Beethoven’s Farewell To The Piano

In 1824, Beethoven, having completed his ninth symphony, returned to his own instrument, the piano, for the final time. He had signed off on his final piano sonatas the previous year, declaring the piano to be “after all an unsatisfactory instrument”. However, he seems to have been in a happier mood with the Op 126 bagatelles. They were conceived as ‘a Cycle’ of pieces, arranged in a specific order and it seems likely that he intended them to be played together as a complete set. When Beethoven sent them to his publisher, he wrote. “They are probably the best I’ve written.” This G major bagatelle follows the extraordinary, stormy B minor bagatelle (which we will look at soon in another film). The G major, like its predecessor, makes use of syncopation, but in a wonderfully innocent way, like a lullaby with a slightly surprising sense of swing. The whole piece is written in a 3-part texture, with two low voices (starting in parallel thirds) accompanying the melody in the outer sections, and, in the exqu