About Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 32, Lewis Lockwood writes (Beethoven, p. 388):
The last sonata gives every sign of being a self-consciously final statement. There is no evidence that after Opus 111, Beethoven ever thought of writing another piano sonata.
Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 32 has a disarmingly simple structure: a brief Maestoso introduction, an Allegro first movement in sonata form, and a second movement Adagio theme and variations. But what Beethoven does in this work consistently confounds our expectations.
The two-movement structure was not all that unusual in Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas: Aside from the two “easy” Op. 49 sonatas, Beethoven’s Piano Sonatas No. 22, Opus 54 (Day 182); No. 24, Opus 78 (Day 230); and No. 27, Opus 90 (Day 272) also have just two movements.
Beethoven had often associated the key of C minor with emotional intensity, such as the Pathetique Sonata (Day 106), the 3rd Piano Concerto (Day 166), and the 5th Symphony (Day 208).
So it is with the Piano Sonata No. 32, but which is also Beethoven’s last work in C minor.
#Beethoven250 Day 324
Piano Sonata No. 32 in C Minor (Opus 111), 1822
American pianist Katie Mahan performing in her adopted second hometown of Salzburg.
Maestoso movements are supposed to sound stately, and the one that opens the Piano Sonata No. 32 has the appropriate double-dotted rhythms, but it’s no welcoming fanfare. This one pulls us in by our shirt collars and seems to warn: “I hope you’re ready!”
The growling theme that opens the Allegro section of the Piano Sonata No. 32 has always seemed much more ominous than fate simply knocking at the door. Fate is already in the room and has us cornered! Yet, by the end it’s subdued itself in a reconciling C major.
The Opus 111 second movement theme and variations are mostly in C major. What impresses us mostly in the beginning is their sheer beauty as the Arietta begins softly and slowly, with a heartbreaking melody.
The theme and first three variations are all in binary form, with two repeated eight-measure sections, but with unusual time signatures: 9/16 for the theme and gently wavy first variation, 6/16 for the syncopated second, and then 12/32 for the astonishing third variation during which Beethoven invents boogie-woogie.
Approximately the last third of Opus 111 (about 10 minutes) is devoted to the final 4th and 5th variations. We might have expected spectacular fireworks after the boogie-woogie episode, but Beethoven pulls back. The music recedes. Binary form is abandoned. The meter returns to 9/16 with rippling streams of 32nd note triplets, nine to a measure, and episodes of extended sparkling trills.
The Arietta returns. The clouds part. Beethoven smiles and blows us a kiss. All is well.
#Beethoven250 Day 324
Piano Sonata No. 32 in C Minor (Opus 111), 1822
In this performance of Beethoven’s last three piano sonatas on a fortepiano, Opus 111 begins at 41:15.
Perhaps the stupidest comment about the Piano Sonata No. 32 was made by Maurice Schlesinger when he wrote Beethoven acknowledging receipt of the manuscript for his father’s publishing company but ventured to ask:
most submissively, if you wrote for the work only one Maestoso and one Andante, or if perhaps the [final] Allegro was accidently forgotten by the copyist. (Quoted in Lockwood, Beethoven, p. 388)
One is baffled what kind of movement he imagined could possibly follow.
It seems likely that Beethoven intentionally meant to emphasize a binary principle in the Piano Sonata No. 32 — one that has been described over the centuries in various ways as “Resistance and Submission,” “Here and Beyond,” “Earth and Heaven,” or “Samsara and Nirvana.”
At one time, Beethoven had intended to dedicate both the Opus 110 and 111 Piano Sonatas to Antonie Brentano, who is believed to be the subject of Beethoven’s “Immortal Beloved” letter (Day 254). However, Opus 110 had no dedication and Opus 111 was dedicated to Archduke Rudolph.