Drums of War: Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 3 in C minor, Opus 37

Bonaparte on the Bridge at Arcole by Antoine-Jean Gros (1801). Napoleon won a decisive victory over the Austrians at the battle of Arcole in 1796 . He famously stepped into the line of fire and waved a banner to inspire his men to attack near the bridge there, an event that quickly became part of the Napoleon legend.

On November 29 and December 1 and 2, the Houston Symphony welcomes world-renowned pianist Garrick Ohlsson back to Jones Hall for Ohlsson Plays Beethoven, a program featuring Beethoven’s dramatic Piano Concerto No. 3. Learn more about this fiery masterpiece and the events that may have inspired it in this post.

The earliest sketch for Beethoven’s Third Piano Concerto dates to as early as 1796, when he was touring as an up-and-coming piano virtuoso in Prague and Berlin with one of his earlier piano concertos. As with many of Beethoven’s compositions, however, it would be years before the Third Concerto took its final shape. Though for a time scholars believed that the concerto was written in 1800 (thanks to the disappearance of several sketchbooks and Beethoven’s atrocious handwriting), most experts now believe the bulk of the work on the concerto took place during the autumn of 1802, making it contemporary with Beethoven’s Second Symphony, Christ on the Mount of Olives, the Violin Sonatas Opus 30, the Piano Sonatas Opus 31—and the Heiligenstadt Testament.

The Testament (written in the Viennese suburb of Heiligenstadt) is an important letter Beethoven wrote to his brothers in which he grapples with his advancing hearing loss, contemplates suicide and ultimately decides to persevere for the sake of his art. It is tempting to hear this struggle reflected in the dark, C minor tonality of the concerto, and such an interpretation can by no means be ruled out; however, given the wide variety of moods evoked by the many pieces he wrote around the same time and the fact that that the concerto was first conceived many years before, such an autobiographical reading of the piece must be considered with some reservations. Most believe that the real impact of Beethoven’s crisis can be heard in his revolutionary Symphony No. 3 of the following year. Nevertheless, Beethoven’s intense inner world would have doubtlessly informed his performance of the work at its premiere in April 1803.

Many commentators have noted the military, march-like character of the work’s opening, suggesting the French Revolution and rise of Napoleon as an alternative source of inspiration:

Beginning the first movement’s orchestral introduction, this melodic idea, characterized by a rhythmic, drum-like tattoo, occurs in Beethoven’s earliest sketches. It enters softly, but soon leads a powerful transition to a contrasting second theme: a singing melody in the relative major. The dark mood of the opening then returns, preparing the way for the soloist’s dramatic entrance. The soloist then plays its own versions of the two main themes, embellished with virtuoso passagework.

Beethoven’s handwriting was not always the clearest. For many years scholars believed that this inscription on the first page of the manuscript said “1800,” and they believed the concerto was for the most part written in that year. Closer inspection, however, reveals that the last digit is in fact a “3,” indicating that Beethoven completed the concerto in 1803.

After an orchestral passage, a more developmental section begins with an exquisite alternation between soloist and orchestra based on the main theme. Further developments lead to a reprise of the main themes and a cadenza, an extended solo for the pianist alone. A gifted improviser, Beethoven would have invented this passage in performance (along with much of the rest of the piano part, as the sketchiness of his original manuscript shows), but in later years when he was no longer performing in public, he wrote down a version of it for other pianists to play. After the traditional trills that end the cadenza, the orchestra reenters with the timpani quietly playing the rhythmic motif from the opening idea. Interestingly, both this moment, one of the most original in the concerto, and the overlapping of the opening idea with itself in the cadenza, are found in Beethoven’s earliest sketch for the composition, suggesting that these were the germinal seeds for the rest of the piece.

As a gifted improviser, Beethoven sometimes neglected to write down some sections of the solo parts of his concertos until after he had played them. The manuscript of the beginning shows that he originally only wrote down the melody. The harmonies and an ornamented variation on the second measure were filled in later in a darker ink. You can peruse more of Beethoven’s manuscript here.

After the first movement comes to a stormy ending in C minor, the beginning of the slow second movement in the distant key of E major is utterly arresting. Beethoven’s student, Carl Czerny, said that the opening theme “must sound like a holy, distant, and celestial Harmony.” This hymn-like, soulful melody is introduced by the piano alone. The orchestra then takes it up and completes it, leading to a lovely cantilena that modulates to B major. Piano arpeggios and fragmentary motifs in the flute and bassoon pass through several keys, leading to a reprise of the main theme.

The last note of the slow movement, a G-sharp, is immediately reinterpreted as an A-flat as the soloist begins the finale, plunging the music back into the dark tonality of C minor. This is just the first of many rough-edged musical jokes in a movement filled with surprises. The main theme alternates with contrasting episodes, including several jaunty, major-key tunes and even a learned fugue based on the main theme. In the end, the music turns to a merry, C major coda, as if assuring us that all that came before was only in jest. Together the soloist and orchestra race to an ending full of triumphant laughter. —Calvin Dotsey

Don’t miss Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 3 on November 29 and December 1 and 2, 2018! Get tickets and more information at houstonsymphony.org.