Chautauqua Institution - Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra: A Beethoven Evening

Ludwig van Beethoven

Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, Op. 37

Concerto No. 3 for Piano and Orchestra in C Minor, op. 37

Ludwig van Beethoven

One of history’s pivotal composers, Ludwig van Beethoven was born on December 16 or 17, 1770 in Bonn, and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. His Third Piano Concerto is dated 1803, although the earliest concept sketch dates back as far as 1796. The score was published in 1804 with a dedication to the Prussian Prince Louis Ferdinand. It received its first performance at Beethoven’s Akademiekonzert of April 5, 1803 in Vienna’s Theater an der Wien, sharing the program with Beethoven’s first two symphonies and his oratorio, Christus am Oelberge. The composer composed his own cadenza for the first movement of the work in 1809. The Concerto is scored for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings.

The start to Beethoven’s career in Vienna was a good one. His reputation as a brilliant pianist was quickly established and commissions poured in steadily. His first two concertos for piano demonstrated clearly that he had learned well from the models offered by Mozart’s masterpieces of the 1780s. He also composed several sonatas and sets of variations during these early stages of his Viennese career.

The Piano Concerto no. 3 in C Minor, op. 37 is a work whose boldness was inspired in no small part to the availability of an instrument built by the French manufacturer, Erard, that boasted a wider range than the five-octave fortepiano heretofore at his disposal. Beethoven, upon hearing a performance of Mozart’s C-Minor Piano Concerto (K. 491) remarked to the English composer and pianist J. B. Cramer, “Ah, dear Cramer, we shall never be able to do anything like that.” Another influence may have been a sonata by Johann F. X. Sterkel, whose theme bears an uncanny similarity to the second theme in the first movement of Op. 37. Beethoven’s Concerto in turn inspired subsequent piano concertos by Louis Spohr, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Frédéric Chopin, and the young Johannes Brahms.

The serious demeanor of Op. 37, Beethoven’s only concerto in a minor key, is its most distinguishing trait, making it kin to his other stormy C-minor compositions such as the Piano Sonatas Op. 10, no. 1, and Op. 13 (Pathétique), the String Quartet, Op. 18, no. 4, and the Symphony no. 5, to name but a few. The imposing first movement, marked Allegro con brio, signals a newer “symphonic” mode of expression not found in his first two concertos. Even when faced with a viable model, as was the case with this work, Beethoven had the rare gift of absorbing ti, and then turning it to his unique creative purpose. Among this movement’s several magical moments, the listener is advised to pay close attention to the return of the orchestra following the cadenza. Normally at this point in the structure of a concerto, the soloist stops playing. Mozart’s K. 491 is an exception to this rule. Beethoven, however, heightens the dramatic effect even more than his idol could ever imagine.

The opening of the second movement, Largo, still has the ability to take the listener by surprise, despite the tranquility of its principal theme. The reason is Beethoven’s choice of a remote tonality—E Major (four sharps)—inserted between two movements in C Minor (three flats). But, as usual, Beethoven is thinking along the lines of long-term strategic planning. The final chord of the Largo is marked forte (loud or strong), which is no small surprise in its own right, given how the music had been winding down in dynamics. The highest pitch in the final chord is a G sharp, which Beethoven ingeniously reinterprets enharmonically as A flat, forming the apex of the Rondo’s Allegro opening theme. Even those of us who know the piece well, the effect of this juxtaposition of G sharp and A flat strikes the ear as freshly today as it surely must have done for those in attendance at its premiere in 1804.