Contexts for

Performance 1

LECTURE 2.7: COMPOSERS AND/AS

PERFORMERS
 In 1803 Beethoven is:
• Still active as a performer in public concerts
• Interested in new pianos and developments
Beethoven in piano technology
• Beginning to acquire a name as a
composer, but doesn’t yet have international
renown
Performer and
Composer • A key participant in Vienna’s music network
• Starting to experience significant
degradation of his hearing
Beethoven’s
1803 Erard
Fortepiano

‘ M R B E E T H OV E N , K E Y B OA R D I ST
I N V I E N N A , OW E S 15 0 0 F R A N C S
FOR THE SALE OF A GRAND
P I A N O , N O . 13 3 ’
 George
Polgreen
Bridgetower
English violinist, 1778-1860
Visits Vienna in 1803, is introduced
to Beethoven’s music network
Beethoven and Bridgetower become
friendly; Beethoven helps
Bridgetower get established in the
Viennese musical scene
Beethoven composes the Violin
Sonata, no 9 for performance
together at a concert staged for the
benefit of Bridgetower
Sonata as ‘Penetrating Dialogue’

[The Violin Sonata no. 9, op. 47 requires] ‘two artists who are in
very mighty command of their instruments, and who understand
how to use them with meaning and with feeling. One finds here
not just a random murmuring with notes, rather, one believes that
once perceives a penetrating dialogue, relentlessly driven
forward.’ (1805 advertisement for the Sonata in a Leipzig music journal)
Rodolphe Kreutzer
• Kreutzer (1766-1831), French violinist and
Paris Conservatoire teacher
• The published score of the Violin Sonata no 9,
op 47, is dedicated to Kreutzer
• Kreutzer didn’t like and never played it
• The ‘Kreutzer’ Sonata features in a short story
by Tolstoy, in turn the inspiration for a string
quartet by Leoš Janáček