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I was sightreading and I’m out of practice, so I won’t subject y’all to my playing, but I’m having a delightful time finally learning Beethoven’s Tempest sonata as a storm rolls in 🖤

#beethoven #classical music #piano music #tempest sonata #dramatic

‘The Tempest Sonata’

One of my favourite Beethoven piece to listen to. I will add this later for my little Classicaloid fanbook project. Man, drawing this in high quality is like composing a symphony. Rekt.

#beethoven #fanart #classicaloid #anime #artwork #art #digital art #digital drawing #ludwig van beethoven #tempest sonata

Thesis, antithesis, and synthesis in Beethoven's Tempest sonata. Composers are experienced practical dialecticians, routinely engaged in reconciling opposites. A prime example, with a twist or two, appears in Beethoven's Tempest sonata, as I show in this week's blog.

Here is a performance of it:

#Beethoven #Tempest sonata #thesis #antithesis #synthesis #classical piano

I’m usually not a fan of Beethoven. I find that a lot of his pieces are irritatingly repetitive--and then he’ll just do something unrelated all of a sudden--and then go back to that other thing again and beat it to death.

When I read his sheet music, it often reminds me of... a child who has limited vocabulary, trying to tell me a story, but not having enough words to build the meat of the story, so instead they just keep repeating the same thing again and again, more emphatically, growing more frustrated with each iteration--and then going off on a new limb of the story all of a sudden--and then coming back to that first point; and, just, cycles of this insanity.

And there’s a time and a place for that kind of frantic, furious driving home of a point. I don’t usually like listening to Beethoven, because, 1) there are a lot of mediocre performances out there, 2) relatedly, I don’t empathise with most interpretations, and 3) I just get bored. Seriously, the dude wrote ringtones. I mean, I get it--that’s how you’d get your brand out there back in the day. And hey, he wrote great ringtones. Just, I don’t often want to listen to catchy ringtones.

So I was delightfully surprised to find this recording of Sonata 17 in D Minor, Op. 31 No. 2, “Tempest”, third movement.

Erez drives home the point with the stubbornly rising emphasis that characterises Beethoven in my mind, and it works. It really works here.

I only wish the video were entirely of the hands--I could really do without the pictures of Beethoven on the screen. And it really is a delight to watch this pianist’s hands <3 His technique is crisp, crystal clear, sparkling.

I don’t usually like Beethoven, but this was a joy to listen to.

#music #piano #Beethoven #Tempest sonata