet “Harp”  (1809)

Late(r) Period

Op. 95 - String Quartet “Serioso”  (1810)
Op. 96 - Violin Sonata #10 in G  (1812)
Op. 97 - Piano Trio “Archduke”  (1811)
Op. 101 - Piano Sonata in A major  (1816)
Op. 102 - Cello Sonatas: C major, D major  (1815, age 47)
Op. 104 - String Quintet in C minor  (1817)
Op. 106 - Piano Sonata in B flat “Hammerklavier (1817)
Op. 125 - Symphony # 9  (1822-7)
Op. 130 - String Quartet in B flat (1825)
Op. 133 - Grosse Fuge (1826)

Cellists are indeed fortunate that the five Cello Sonatas by Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) come from all three of his creative periods: the two Op. 5 sonatas come from his early Viennese years, the Op. 69 sonata from his heroic middle period and the two Op. 102 sonatas introduce his late period. As with his symphonies and string quartets, the evolution of his cello sonatas reflect Beethoven’s musical and spiritual growth. Those interested in delving deeply into Beethoven and the cello will want to refer to Marc D. Moscovitz’s and R. Larry Todd’s excellent book, “Beethoven’s Cello: Five Revolutionary Sonatas and their World.” 

With the Op. 5 Cello Sonatas, Nos. 1 and 2, Beethoven established a precedent for what would become the modern cello sonata. Prior to this in the 18th century, cello music commonly took one of two forms - either virtuosic, along with another instrument such as basso continuo, or an “accompanied keyboard sonata” with the obbligato cello essentially reinforcing the keyboard bass line. Parity of the two instruments was not an important consideration until Beethoven conceived his Op. 5 Cello Sonatas. Although originally published in 1796 as “Two Grand Sonatas for the Harpsichord or Pianoforte with a Violoncello obbligato” the cello part is not simply duplicating the keyboard bass line - Beethoven has given it its own important voice.

It is helpful to understand the historical backdrop of the origin of these initial Op. 5 Sonatas. While in his 20’s Beethoven ventured on a tour which included Prague, Leigzig, Dresden and ultimately Berlin where he stayed for 2 months. He was supported by his patron Prince Karl Lichnowski who had guided Mozart on a similar tour 7 years earlier. Beethoven hoped to have an audience with the King of Prussia, Frederick Wilhelm II, who was an accomplished amateur cellist. Frederick Wilhelm II was the nephew of Frederick the Great, Emperor of Prussia, for whom Bach had written the “The Musical Offering.” Frederick the Great was also an accomplished musician - a flutist as well as composer who wrote dozens of flute concerti. Frederick Wilhelm II, who succeeded Frederick the Great in 1787, began his musical studies with viola da gamba but later switched to violoncello and became quite proficient. He is said to have practiced several hours per day, and even when on military campaigns insisted that a string quartet accompany him so he could play quartets. He surrounded himself with fine cellists of the day, including the Duport brothers, Jean-Louis and Jean-Pirerre, as well as Luigi Boccherini, although the latter worked mostly in absentia from Spain. 

Beethoven came to Berlin hoping to write something for King Frederick Wilhelm II, knowing that Haydn had composed his Prussian Quartets (set of six String Quartets, Op. 50) for him, and Mozart had written his Prussian Quartets (three String Quartets K. 575, K. 589 and K. 590) for him as well. The King did commission Beethoven to write music and he dedicated his two Op. 5 Cello Sonatas to the King, presented in 1796. 

It is likely that Beethoven was fully cognizant that he needed to produce something on a grand scale befitting a King who was also an accomplished cellist. Therefore the cello was featured prominently, not just duplicating the keyboard baseline. And because Beethoven was a virtuoso pianist, he wrote grand sweeping piano parts for himself.

The Op. 5 sonatas are quite long which is particularly significant as each comprise only two movements each. Each sonata’s first movement opens with a substantial slow introduction leading without pause into a lively section in sonata-allegro form. Each Sonata’s introductory section includes dotted rhythms which serve to create an elevated style reminiscent of Lully’s French Overture style. Each sonata’s second movement finale is a fast rondo where a recurring refrain alternates with contrasting episodes.

The first of the two Op. 5 Cello Sonatas, in F major, begins with a slow introduction, followed by long first movement in sonata-allegro form, utilizing brilliant virtuosic style. Dr. Michael Fink notes that the Adagio near the end of the first movement could be considered a forecast of the Fifth Symphony’s finale. The second movement is a lighthearted Rondo incorporating drone like effects suggesting folk music. Beethoven seems to delight in juxtaposing two contrasting worlds.

The second of the two Op. 5 Cello Sonatas, in G minor, also begins with an extended slow introduction, even longer than that of the first sonata, followed by a lengthy first movement in tragic style. Dr. Michael Fink observes that “in the graceful main Allegro, the first theme (in the minor mode) is chiefly a conversation between the cello and piano with a feeling resembling laughter through tears.The second theme (in major) carries an air of suppressed joy. These muted emotions disappear in the development, which is bursting with energy. The recapitulation continues this high emotional pitch and ends with an extensive coda - Beethoven’s first to become a “post-development” section.” The second movement is a more jocular Rondo - with the two instruments often in canon. Although in classic sonata form, its high energy and striking contrasts are elements we see later in more mature Beethoven.

Beethoven performed the Op. 5 Sonatas for King Frederick Wilhelm II, along with cellist Jean-Louis Duport, whose prowess was extolled by Voltaire: “Monsieur Duport, you will make me believe in miracles, for I see that you can turn an ox into a nightingale.”  The King was evidently pleased with Beethoven’s Op. 5 Cello Sonatas as he gifted Beethoven a handsome gold snuff box filled with 100 Louis d’ors, which could be worth over $405,000 in current US dollars.

It would be ten years before Beethoven returned to the cello sonata medium with his Sonata No. 3 in A major, Op. 69, which he dedicated to Ignaz von Gleichenstein, a German aristocrat, amateur cellist and moreover a close friend and significant patron. In this same period Beethoven composed his Fifth and Sixth Symphonies and turned in all three to his publisher in 1808.

Beethoven’s Middle period features expansion, innovation and epic heroism. The heroic style is highly dramatic, intense, dissonant, coinciding with the political realities of Europe which was engulfed in Napoleanic Wars. Napoleon occupied Vienna twice when Beethoven was living there so he had a first person understanding of the effects of war. Other essential works of the Middle Period included, besides the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, the Violin Concerto, the “Razumovsky” String Quartets, the “Appassionata” Piano Sonata as well as the final piano trios, Op. 70 among others (see visual).

The third Cello Sonata is the longest of the five sonatas and undoubtedly the most popular. Not until this third sonata does Beethoven achieve supreme balance where thematic material is evenly distributed between the piano and cello. Unlike his first two Cello Sonatas which were in just two movements, the third is in three movements.

In a daring move, Beethoven begins the first movement with the cello alone presenting the opening theme. As R. Larry Todd describes it, there is an improvisational feel where the cello plays as if it has just discovered it (as it popped into Beethoven’s mind), then the piano responds in turn. The piano has a flourishing cadenza, answered by the cello with a cadenza as well. It is important to remember that before Beethoven was known as a composer, he was known as a virtuoso pianist, and his improvisational skills were paralleled those of Mozart. It is almost as if the piece proceeds in fits and starts at first, as ideas are “forming.”

The second movement is a demonic Scherzo, not in a standard 3 part ABA form, but rather a 5 part ABABA with two trios and three main sections. As Todd says, this creates the feeling that the Scherzo has been going on for a while, and maybe will continue, but “finally destroys itself by vanishing in a little puff.”

Like the first two Cello Sonatas, the third does not have a free standing formal slow movement. What seems initially promising as a bona fide lyrical slow movement is fairly quickly aborted before any substantial development and moves directly into the finale without a break (attacca). The final Allegro vivace is a burst of extraordinary motion and energy in sonata-allegro form. As with the first movement, Beethoven creates the illusion of having difficulty finishing the movement, a technique used to great effect in the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, all in published in 1808. Many consider the A major Cello Sonata to be one of Beethoven’s crowning achievements, celebrated for its seemingly inevitable perfect form, parity between instruments and gorgeous melodies.

In Beethoven’s final two Cello Sonatas, Op. 102, (1817) we find his writing on the threshold of what will become his late style. By this time, Beethoven had become completely deaf and was no longer performing publicly as a pianist. At his final public performance which included his own Archduke Trio, violinist Louis Spohr gave a sad account of the proceedings. According to Spohr, Beethoven crashed around in the forte passages, then in the piano passages played so softly that the notes couldn’t be heard. Thus the Op. 102 Cello Sonatas were written by a composer relying totally on his inner ear. As a result, as Todd observes, these pieces are more abstract and more experimental, where he is rediscovering and reinventing his composing identity.

The Op. 102 Sonatas were dedicated to Countess Marie Erdody, a Hungarian noblewoman and amateur pianist who maintained a close relationship with Beethoven since 1802 and was a significant patron, able to secure a crucial annuity that supported him throughout his years in Vienna. She was instrumental in commissioning the Op. 102 Sonatas for the benefit of a mutual friend, Joseph Lincke, cellist of the legendary Schuppanzigh Quartet which premiered many of Beethoven’s String Quartets. They were the “house” quartet for yet another of Beethoven’s royal patrons, the Russian Count Razumovsky. Unfortunately, on New Year’s eve the previous year in 1814 Razumovsky’s palace burnt to the ground leaving the family in financial ruin, forcing them to return to Russia. The Schuppanzigh Quartet disbanded and cellist Joseph Linke sought new opportunities. Countess Erdody hired him as music tutor for her family and subsequently urged Beethoven to write some new music for Lincke to play. Beethoven composed his final two sonatas, Op. 102 as a kind of farewell gift.

While Beethoven’s 3rd and final creative “Late” period is most famous for the Ninth Symphony, the late String Quartets and the final piano sonatas, this period began with the Op. 102 Cello Sonatas. At the threshold of his late stle, they contain many of the features typical of late period Beethoven, including unconventional form, deeply probing emotional expression as well as transcendental and experiential difficulty. Beethoven has renewed interest in counterpoint, and especially the fugue form.

Sonata No. 4 in C major, Op. 102, No. 1 is sometimes called the “Free Sonata” as Beethoven suggests in the title (“Freye Sonate”) something unconventionally fantasia-like in its structure. It comprises only two movements, and like it’s Op. 102 counterpart in D major, is much shorter than the earlier cello sonatas. Todd observes that it is Intimate and inviting, drawing the listener close. Both movements begin with a soulful slow introduction which share thematic material, serving to unify the entire work. The cello opens the movement alone, marked teneramente, or “tenderly,” followed by the piano which elaborates empathetically. After the slow introduction, the first movement follows in sonata-allegro form, interestingly, in a forceful, almost martial A minor rather than the titular key of C major, the two instruments in forceful lockstep. The second movement opens with an even more soulful introduction, bridged by a return to the opening thematic material into the finale which initially teases as a fugue but actually emerges as a sonata form, light and buoyant to the end, in stark contrast to the severe A minor section in the first movement.

Beethoven’s final Cello Sonata, Op. 102, No. 2  in D major delves even more deeply into the realm of his late period. The first of three movements is an exuberant tight sonata-allegro form, dispensing entirely of any slow introduction he had utilized in the past. Thematically it is based on deceptively simple scales and intervals but it richly exudes an heroic effect with an almost martial quality.

For the first time Beethoven creates a formal slow movement, the emotional center of the sonata. Alternating dark and light, brooding and tender, it is, as Kai Christiansen describes, “suffused with that ineffable admixture of profundity and simplicity that is a hallmark of Beethoven’s late works.”

Instead of ending darkly, which some might predict from the way the slow movement progresses, it unexpectedly turns, without pause, to the finale which is as full fledged  transcendental fugue. The subject of this fugue sounds vaguely baroque which underscores his returned interest in older musical forms. Here again, Beethoven is careful to give the cello a full voice in this complex fugue, which, David Patrick Stearns describes as “...contrapuntal thickets repeatedly threaten(ing) to unravel with a number of strands moving in different directions.” He goes on to say “...the Finale of Op. 102, No. 2 ...is a movement that takes its place alongside other late-Beethoven works providing a glimpse of the language to come in a far bigger, even more exalted Op. 133 Grosse Fugue a decade later.”

Stepping back to look at the evolution from Beethoven’s Op. 5 to Op. 102 Cello Sonatas, we see a marvelous odyssey and transformation. It is truly remarkable that this was achieved in the lifetime of one composer.