A university level essay about the above title, Ive pasted what i’d started with before practical work came my way making it near impossible to finish this in time. I’ve also attached a suggested list of sources but others can be used, also the final powerpoint around how we should approach the essay. Use of musical score examples etc are welcome also.
Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor also known
as the “Moonlight sonata” has since it’s premier in 1802 performed by Beethoven
himself, has been a much loved and played standard of the piano repertoire for
both pianists and audiences alike. The sonata gained it’s now acclaimed
nickname from this performance with the German music critic Ludwig Rellstab
describing the first movement as “being akin to moonlight flickering across
Lake Lucerne”.
The way Beethoven structured this turn of the century piano
sonata is significant as it departs from the traditional fast slow fast form
that had become the perceived sound of a classical sonata. However, with piano
sonata No. 14 Beethoven decides to use an end-weighted trajectory with each
subsequent movement the tempo markings increasing from movement one in adagio
sostenuto, movement two in Allegretto before the final movement being in Presto
agitato. Beethoven’s naming of the piece as a “sonata quasi una fantasia” (sonata
in the manner of a Fantasy) is significant as it reminds performers of the
improvisatory and expansive nature of the music in a fantasia style which Beethoven
so wanted the music to capture.