Beethoven’s Hammer
Beethoven.
That’s usually the answer I give when someone asks me what composer I like. I mean, it’s fairly conventional, but it’s really true. Most people however are looking for a slightly more obscure name that sounds a bit less marketable to the untrained professional…perhaps Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Shostakovich, Scriabin, Strauss, or some other composer whose name starts with an “s.”
Well, the S’s are great in the 20th Century, but it’s the B’s that ruled before. I’m talking about Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms.
And it’s that weird connection between these guys that leads me to what is quickly becoming my favorite Beethoven piano sonata. How many Beethoven piano sonatas are there? 32…more if you count the “unofficial” ones. Admittedly I haven’t exactly gone through all of them and listened with equal intensity. But I’ve heard many of them and have played parts of them.
The stand-outs of the group have names. Moonlight, Waldstein, Appassionata, Tempest, Pastoral, etc. And the one I’m writing about has one too: Hammerklavier. It’s numbered Piano Sonata number 29 and given Opus number 106. And it’s a real mofo.
As part of my musical experiment, I listened to the sucker for a month…one month of Hammerklavier ringing in my head. To be honest, it’s a really hard one to get in your ears so the experiment really helped out. And ultimately, that’s what makes this piano sonata so spine tingling good: The whole thing is ugly.
Andras Schiff says it himself. He scoffs at those who regard it as generically beautiful, like that’s what polite civilized people are supposed to call it. Nope. Beethoven is writing something that is ugly and harsh and difficult and utterly human. Of course, there are moments of conventional beauty, which makes them all the more beautiful because they are surrounded by the coldness of an immense cavern. The correct term I believe is sublime, vast and uncaring like the Himalayas.
The whole last movement of the Hammerklavier sonata is based on a fugue, which comes courtesy of Beethoven’s study of Bach’s amazing and unsurpassed fugal technique. Beethoven makes a run at it, but is also interested in the amounts of sheer noise and pyrotechnics that result. He takes the strictness of Bach and loosens up for some fun. Lots of banging low notes and tender high ones.
Where does Brahms come in? Well, Brahms clearly studied the Hammerklavier sonata. He borrows Beethoven’s use of thirds in the Hammerklavier for his Third Symphony. It’s uncanny really if you know both pieces. Scholars note these kinds of things so it’s really not just my imagination.
So yes, I like Beethoven. But no, he’s not going to roll over. After you charge through his greatest hits, you’ll find a plethora of second-string masterpieces…not second-string because they’re not as good, but just not as conventional or ostensibly beautiful. No, they just feature a deaf guy working out his demons and reaching for the sublime.
Incidentally, I also heard this piece used in a PBS documentary on Charles Schultz, creator of Peanuts and Charlie Brown. I think it was used, because Schroeder is a Beethoven-lover and a sort of cold and uncaring pianist that Lucy pines over unrequited. There’s a sort of happiness I get from knowing that this weird Beethoven piece actually connects to pop culture in some way.
So when are you going to hear it? How about now? The following recording is taken from Schiff’s free lecture on Beethoven’s sonatas at the link above where it says Andras Schiff. Go check out the entire lecture since he spends almost an hour and a half explaining and demonstrating the genius behind this piece.
Hammerklavier sonata, final movement sans intro - Beethoven (Andras Schiff live)
