Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)
Piano Trio no. 1, in E-flat major, op. 1 (1795)
The three piano trios published as Beethoven’s opus 1 in 1795 date from his early years in Vienna when he was still studying with Haydn. Though it is sometimes difficult to accurately date Beethoven’s earliest published compositions – in part because Beethoven was famously misleading about which pieces were written when to Haydn (which was one of several causes of tension between the two) – scholar Lewis Lockwood suggests that the first trio, in E-flat major, was probably composed in Vienna during the summer of 1793.
It certainly possesses many of the hallmarks familiar to Beethoven’s later music. The opening movement is, as Lockwood notes, the first of many Beethoven compositions in E-flat major to open with an outline of the tonic triad, in this case extended to two-octaves. The second melodic idea of the movement is far more restricted in range, only covering about a perfect fifth. Together, though, they complement each other perfectly, lending a seriousness to the music that carries through the movement.
The slow second movement is in A-flat major, the subdominant key of E-flat, and the same key of the slow movement of the much later E-flat major string quartet, op. 127. It features one a non-triadic melody (that not exactly a Beethoven specialty), and showcases both his lyrical abilities and his dexterity at creating convincing dramatic shifts within a movement.
In place of a minuet, Beethoven often opted to write scherzos – movements that follow the same formal pattern of the minuet, just in a faster tempo. It’s appropriate, then, that opus 1, no. 1 contains a movement that would be so strongly connected with Beethoven’s name and subsequent output. The Italian word scherzo also means “joke,” and there’s quite a bit of musical humor packed into this brief movement: feints at tonalities that don’t quite resolve as we might expect them to; unexpected instrumental combinations; sudden changes in dynamics, textures, and character; and a final, subtle gag at the end on which one can imagine Haydn smiling his approval.
The finale is filled with peppy, Haydn-esque character and wit, but with some marvelously original touches thrown in, as well: for instance, a two-against-three melody/accompaniment pattern in the first section; an augmentation of the opening theme of the Scherzo at the center of the movement; a combination of gestures from the first movement with the opening theme of the finale towards the end; and some fantastically unexpected turns of harmony (including a modulation to the foreign key of E major about three-quarters of the way through the movement).
© Jonathan Blumhofer
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