Piano Sonata No. 17 in D Minor

The D Minor Piano Sonata, Op. 31 No. 2, brims with formal innovation and highly personal expression, qualities that align it with the great minor-key works of Beethoven’s maturity. It was completed in late 1802, a tumultuous year for the composer, when he came to terms with the loss of his hearing. In response to a query from his (notoriously unreliable) biographer Anton Schindler about how to interpret this work, Beethoven told him to read Shakespeare’s The Tempest. It may be that Beethoven knew little of the play beyond its German title, Der Sturm, but the resulting nickname aptly invokes the turbulence and power of the music. Beethoven breaks with formal convention right from the start, alternating a tentative “Largo” arpeggio with snatches of the main “Allegro”, bringing back the “Largo” at structurally important moments later in the movement. The central “Adagio” in B flat major illustrates Beethoven’s capacity to achieve an elevated effect with apparently simple means. After an opening of rapt elegance, a sonorous melody is offset by drumlike rolls that underpin the texture through much of the movement. The “Allegretto” finale mixes grace and pathos with an agitated drive, not unlike the finale of Mozart’s Piano Sonata in A minor, K. 310 (1778). As with the first movement, Beethoven ends quietly, with a backwash of the music’s presence remaining long after the final note.