Piano Sonata No. 21

All afternoon he had been practicing with fury, first scales, then exercises.

Then a pause, and now his fingers slipped into the first movement of the Waldstein Sonata.

Secretly, mysteriously he began, then broke sharply, impatiently crescendo as the passion of the music mounted up and up.

And now as it settled into its rhythm, his hands ran smoothly and joyously along.

There are 91 pages in it, and it's not a tidy book about the Eroica.

The symphony shares this book with the Waldstein Piano Sonata, an opera that Beethoven abandoned, and the first numbers of the opera that became Fidelio.

Also his triple concertos, various songs, and the earliest ideas for what turned into the fifth and sixth symphonies.

Projects sit on top of one another, crammed into this book.

In Joseph Vance we have the growth of the soul from an environment of poverty and crime to the loftiest heights of nobility and self-denial.

And the theme in the Waldstein Sonata triumphantly repeats the confidence of Dr. Thorpe, who regards death not as a barrier but as a gateway.

In Alice for Short the mystery of the spirit world completely envelops the humdrum inconsistencies that form the daily round, the trivial task.

This is seen perhaps not so much in the ghosts, for they speak of the past.

All afternoon he had been practicing with fury, first scales, then exercises.

Then a pause, and now his fingers slipped into the first movement of the Waldstein Sonata.

Secretly, mysteriously he began, then broke sharply, impatiently crescendo as the passion of the music mounted up and up.

And now as it settled into its rhythm, his hands ran smoothly and joyously along.

It shows a somewhat unusual phase of Beethoven's genius, and is but one more proof of his versatility, one more justification for his title, the Shakespeare of Music.

Sonata C Major, Opus 53.

This is one of the best and justly most beloved of the pianoforte works in what is known as Beethoven's second period, that is to say the period when his creative power was at its zenith, when his genius had reached its fullest maturity.

It showed no sign of waning, when in its individual development it had outgrown all youthful crudities, all reminiscent suggestions of older masters, occasionally to be found in his earlier writings, yet before it had lapsed into that somewhat abstruse metaphysical vein to which some of us are inclined to object in its latest works, in which individuality is sometimes exaggerated into eccentricity.

The present writer is not among those who regard his latest sonatas for the piano as in any sense his greatest works, and it is something of a question whether any pianist would play or any audience tolerate the Opus 111, for instance, if it bore any signature but that of Beethoven.

The works of his second or middle period are instinct with far more genuine spontaneity and true musical effect.

The Opus 53 is familiarly known among musicians under two names.

It is often designated as the Aurora Sonata because of its suggestive reference to, not to say actual description of, those wondrous fireworks of the heavens, the Northern Lights.

One of my favorite of his sonatas.

Piano Sonata Number 21 in C major, The Waldstein, Opus 53.

Now, this is one of Beethoven's two heroic [laughs] period, uh, piano sonatas.

The other one is The Appassionata.

... of sound to it.

The rhythmic aggression in this piece, by the way, is especially well-caught after the one-minute-and-30-second mark.

Track 16 to 17 is Alexander Scriabin's Piano Sonata Number 4 in F-sharp major, Opus 30.

Liu says this is one of the most luminous works in the entire program.

All afternoon he had been practicing with fury, first scales, then exercises.

Then a pause, and now his fingers slipped into the first movement of the Waldstein Sonata.

Secretly, mysteriously he began, then broke sharply, impatiently crescendo as the passion of the music mounted up and up.

And now as it settled into its rhythm, his hands ran smoothly and joyously along.