About the "moon" sonata of Ludwig van Beethoven. The history of the creation of L. Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" The name Moonlight gave to the sonata

Ludwig van Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata. Sonata of love or...

Sonata cis-moll(Op. 27 No. 2) is one of Beethoven's most popular piano sonatas; perhaps the most famous piano sonata in the world and the favorite work for home music playing. For more than two centuries it has been taught, played, softened, tamed - just as in all centuries people have tried to soften and tame death.

Boat on the waves

The name “Lunar” does not belong to Beethoven - it was introduced into circulation after the composer’s death by Heinrich Friedrich Ludwig Relstab (1799–1860), a German music critic, poet and librettist, who left a number of notes in the master’s conversation notebooks. Relshtab compared the images of the first movement of the sonata to the movement of a boat sailing under the moon along Lake Vierwaldstedt in Switzerland.

Ludwig van Beethoven. Portrait painted in the second half of the 19th century

Ludwig Relstab
(1799 - 1860)
German novelist, playwright and music critic

K. Friedrich. Monastery cemetery in the snow (1819)
National Gallery, Berlin

Switzerland. Lake Vierwaldstedt

Beethoven's different works have many names, which are usually understood only in one country. But the adjective “lunar” in relation to this sonata has become international. The lightweight salon title touched the depths of the image from which the music grew. Beethoven himself, who tended to give parts of his works slightly ponderous definitions in Italian, called his two sonatas Op. 27 No. 1 and 2 - quasi una fantasia- “something like a fantasy.”

Legend

The romantic tradition associates the emergence of the sonata with the composer’s next love interest - his student, young Giulietta Guicciardi (1784–1856), cousin of Theresa and Josephine Brunswick, two sisters with whom the composer was in turn attracted at different periods of his life (Beethoven, like Mozart, had a tendency to fall in love with entire families).

Juliet Guicciardi

Teresa Brunswick. Beethoven's faithful friend and student

Dorothea Ertman
German pianist, one of the best performers of Beethoven's works
Ertman was famous for her performances of Beethoven's works. The composer dedicated Sonata No. 28 to her

The romantic legend includes four points: Beethoven's passion, playing a sonata under the moon, a marriage proposal rejected by heartless parents due to class prejudices, and, finally, the marriage of a frivolous Viennese, who preferred a rich young aristocrat to the great composer.

Alas, there is nothing to confirm that Beethoven ever proposed to his student (as he, with a high degree of probability, later proposed to Teresa Malfatti, the cousin of his attending physician). There is not even evidence that Beethoven was seriously in love with Juliet. He didn’t tell anyone about his feelings (just as he didn’t talk about his other loves). The portrait of Giulietta Guicciardi was found after the composer's death in a locked box along with other valuable documents - but... in the secret box were several portraits of women.

And finally, Juliet married Count Wenzel Robert von Gallenberg, an elderly ballet composer and musical theater archivist, only a couple of years after the creation of the op. 27 No. 2 - in 1803.

Whether the girl with whom Beethoven was once infatuated was happy in marriage is another question. Before his death, the deaf composer wrote down in one of his conversation notebooks that some time ago Juliet wanted to meet him, she even “cried,” but he refused her.

Caspar David Friedrich. Woman and sunset (Sunset, sunrise, woman in the morning sun)

Beethoven did not push away the women with whom he was once in love, he even wrote to them...

The first page of a letter to the “immortal beloved”

Perhaps in 1801, the hot-tempered composer quarreled with his student over some trifle (as happened, for example, with the violinist Bridgetower, the performer of the Kreutzer Sonata), and even many years later he was ashamed to remember it.

Secrets of the heart

If Beethoven suffered in 1801, it was not at all from unhappy love. At this time, he first told his friends that he had been struggling with impending deafness for three years. On June 1, 1801, his friend, violinist and theologian Karl Amenda (1771–1836) received a desperate letter. (5) , to which Beethoven dedicated his beautiful string quartet op. 18 F major. On June 29, Beethoven informed another friend, Franz Gerhard Wegeler, about his illness: “For two years now I have almost avoided any society, since I cannot tell people: “I am deaf!”

Church in the village of Geiligenstadt

In 1802, in Heiligenstadt (a resort suburb of Vienna), he wrote his stunning will: “O you people who consider or declare me embittered, stubborn or a misanthrope, how unfair you are to me” - this is how this famous document begins.

The image of the “Moonlight” sonata grew through heavy thoughts and sad thoughts.

The moon in the romantic poetry of Beethoven's time is an ominous, gloomy luminary. Only decades later, her image in salon poetry acquired elegance and began to “brighten.” The epithet “lunar” in relation to a piece of music from the late 18th – early 19th centuries. can mean irrationality, cruelty and gloom.

No matter how beautiful the legend of unhappy love is, it is difficult to believe that Beethoven could dedicate such a sonata to his beloved girl.

For the “Moonlight” sonata is a sonata about death.

Key

The key to the mysterious triplets of the “Moonlight” sonata, which open the first movement, was discovered by Theodor Visev and Georges de Saint-Foy in their famous work on Mozart’s music. These triplets, which today any child admitted to his parents' piano enthusiastically tries to play, go back to the immortal image created by Mozart in his opera Don Giovanni (1787). Mozart's masterpiece, which Beethoven resented and admired, begins with a senseless murder in the dark of night. In the silence that followed the explosion in the orchestra, three voices emerge one after another on quiet and deep string triplets: the trembling voice of the dying man, the intermittent voice of his killer and the muttering of the numb servant.

With this detached triplet movement, Mozart created the effect of life flowing away, floating away into the darkness, when the body is already numb, and the measured sway of Lethe carries away the fading consciousness on its waves.

In Mozart, the monotonous accompaniment of the strings is superimposed with a chromatic mournful melody in the wind instruments and singing - albeit intermittently - male voices.

In Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata, what should have been an accompaniment drowned out and dissolved the melody - the voice of individuality. The upper voice floating above them (the coherence of which is sometimes the main difficulty for the performer) is almost no longer a melody. This is the illusion of a melody that you can grab onto as your last hope.

On the verge of goodbye

In the first movement of the Moonlight Sonata, Beethoven transposes the Mozart death triplets that had sunk into his memory a semitone lower - into a more reverent and romantic C sharp minor. This will be an important key for him - in it he will write his last and great quartet cis-moll.

The endless triads of the “Moonlight” Sonata, flowing into one another, have neither end nor beginning. Beethoven reproduced with amazing accuracy that feeling of melancholy that is evoked by the endless play of scales and triads behind the wall - sounds that, with their endless repetition, can take away the music from a person. But Beethoven raises all this boring nonsense to a generalization of the cosmic order. Before us is musical fabric in its purest form.

By the beginning of the twentieth century. and other arts approached the level of this discovery of Beethoven: thus, artists made pure color the hero of their canvases.

What the composer does in his work of 1801 is strikingly consonant with the search of the late Beethoven, with his last sonatas, in which, according to Thomas Mann, “the sonata itself as a genre ends, comes to an end: it has fulfilled its purpose, achieved its goal , there is no further path, and she dissolves, overcomes herself as a form, says goodbye to the world.”

“Death is nothing,” Beethoven himself said, “you live only in the most beautiful moments. What is genuine, what really exists in a person, what is inherent in him, is eternal. What is transitory is worthless. Life acquires beauty and significance only thanks to fantasy, this flower, which only there, in the sky-high heights, blooms magnificently...”

The second movement of the Moonlight Sonata, which Franz Liszt called “a fragrant flower that grew between two abysses - the abyss of sadness and the abyss of despair,” is a flirtatious allegretto, similar to a light interlude. The third part was compared by the composer's contemporaries, accustomed to thinking in images of romantic painting, to a night storm on a lake. Four waves of sound rise up one after another, each ending with two sharp blows, as if the waves hit a rock.

The musical form itself is bursting out, trying to break the boundaries of the old form, splashing out over the edge - but it retreats.

The time has not yet come.

Text: Svetlana Kirillova, Art magazine

Part one: Adagio sostenuto

Part two: Allegretto

Part three: Presto agitato

Piano Sonata No. 14 in C sharp minor, op. 27, No. 2 (Quasi fantasia, better known as “Lunar”)- a piece of music written by the German composer Ludwig van Beethoven in 1801. The first part of the sonata (Adagio sostenuto) was called “lunar” by the music critic Ludwig Rellstab in 1832, after the author’s death - he compared this work to “moonlight over Lake Firwaldstätt.”

The sonata is dedicated to 18-year-old Giulietta Guicciardi, to whom Beethoven gave music lessons in 1801. The composer was in love with the young countess and wanted to marry her.

The change that has taken place in me now is caused by a sweet, wonderful girl who loves me and is loved by me.

In March 1802, Sonata No. 14 - with a dedication to Juliet - was published in Bonn, although from the first months of 1802 Juliet showed a clear preference for the composer Wenzel Galenberg and eventually married him. Six months after writing the sonata, on October 6, 1802, Beethoven wrote the “Heiligenstadt Testament” in despair. Some Beethoven scholars believe that it was to Countess Guicciardi that the composer addressed a letter known as the letter “to the immortal beloved.” It was discovered after Beethoven's death in a hidden drawer in his wardrobe. Beethoven kept a miniature portrait of Juliet along with this letter and the Heiligenstadt Testament. The melancholy of unrequited love, the agony of hearing loss - the composer expressed all this in the “Moon” sonata.

The illusion did not last long, and already in the sonata one can see more suffering and anger than love.

The monument of love that he wanted to create with this sonata very naturally turned into a mausoleum. For a person like Beethoven, love could not be anything other than hope beyond the grave and sorrow, spiritual mourning here on earth.

Analysis

Both sonatas of opus 27 (Nos. and 14) have the subtitle “in the spirit of fantasy” (Italian: quasi una fantasia): Beethoven wanted to emphasize that the form of the sonatas differs from the composition of the classical sonata cycle adopted at the time of the creation of this sonata.

The sonata consists of three movements:

1. Adagio|Adagio sostenuto. The sonata begins with what in a classical sonata cycle is usually the middle part of a sonata cycle - slow, gloomy, rather mournful music. The famous music critic Alexander Serov finds an expression of “deadly despondency” in the first part of the sonata. In his methodological analysis and edition of the sonata, Professor A. B. Goldenweiser identified three key elements important for the analysis and performance interpretation of the movement:

• General choral plan of texture, determined by the movement of bass octaves, which also includes:
• The harmonic triplet figuration, covering almost the entire movement, is a relatively rare example in Beethoven of a monotonous rhythmic movement sustained throughout the entire composition, more typical of the preludes of J. S. Bach
• A mournful, sedentary melodic voice, rhythmically almost coinciding with the bass line.

In sum, these three elements form a harmonious whole, but at the same time they function separately, forming a continuous living declamatory line, and not “playing along” only with their part to the leading voice.

2. Allegretto - the second movement of the sonata.

For insufficiently sensitive students, the “consoling” mood of the second movement easily turns into an entertaining scherzando, which is fundamentally contrary to the meaning of the work. I have heard this interpretation dozens, if not hundreds of times. In such cases, I usually remind the student of Liszt’s catchphrase about this allegretto: “This is a flower between two abysses,” and I try to prove to him that this allegory is not accidental, that it surprisingly accurately conveys not only the spirit, but also the form of the composition, for the first bars the melodies resemble the involuntarily opening cup of a flower, and the subsequent ones resemble leaves hanging on the stem. Please remember that I never “illustrate” music, that is, in this case I am not saying that this music is a flower - I am saying that it can evoke a spiritual, visual impression of a flower, symbolize it, suggest to the imagination the image of a flower.

I forget to say that this sonata also contains a scherzo. One cannot help but wonder how this scherzo, which has nothing to do with either the previous or the subsequent one, got mixed up here. “It is a flower between two abysses,” said Leaf. Perhaps! But such a place, I believe, is not very impressive for a flower, so from this side Mr. Liszt’s metaphor may not be entirely wrong.

Alexander Serov

3. Presto agitato - third movement of the sonata.

A sudden adagio... piano... The man, driven to the extreme, falls silent, his breathing stops. And when, after a minute, breathing comes to life and the person rises, the futile efforts, sobs, and riots are over. Everything has been said, the soul is devastated. In the last bars, only majestic power remains, conquering, taming, accepting the flow.

Romain Rolland

Some interpretations

• Wilhelm Kempff, YouTube video ;

The heroic-dramatic line does not exhaust all the versatility of Beethoven's quest in the field of the piano sonata. The content of "Lunar" is connected with something else, lyric-dramatic type.

This work became one of the composer's most stunning spiritual revelations. At the tragic time of the collapse of love and the irreversible decline of hearing, he spoke here about himself.

The Moonlight Sonata is one of the works in which Beethoven sought new ways to develop the sonata cycle. He called her sonata-fantasy, thereby emphasizing the freedom of composition, which deviates far from the traditional scheme. The first movement is slow: the composer abandoned the usual sonata style in it. This is an Adagio, completely devoid of the figurative and thematic contrasts typical of Beethoven, and this is very far from the first part of the “Pathetique”. This is followed by a small Allegretto of a minuet nature. The sonata form, saturated with extreme drama, is “reserved” for the finale, and it is this that becomes the culmination of the entire composition.

The three parts of “Lunar” are three stages in the process of developing one idea:

• Part I (Adagio) - mournful awareness of life's tragedy;
• Part II (Allegretto) - pure joy that suddenly flashed before the mind's eye;
• Part III (Presto) - psychological reaction: mental storm, outburst of violent protest.

That immediate, pure, trusting thing that Allegretto brings with it instantly ignites Beethoven’s hero. Having awakened from his sorrowful thoughts, he is ready to act and fight. The last movement of the sonata turns out to be the center of drama. It is here that all figurative development is directed, and even in Beethoven it is difficult to name another sonata cycle with a similar emotional buildup towards the end.

The rebellion of the finale, its extreme emotional intensity turns out to be the other side of the silent grief of Adagio. What is concentrated in itself in Adagio breaks outward in the finale, this is the release of the internal tension of the first part (a manifestation of the principle of derivative contrast at the level of the relationship between the parts of the cycle).

Part 1

IN Adagio Beethoven's favorite principle of dialogical oppositions gave way to lyrical monologue - the one-theme principle of solo melody. This speech melody, which “sings while crying” (Asafiev), is perceived as a tragic confession. Not a single pathetic exclamation disturbs inner concentration, grief is strict and silent. In the philosophical fullness of the Adagio, in the very silence of grief, there is much in common with the drama of Bach’s minor preludes. Like Bach, the music is full of internal, psychological movement: the size of phrases is constantly changing, tonal-harmonic development is extremely active (with frequent modulations, intruding cadences, contrasts of the same modes E - e, h - H). Interval relationships sometimes become emphatically acute (m.9, b.7). The ostinato pulsation of the triplet accompaniment also originates from Bach’s free prelude forms, at times coming to the fore (the transition to the reprise). Another textured layer of Adagio is the bass, almost passacal, with a measured descending step.

There is something mournful in Adagio - the dotted rhythm, asserted with particular insistence in the conclusion, is perceived as the rhythm of a funeral procession. Form Adagio 3x-particular of developmental type.

part 2

Part II (Allegretto) is included in the “Lunar” cycle, like a bright interlude between two acts of the drama, highlighting their tragedy by contrast. It is designed in lively, serene tones, reminiscent of a graceful minuet with a playful dance melody. The complex 3x-partial form with trio and reprise da capo is also typical for the minuet. In terms of imagery, Allegretto is monolithic: the trio does not introduce contrast. Throughout the Allegretto, Des-dur is preserved, enharmonically equal to Cis-dur, the same name of the Adagio key.

Final

The extremely tense finale is the central part of the sonata, the dramatic culmination of the cycle. The principle of derivative contrast manifested itself in the relationship between the extreme parts:

• despite their tonal unity, the color of the music is sharply different. The mutedness, transparency, and “delicacy” of Adagio are opposed by the frantic sound avalanche of Presto, full of sharp accents, pathetic exclamations, and emotional explosions. At the same time, the extreme emotional intensity of the finale is perceived as the tension of the first part breaking through in all its power;
• the extreme parts are combined with an arpeggiated texture. However, in Adagio she expressed contemplation and concentration, and in Presto she contributes to the embodiment of mental shock;
• the original thematic core of the main part of the finale is based on the same sounds as the melodious, undulating beginning of the 1st movement.

The sonata form of the finale of “Lunarium” is interesting because of the unusual relationship of the main themes: the leading role from the very beginning is played by a secondary theme, while the main one is perceived as an improvisational introduction of a toccata nature. It is an image of confusion and protest, given in a rushing stream of rising waves of arpeggios, each of which ends abruptly with two accented chords. This type of movement comes from prelude improvisational forms. The enrichment of sonata drama with improvisation is observed in the future - in the free cadences of the reprise and especially the coda.

The melody of the side theme sounds not as a contrast, but as a natural continuation of the main part: the confusion and protest of one theme results in a passionate, extremely excited statement of another. The secondary theme, compared to the main one, is more individualized. It is based on pathetic, verbally expressive intonations. Accompanied by a secondary theme, the continuous toccata movement of the main part is maintained. The secondary key is gis-moll. This tonality is further consolidated in the final theme, in the offensive energy of which the heroic pulse is palpable. Thus, the tragic appearance of the finale is revealed already in its tonal plane (the exclusive dominance of the minor).

The predominant role of the side is also emphasized in the development, which is almost exclusively based on a single topic. It has 3 sections:

• introductory: this is a short, only six bars of the main theme.
• central: development of a secondary theme, which takes place in different keys and registers, mainly in low.
• big pre-reprise precursor.

The role of the climax of the entire sonata is played by code, its scale exceeding development. In the code, similar to the beginning of development, the image of the main part fleetingly appears, the development of which leads to a double “explosion” on a diminished seventh chord. And again a side topic follows. Such a persistent return to one topic is perceived as an obsession with one idea, as an inability to distance oneself from overwhelming feelings.

What you need to know about Beethoven, the suffering of Christ, Mozart's opera and romanticism to properly understand one of the world's most famous works, explains Vice-Rector of the Humanitarian Institute of Television and Radio Broadcasting, PhD in Art History Olga Khvoina.

In the vast repertoire of world musical classics, it is perhaps difficult to find a more famous work than Beethoven’s “Moonlight” Sonata. You don’t have to be a musician, or even a big fan of classical music, to hear its first sounds and immediately recognize and easily name both the work and the author.

Sonata No. 14 or "Moonlight"

(C sharp minor, op. 27, No. 2),
first part

Performed by: Claudio Arrau

One clarification, however, is required: for the inexperienced listener, the “Moonlight” sonata is exhausted by recognizable music. In fact, this is not the entire work, but only its first part. As befits a classical sonata, it also has a second and a third. So, while enjoying the recording of the “Moonlight” sonata, it is worth listening to not one, but three tracks - only then will we know the “end of the story” and be able to appreciate the entire composition.

First, let's set ourselves a modest task. Focusing on the well-known first part, let's try to understand what this exciting music that makes you come back to yourself hides within itself.

The "Moonlight" Sonata was written and published in 1801 and is among the works that opened the 19th century in the musical art. Becoming popular immediately after its appearance, this composition gave rise to many interpretations during the composer’s lifetime.

Portrait of an unknown woman. The miniature, which belonged to Beethoven, presumably depicts Giulietta Guicciardi. Around 1810

The dedication of the sonata, recorded on the title page, to Giulietta Guicciardi - a young aristocrat, a student of Beethoven, with whom the musician in love dreamed in vain during this period - encouraged the audience to look for an expression of love experiences in the work.

Title page of the edition of Ludwig van Beethoven's piano sonata “In the Spirit of Fantasy” No. 14 (C-sharp minor, op. 27, No. 2) with dedication to Juliet Guicciardi. 1802

About a quarter of a century later, when European art was enveloped in romantic languor, the composer’s contemporary, the writer Ludwig Relstab, compared the sonata with a picture of a moonlit night on Lake Firvaldstät, describing this night landscape in the short story “Theodor” (1823); It was thanks to Relshtab that the poetic definition “Moonlight” was assigned to the work, known to professional musicians as sonata No. 14, and even more precisely, sonata in C sharp minor, opus 27, No. 2 (Beethoven did not give his work such a name). In the text of Relshtab, which seems to have concentrated all the attributes of a romantic landscape (night, moon, lake, swans, mountains, ruins), the motif of “passionate unrequited love” sounds again: the strings of an aeolian harp, swayed by the wind, plaintively sing about it, filling it with their mysterious sounds the entire space of the mystical night;

Having mentioned two very well-known options for interpreting the content of the sonata, which are suggested by verbal sources (the author’s dedication to Juliet Guicciardi, Relshtab’s definition of “Moonlight”), let us now turn to the expressive elements contained in the music itself, and try to read and interpret the musical text.

Have you ever thought that the sounds by which the whole world recognizes the “Moonlight” Sonata are not a melody, but an accompaniment? Melody - it would seem that the main element of musical speech, at least in the classical-romantic tradition (avant-garde movements of music of the 20th century does not count) - does not appear immediately in the Moonlight Sonata: this happens in romances and songs, when the sound of an instrument precedes the singer’s introduction. But when the melody prepared in this way finally appears, our attention is completely focused on it. Now let’s try to remember (maybe even sing) this melody. Surprisingly, we will not find any melodic beauty in it (various turns, leaps at wide intervals or smooth progressive movement). The melody of the Moonlight Sonata is constrained, squeezed into a narrow range, hardly makes its way, is not sung at all and only sometimes breathes a little more freely. Its beginning is especially significant. For some time the melody cannot break away from the original sound: before it moves even a little, it is repeated six times. But it is precisely this six-fold repetition that reveals the meaning of another expressive element - rhythm. The first six sounds of the melody reproduce a recognizable rhythmic formula twice - this is the rhythm of a funeral march.

Throughout the sonata, the initial rhythmic formula will return repeatedly, with the persistence of thought that has taken possession of the hero’s entire being. In the coda of the first movement, the original motif is finally established as the main musical idea, repeating itself again and again in a gloomy low register: the validity of associations with the thought of death leaves no doubt.

Returning to the beginning of the melody and following its gradual development, we discover another essential element. This is a motive of four closely related, as if crossed sounds, pronounced twice as a tense exclamation and emphasized by dissonance in the accompaniment. To listeners of the 19th century, and especially today, this melodic turn is not as familiar as the rhythm of the funeral march. However, in church music of the Baroque era (in German culture represented primarily by the genius of Bach, whose works Beethoven knew from childhood), he was the most important musical symbol. This is one of the variants of the motif of the Cross - a symbol of the dying sufferings of Jesus.

Those who are familiar with music theory will be interested to learn about one more circumstance that confirms that our guesses about the content of the first part of the Moonlight Sonata are correct. For his 14th sonata, Beethoven chose the key of C-sharp minor, which is not often used in music. This key has four sharps. In German, “sharp” (a sign of raising the sound by a semitone) and “cross” are denoted by one word - Kreuz, and in the outline of the sharp there is a similarity with a cross - ♯. The fact that there are four sharps here further enhances the passionate symbolism.

Let us make a reservation again: work with such meanings was inherent in church music of the Baroque era, and Beethoven’s sonata is a secular work and was written in a different time. However, even during the period of classicism, tonalities remained tied to a certain range of content, as evidenced by musical treatises contemporary to Beethoven. As a rule, the characteristics given to tonalities in such treatises recorded the moods characteristic of the art of the New Age, but did not break ties with the associations recorded in the previous era. Thus, one of Beethoven’s older contemporaries, composer and theorist Justin Heinrich Knecht, believed that C-sharp minor sounds “with an expression of despair.” However, Beethoven, when composing the first part of the sonata, as we see, was not satisfied with a generalized idea of ​​​​the nature of tonality. The composer felt the need to turn directly to the attributes of a long-standing musical tradition (the motif of the Cross), which indicates his focus on extremely serious themes - the Cross (as a destiny), suffering, death.

Autograph of Ludwig van Beethoven's piano sonata “In the Spirit of Fantasy” No. 14 (C sharp minor, op. 27, No. 2). 1801

Now let's turn to the beginning of the "Moon" Sonata - to those very familiar sounds that attract our attention even before the melody appears. The accompaniment line consists of continuously repeating three-note figures, resonating with deep organ basses. The initial prototype of this sound is the plucking of strings (lyre, harp, lute, guitar), the birth of music, listening to it. It is easy to feel how the non-stop smooth movement (from the beginning to the end of the first movement of the sonata it is not interrupted for a moment) creates a meditative, almost hypnotic state of detachment from everything external, and the slowly, gradually descending bass enhances the effect of withdrawal into oneself. Returning to the picture painted in Relshtab’s short story, let us recall once again the image of the Aeolian harp: in the sounds produced by the strings only due to the blowing of the wind, mystically minded listeners often tried to grasp the secret, prophetic, fateful meaning.

To scholars of 18th-century theatrical music, the type of accompaniment reminiscent of the opening of the Moonlight Sonata is also known as ombra (Italian for “shadow”). For many decades, in opera performances, such sounds accompanied the appearance of spirits, ghosts, mysterious messengers of the afterlife, and, more broadly, reflections on death. It is reliably known that when creating the sonata, Beethoven was inspired by a very specific opera scene. In the sketch notebook, where the first sketches of the future masterpiece were recorded, the composer wrote out a fragment from Mozart’s opera “Don Giovanni”. This is a short but very important episode - the death of the Commander, wounded during a duel with Don Juan. In addition to the characters mentioned, Don Giovanni's servant Leporello participates in the scene, so that a terzetto is formed. The characters sing at the same time, but each about their own: the Commander says goodbye to life, Don Giovanni is full of remorse, the shocked Leporello abruptly comments on what is happening. Each of the characters not only has its own text, but also its own melody. Their remarks are united into a single whole by the sound of the orchestra, which not only accompanies the singers, but, stopping the external action, fixes the viewer’s attention on the moment when life is balancing on the brink of oblivion: measured, “dripping” sounds count down the last moments separating the Commander from death. The end of the episode is accompanied by the remarks "[The Commander] is dying" and "The moon is completely hidden behind the clouds." Beethoven will repeat the sound of the orchestra from this Mozart scene at the beginning of the Moonlight Sonata almost literally.

The first page of a letter from Ludwig van Beethoven to his brothers Carl and Johann. October 6, 1802

There are more than enough analogies. But is it possible to understand why the composer, who had barely crossed the threshold of his 30th birthday in 1801, was so deeply and truly concerned about the theme of death? The answer to this question is contained in a document whose text is no less poignant than the music of the Moonlight Sonata. We are talking about the so-called “Heiligenstadt Testament”. It was found after Beethoven's death in 1827, but was written in October 1802, about a year after the creation of the Moonlight Sonata.
In fact, the “Heiligenstadt Testament” is an extended suicide letter. Beethoven addressed it to his two brothers, indeed devoting several lines to instructions on the inheritance of property. Everything else is an extremely sincere story addressed to all contemporaries, and perhaps descendants, about the suffering experienced, a confession in which the composer several times mentions the desire to die, expressing at the same time his determination to overcome these moods.

At the time of the creation of his will, Beethoven was in the Vienna suburb of Heiligenstadt, undergoing treatment for an illness that had tormented him for about six years. Not everyone knows that the first signs of hearing loss appeared in Beethoven not in his mature years, but in the prime of his youth, at the age of 27. By that time, the composer’s musical genius had already been appreciated, he was received in the best houses of Vienna, he was patronized by patrons of the arts, and he won the hearts of ladies. Beethoven perceived the illness as the collapse of all hopes. The fear of opening up to people, so natural for a young, proud, proud person, was almost more painfully experienced. The fear of discovering professional failure, fear of ridicule or, conversely, manifestations of pity forced Beethoven to limit communication and lead a lonely life. But the accusations of unsociability hurt him painfully with their injustice.

This whole complex range of experiences was reflected in the “Heiligenstadt Testament,” which recorded a turning point in the composer’s mood. After several years of struggling with the disease, Beethoven realizes that hopes for a cure are futile, and vacillates between despair and stoic acceptance of his fate. However, in suffering he early gains wisdom. Reflecting on providence, deity, art (“only it... it held me back”), the composer comes to the conclusion that it is impossible to die without fully realizing his talent.

In his mature years, Beethoven would come to the idea that the best of people find joy through suffering. The "Moon" Sonata was written at a time when this milestone had not yet been passed.

But in the history of art, she became one of the best examples of how beauty can be born from suffering.

Sonata No. 14 or "Moonlight"

(C-sharp minor, op. 27, No. 2)

Performed by: Claudio Arrau

The sonata cycle of the fourteenth piano sonata consists of three parts. Each of them reveals one feeling in the richness of its gradations. The meditative state of the first movement gives way to a poetic, noble minuet. The finale is a “stormy bubbling of emotions”, a tragic outburst...it shocks with its uncontrollable energy and drama.
The figurative meaning of the finale of the “Moon” sonata is in a grandiose battle of emotion and will, in the great anger of the soul, which fails to master its passions. Not a trace remains of the enthusiastic and anxious dreaminess of the first part and the deceptive illusions of the second. But passion and suffering pierced my soul with a force never before experienced.

It could also be called an “alley sonata,” since, according to legend, it was written in the garden, in the half-burgher, half-rural environment that the young composer liked so much” (E. Herriot. The Life of L.V. Beethoven).

A. Rubinstein vigorously protested against the epithet “lunar” given by Ludwig Relstab. He wrote that moonlight requires something dreamy and melancholy, gently shining in musical expression. But the first part of the cis-moll sonata is tragic from the first to the last note, the last is stormy, passionate, it expresses something opposite to light. Only the second part can be interpreted as moonlight.

“The sonata contains more suffering and anger than love; the sonata’s music is gloomy and fiery,” says R. Rolland.

B. Asafiev wrote enthusiastically about the music of the sonata: “The emotional tone of this sonata is filled with strength and romantic pathos. The music, nervous and excited, then flares up with a bright flame, then sank into painful despair. The melody sings while crying. The deep warmth inherent in the sonata described makes it one of the most beloved and accessible. It’s hard not to be influenced by such sincere music, an expression of immediate feeling.”

Ludwig van Beethoven
Moonlight Sonata

This happened in 1801. The gloomy and unsociable composer fell in love. Who is she who won the heart of the brilliant creator? Sweet, spring-beautiful, with an angelic face and a divine smile, eyes in which you wanted to drown, sixteen-year-old aristocrat Juliet Guicciardi.

In a letter to Franz Wegeler, Beethoven asks a friend about his birth certificate, explaining that he is thinking about getting married. His chosen one was Juliet Guicciardi. Having rejected Beethoven, the inspiration for the Moonlight Sonata married a mediocre musician, the young Count Gallenberg, and went with him to Italy.

“Moonlight Sonata” was supposed to be an engagement gift with which Beethoven hoped to convince Giulietta Guicciardi to accept his marriage proposal. However, the matrimonial hopes of the composers had nothing to do with the birth of the sonata. "Moonlight" was one of two sonatas published under the general title Opus 27, both composed in the summer of 1801, the same year that Beethoven wrote his emotional and tragic letter to his school friend Franz Wegeler in Bonn and first admitted that he had hearing problems began.

The "Moonlight Sonata" was originally called the "Garden Arbor Sonata", after its publication Beethoven gave it and the second sonata the general title "Quasi una Fantasia" (which can be translated as "Fantasy Sonata"); this gives us a clue to the mood of the composer at that time. Beethoven desperately wanted to take his mind off his impending deafness, while at the same time he met and fell in love with his student Juliet. The famous name “Lunar” arose almost by accident; it was given to the sonata by the German novelist, playwright and music critic Ludwig Relstab.

A German poet, novelist and music critic, Relstab met Beethoven in Vienna shortly before the composer's death. He sent Beethoven several of his poems in the hope that he would set them to music. Beethoven looked through the poems and even marked a few of them; but I didn’t have time to do anything more. During the posthumous performance of Beethoven's works, Relstab heard Opus 27 No. 2, and in his article enthusiastically noted that the beginning of the sonata reminded him of the play of moonlight on the surface of Lake Lucerne. Since then, this work has been called “Moonlight Sonata”.

The first movement of the sonata is undoubtedly one of Beethoven's most famous works composed for piano. This passage shared the fate of Fur Elise and became a favorite piece of amateur pianists for the simple reason that they can perform it without much difficulty (of course, if they do it slowly enough).
This is slow and dark music, and Beethoven specifically states that the damper pedal should not be used here, since each note in this section must be clearly distinguishable.

But there is one strange thing here. Despite the worldwide fame of this movement and the widespread recognition of its first bars, if you try to hum or whistle it, you will almost certainly fail: you will find it almost impossible to catch the melody. And this is not the only case. This is the characteristic feature of Beethoven's music: he could create incredibly popular works that lack melody. Such works include the first movement of the Moonlight Sonata, as well as the no less famous fragment of the Fifth Symphony.

The second part is the complete opposite of the first - it is cheerful, almost happy music. But listen more closely, and you will notice shades of regret in it, as if happiness, even if it existed, turned out to be too fleeting. The third part bursts into anger and confusion. Non-professional musicians, who proudly perform the first part of the sonata, very rarely approach the second part and never attempt the third, which requires virtuoso skill.

No evidence has reached us that Giulietta Guicciardi ever played a sonata dedicated to her; most likely, this work disappointed her. The gloomy beginning of the sonata did not at all correspond to its light and cheerful character. As for the third movement, poor Juliet must have turned pale with fear at the sight of hundreds of notes, and finally realized that she would never be able to perform in front of her friends the sonata that the famous composer dedicated to her.

Subsequently, Juliet, with respectable honesty, told researchers of Beethoven’s life that the great composer did not think about her at all when creating his masterpiece. Guicciardi's evidence raises the possibility that Beethoven composed both Opus 27 sonatas, as well as the Opus 29 String Quintet, in an attempt to somehow come to terms with his impending deafness. This is also indicated by the fact that in November 1801, that is, several months after the previous letter and the writing of the “Moonlight Sonata,” Beethoven mentioned in a letter about Juliet Guicciardi, a “charming girl” who loves me, and whom I love "

Beethoven himself was irritated by the unprecedented popularity of his Moonlight Sonata. “Everyone is talking about the C-sharp-minor sonata! I wrote the best things!” he once said angrily to his student Cherny.

Presentation

Included:
1. Presentation - 7 slides, ppsx;
2. Sounds of music:
Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata - I. Adagio sostenuto, mp3;
Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata - II. Allegretto, mp3;
Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata - III. Presto agitato, mp3;
Beethoven. Moonlight Sonata 1 part Symph. ork, mp3;
3. Accompanying article, docx.