Lecture 2, Question 1: Let's talk about Beethoven's personality.

[Jill_Curtis Institute]

Beethoven's Personality

What are the crucial components of Beethoven’s personality, and how are they in evidence in early works such as the Sonata Op. 7?

[Ebalto]

It seems like Beethoven had the personality of a modern rock star. He was independent, confident, even a little defiant. And this comes through in his music where he breaks from the expected and is just being himself.

[cch...@gmail.com]

I also listened to recordings by Barenboim(<3), Goode, Biss (on Spotify), and Ashkenazy. I found most recordings on youtube but there it was a little challenging to find one video that combined all 4 movements.
From the dynamics of the sonata, I feel like Beethoven can go between extremes of emotions. Also he seems ambitious and demanding b/c as a former piano student, I feel like the piece would be really challenging to learn. I feel like Beethoven is also diverse in the sense that his Sonata Op. 7 requires a player to be really sensitive to stylistic interpretation but also to be technically rigorous in their playing.

It would be interesting elsewhere to have a space to discuss what were others' favorite recordings.

[fionac...@gmail.com]

It can be difficult to listen without prejudice to these early sonatas knowing, as we do, the whole story of Beethoven's life. I find the virtuosity, the sensitivity, the sheer brilliance within these pieces reveal more than a young ambitious composer at the beginning of his career. I find there is tenderness, humour, a playfulness, arrogance (justifiably so in my opinion), a desire to dazzle, grace, discipline, control - qualities that we don't associate with the Beethoven of myth.

[Jay Williams]

He was perhaps a bit ASD:  It didn't make sense to him that class mattered over talent.  Here he was a genius, yet he didn't have the right last name.  His defiance was aimed largely at that dichotomy.  

His lack of social awareness appears in a lot of venues.  Nowhere is it clearer than his role as conductor, where  he was seldom welcome by the orchestra.  He wrote a clever Mass for the Esterhazys as an audition piece for Hayn's position.  Thankfully he didn't get the, but it sounds as if the orchestra intentionally turned the "suck" knob up on the piece so that he wouldn't have a chance at being their new boss.  It can be very frustrating and isolating to have so little understanding of what's going on in the rich world of social nuance.  

His introversion is hard to dispute: Long walks recharged him and allowed him to think out his musical ideas clearly.  It's no wonder then that the solo piano sonata is the genre that feels the most revealing of his true emotional self.

That's the tragedy I feel in it, at least.

[my_apologies]

I kind of feel like he was somewhat restless when it came to music, like he wanted to change it, and mold it into something different that he could relate to in his own way. Sometimes I have a small feeling like it seems he was bored with the traditional forms and wanted to create something new that would inspire, impress, and give a sense of change that resembled how he saw the world but still relatable to whomever heard it. To FEEL a difference with/through his music. My thought on this could be very wrong though.

[Jaromír Dobrý]

I've read here that Beethoven's personality was the one of the rock star's. I think it fits better to Mozart than Beethoven. Mozart was probably the best composers of his era and he certainly knew it. Beethoven is somehow searching for something even he does not know and perhaps is never satisfied (but the result is great). In the later periods it seems like Beethoven would like to write romantic pieces but he couldn't imagine the romantic style yet.

[rikitra...@gmail.com]

The first attribute we should realize is that Beethoven is a romantic. He wrote opus 7 in honor of a countess, therefore his work will be focused on trying to impress and show adoration. He was a nonconformist in the way he adds an extra movement and takes an unprecedented amount of time to wind down his final movement. In these aforementioned ways he seeks to surprise his audience, leading them on to more unorthodox tricks later in his work.

[left...@gmail.com]

Beethoven was famously irascible. He was certainly one of the great geniuses of music but he never had the same devotion to balance as Mozart and it may have been part of his upbringing.

Without getting too psychological, Mozart's father, though not a great genius himself, was a thoroughly trained musician, perhaps the best teacher of his day. As a result, even Mozart's most juvenile compositions are remarkably accomplished and by the time he entered his early teens, he was able to write masterpieces at will.

Beethoven's father was, by all accounts, a competent musician but no Leopold Mozart and a drunken, abusive boor. The WoO piano concerto is pretty good stuff for a kid but nothing you want to hear twice.

Mozart rose, almost floated, to the top on the basis of his genius and his problems in life were largely caused by the fact that genius didn't pay the bills. Had he survived a few years more to exploit the success of Zauberflote, he would have been the richest man in Vienna.

Beethoven had to fight his way to the top. Through the school of hard knocks, he learned how to dominate others and he needed this to negotiate the Viennese musical scene.

Even in the earliest official works, even in some of the WoO material, Beethoven had elbows. He needed them and he used them.

There is always some brusque element, such as the abrupt key change in the finale to Sonata 7, that remind you that Beethoven is in charge. This willingness to get right up in your face is the Beethoven touch.

[chriswh...@gmail.com]

One implication of your comparison between Mozart and Beethoven needs clarifying. Beethoven was not by any stretch of the imagination poor. For several years he got a generous "pension" from an appreciative prince, he got paid for performing and he, or his brother Carl, negotiated decent fees from the firms that published his scores. His income took a knock when the pension was discontinued and his hearing loss meant he could not perform, but he was never the archetypal starving genius.

[alida...@gmail.com]

I find it difficult to understand or appreciate the works of any artist through analysis of their personality. We are, in fact, all human -- each with his or her set of vices and virtues. The human experience is complex and is often only demonstrated through the actions we perform as we live out our lives. I know it is popular today to closely examine and dissect the character and personality of great and famous people as if we could more easily understand their genius. I would rather let the works stand for the person themselves -- rather than have the person stand for the works.

I love the music of Beethoven because of its depth. It challenges me to have new and different experiences and I don't know how or why. In today's world of marketable homogeneity and sameness, I find this to be more important than ever in my life.

[edill...@gmail.com]

Without speculating too much, he must have had a tremendous desire to succeed. given he followed in the footsteps of Haydn and Mozart, he was fortunate to have those 2 brilliant composer to learn from and build upon/expand on from their

[Tony Louis]

His brilliance and confidence, and his desire to push the boundaries, I think. Op 7 seems to be saying he has mastered the form, and his brilliance is obvious. At the same time, his confidence shows in the chances he takes with this composition.

[hartma...@gmail.com]

I would just like to add one component: Beethoven's curiosity or maybe one must call it restlessness. Each sonata is different. He always tries something new. What could I still invent, what could be composed in a different way? Each sonata is different, even the two "sonatinas" opus 49 are completely different in their characters.

To clarify my answer think about symphonies by Anton Bruckner. Wonderful music that inspired the joke: Bruckner has written a wonderful symphony, why did he have repeat it 8 times.

There is no repetition in Beethoven.

[Natalia]

Following Mr.Biss reading suggestions, I am really fascinated with "Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph" by Jan Swafford. I found very important as a fact of Beethoven's biography the influence of ethical and revolutionary ideas of the Masons and Illuminati. Christian Neefe, the teacher of Beethoven in his early period in Bonn, was an active Mason and a founding member of an Illuminati lodge in Bonn... Although there are no historical evidences whether Beethoven belonged to those lodges,  he was definitely inspired by their ideas yet in his teenage years. Appealing to wide auditory, heroic images, strong emotions, pure ethic's voices - all these features can be traced in his early works, but they flourish in his sonatas and symphonies.

[masae...@gmail.com]

Beethoven's independence and daring truly displays itself through his music. I feel the more I listen to his music the more you get a sense of who he truly is as a person. I think the emotions he evokes in the listener is his way of sharing a piece of himself.

[broger...@gmail.com]

My ideas of Beethoven's personality changed after reading Schindler's Life of Beethoven. I always had the image of him sitting on his sick bed, shaking his fist at the thunder defiantly, or storming around his apartment shouting out bits of the Grosse Fugue, that sort of thing. Schindler's book gave me more of an appreciation of how satiric, in a good-humored way he could be, how cynical, at times, about audience reaction to him. There's a description of him playing something in an improvisation which deeply moved the audience, and then him mocking the audience for being swayed by such cheap sentiment. A kind of fear of being inauthentic. I would definitely recommend Schindler's biography. It's sometimes barely more than a pastiche of primary sources and records of conversations, and it is not engagingly written, but it's worth working through.

[broger...@gmail.com]

Oops, I was referring to Thayer's biography of Beethoven, not Schindler's.

[Vivien Naomi Lee]

I do agree with how some of the other respondents have tackled this question. Some saying he is like a modern rock star.

After Mr Biss had explained the background and why this sonata is especially different and innovative, it seems to me that Beethoven was really daring in expressing what he wanted to hear in his own pieces, and not necessarily doing the crowd-pleasers. His music stands out as something special and you kinda never know what he's going to do next. He just does what he wants. More than just sounding good, it expresses how he thinks - never a one-track mind. Not really focused but still coherent as a whole.

[Sascha R]

Fresh, crisp music in the first movement, inward turning, meditating in the adagio, a bit mockingly courteous or witty in the menuet, and a classical ending with

a mission/message. A personality which is hard to describe with few words and probably very self-contradictory like many humans.

[lke...@gmail.com]

Beethoven described himself as "full of the tender feeling of goodwill," "even inclined to accomplish great things," and "born with a fiery, active temperament." That description comes from a letter to his brothers from Heiligenstadt, where he had taken refuge for six months to deal with his worsening deafness. The letter states that he had been secretly suffering from he has been suffering silently for six years -- starting around 1796, when opus 7 was written. "Oh you men who think or say that I am malevolent, stubborn, or misanthropic, how greatly do you wrong me. You do not know the secret cause which makes me seem that way to you."

Opus 7 shows us the tender feeling and fire Beethoven attributed himself; the suffering must have only been beginning.

It's difficult to describe Beethoven's personality in the usual terms. There are so few like him. He was a superman, a demigod, a god, a creator, but a human who wondered, suffered, offered kindness and love. It's easy to see how me might have enjoyed scaring ordinary people, especially petty ones. He sang and danced with Pan; he wrote music from heaven, he was volcanic, he knew man's terrors. He was disciplined, yet inventive. He never took the path of least resistance. He didn't give into lassitude or hide his light under a bushel; he went out and accomplished. He was an intellectual, embracing the Enlightenment. He was sincere, yet humorous. If there is a next world, I would like to see Beethoven. He is so alive.

[Arthur Glover]

Well you have said that Beethoven was always stretching the limits of his piano. Therefore, you can say that he was risk taker. Addtionally, it was mentioned that he seemed to answer a question with a question in his music. Possibly made him like me a "Thinker". 

[pericl...@gmail.com]

He was like the instrument pianoforte: Powerful, loud, strong but at the same time so delicate, soft, profound and all that is in his music.

[Candlestud]

Goodness my first time listening to this piece. ... Barenboim.

There are so much stuff packed into this Sonata, I am hearing more than what I usually hear from a regular symphony!

too busy, not enough time to go beyond the music and discuss how Beethoven's personality is reflected in this piece. 

maybe after I listen to this 50 times over then I'd be able to comment. Sorry.

[kmus...@gullotta.it]

La componente fondamentale di Beethoven è, secondo me, la libertà intellettuale che lo porta ad esprimersi, anche in composizioni come l’op.7, con una concezione personale della struttura timbrica, melodica, armonica. E’ un processo che non nasce però “ex abrupto” ma in maniera lenta che porterà i suoi frutti con le opere successive.

[jael...@gmail.com]

I am most struck by Beethoven's genius as an aspect of his personality. To be able to tweak, develop, and reimagine forms that were mastered so perfectly by Haydn and Mozart, gifted composers for any era in music, is quite astounding. There must have been some element of bravado in his personality to achieve this and develop the sonata so brilliantly over his lifetime.

[simonr...@gmail.com]

Am still coming to grips with listening and understanding his music. He is very ambitious, creative, dominant and revels in drama feeling the emotions under his fingers. Visualise how he gets lost in a piece, it seems to carry you, hes telling a story, wanting to share no restrictions

[reed...@gmail.com]

He's brilliant, impatient, constantly improvising. He draws in what has been , but strains to express what he needs to express. He is a man of deep emotion.

[vartan....@gmail.com]

It's interesting how Beethoven sticks to the traditional sonatas of Haydn and Mozart while introducing new elements into them and becoming fully himself.
I had never listened to Opus 7 in full, and I haven't played it, so it was interesting to see his daring harmonic moves (especially in the coda of the rondo) as early as opus 7. Like the professor said, Beethoven wasn't infantine. Life had treated him in a way that makes him a mature person, and hence a mature composer.

[fsin...@gmail.com]

Beethoven's way of working, and his method of composing as you have very well described it, suggest for a non intuitive composer, rather a "builder", or, to say more elegantly, a thinker, as written in one of the previous replies. Maybe he is the first conscious musical philosopher, drawing from German speculative achievements in his era. It is also notorious that he had many extra musical literary interests, notwithstanding his being a self -thaugt man. He thinks of music as a kind of reply to Kant's unanswered question in the third Critic:how is beauty thinkable, and possible?

[fsin...@gmail.com]

[alfres...@gmail.com]

i think that beethoven´s personality is the result of his life that was very hard since a early age but however is beautifull and he represents that in his music

[maragi...@gmail.com]

A very creative personality, not able to follow rules and traditions, but trying to live through them anew. In Op. 7 there is the research of new ways to build a sonata, trying to give new form and meaning to traditional rules

[dedi...@gmail.com]

A little off topic. In Mozart's piano concerto no 20, K 466, the orchestra sneaks in a simple theme that gradually comes to dominate the first movement. Beethoven wrote the coda for this concerto that is commonly performed.

[jova...@gmail.com]

Modern rock star? I don't think so. His music was composed in private, published belatedly, and only one piece was performed during his lifetime. He was independent, gruff, emotional, untidy, defiant, and probably a little intimidating. Op. 7 includes several elements (e.g., fortissimo-piano) that were not found in Mozart or Haydn's works, a good example of his independence and strong emotions.

[dionisioel...@gmail.com]

After listening with a new attention the sonata n.7, I'm convinced LvB was a very shy, sweet and tender person. I can feel his hunger for love and deep connection with other people. And I can feel too his feeling of isolation trapped in his brilliant genius. The people were intimidated by his prodigious energy and ingenuity, they could admire him, they could put him in a pedestal, but they will not love him as he needed so desperately. He liked success but it will be no replacement for true love from friends or family. LvB is a desperate unhappy guy with anger explosions combined with moment of unbelievable sweetness.

[Esther Hadassa]

Been reading some of the comments and here's a woman's 2 cents (or for what ever it's worth) .....

By no means would I have considered Beethoven to be shy or introverted, though he might have had his moments of awkwardness when it came to romance. Don't we all go through that one way or an other when we're falling in love with a person?
Indeed he craved love, maybe more than anything else. He was surely a passionate man and would have made for a passionately loving husband, though at times there might have been some fiery arguments depending on the woman's character. Beethoven had a strong personality with strong opinions, he might have been even an overwhelming man when it comes to love (his way or ....).
He knew very well what he wanted and how, making strong statements ... and don't argue unless you're up for a heated argument. *giggles*
But then again he also had a wonderful sense of humour and could indeed be sweet and gentle. He sure didn't have a 1 dimensional personality, more like an union with a lot of layers to peel back. That's why his music is so versatile and each time you listen to his music you discover a new layer an new element. Listening to Beethoven I'll never die of boredom!

[dionisioel...@gmail.com]

Esther,
I know that LvB has no reputation of shyness. However, sometimes his music is so intensively sweet that I believe it comes from a very sensitive personality with a very rich internal life. I'm not a psychologist, but I understand that outspoken and social people don't have the same level of internal richness. Additionally, some shy people protects their inner soul under a mask of boldness, temper and energy.
Anyway it is nice to chat with you about my favorite composer.
Thanks.

[twisted....@gmail.com]

As others have pointed out, Beethoven's ambition and creativity were clear from early on. Another key component is what some might consider restlessness, but I call dissatisfaction, especially where his art and his ability to convey it the way he wanted is concerned. In the lecture, Mr. Biss mentioned how even the piano didn't feel like enough for Beethoven to express himself and he helped push innovations and changes to it. Even in his early work, a three movement sonata wasn't enough for him, he needed to add another. And to be clear, I don't say any of this as a negative about him; an artist should constantly push forward, as an individual or for the entire medium (as Beethoven did) and that desire to do more and better is one of the driving forces behind great art.

[adrian.i...@gmail.com]

He is a nonconformism, rebel and revolutionary.

[mmjl1...@gmail.com]

Beethoven was a man with extrême passion, his talent for composing music gave him an escape from the lack of love and care for his family. He was very much a rebel not following classical models, doing his own thing. I found this Sonata a very impressive work, energetic, somewhat daring, the tone in this Sonata expresses his melancholy and his solitude.

[quince...@gmail.com]

Beethoven is confident, innovative, non-conforming, and true to his own vision while maintaining a reverence for sonata form. He is revolutionary in adding a 3rd movement to make it as profound as a Symphony in its own right. His frustration with pianos of his own day caused him to write beyond the piano's
capability, with an eye toward the evolution of the instrument's future development.

[arthur Geltzer]

He expresses his personalty even in the early Sonatas. He is willing to break with traditional form. In the first movement he surprises by his use of silences to achieve power in his music. Even in a short motif, he evokes a theme that is remembered and relies on his very original and unorthodox thought process.  

[Luis Samuel Gracida Aceves]

From my extremely limited knowledge about Beethoven's personality, and after listening to the lecture on the sonata, I would say that Beethoven was one of those artists whose voice simply cannot stay still. They are not content with limitations and are on some sort of "quest" for the transcendent if you will. It must have also been important for Beethoven to have an independent personality that allowed him to defy traditions and norms without fear of rejection (or in spite of it) because the music he was hearing in his head was stronger. 

[rebecca sheridan]

all i hear is that he was mean and particular about things like coffee beans.

[kristinoh...@gmail.com]

I find the first movement is less brash and bombastic that I had been expecting from Beethoven. It is far more reminiscent of the delicate and playful sound of Mozart and Haydn.
The second movement far more emotive and moody. The silences to start really leave you salivating for more. The return to the initial theme I quite enjoy. He seems more contemplative here.
The third and fourth movements return to that playful quality of the first, but seems a bit more show-offy, as if Beethoven is pulling out all his technique tricks, until it resolves to finish.

[Seda Hocaoglu]

Beethoven seems to be constantly searching for something in his sonatas.They're energetic, powerful, technically challenging, and he's able to take a traditional piece and reinvent something within and make it seem as if it were something new. I can even hear bouts of restlessness in little parts of certain movements (like the trio section in the third movement of his Opus 7). 

It makes one wonder how he was in real life- Was he as restless as his music? Did he have a powerful personality, or was he someone who tended to be quiet, brimming with energy underneath the surface? Was he arrogant (he does seem to enjoy showing off his skills); was he a prankster ( reflecting his playful personality in his pieces); was he a social being (his music makes me think of him as more of a recluse than someone who enjoys people)? I think I'd have to read a little more about his life to see more connections between the person himself and his music but for now, these are the questions that come to mind.

[Nancy Schleier]

Beethoven was a big personality who enjoyed the limelight. He wanted to not only make a splash in the music world, he wanted to turn it on its ear. One unique aspect of Beethoven was his ability to take small, seemingly meaningless phrases and allow them to grow into something of truly mammoth proportions without sounding pretentious. His early works, while certainly virtuosic, value utility over virtuosity for the sake of virtuosity which speaks to his desire to be appreciated for his own genius rather than the difficulty of his works.

[44hai...@gmail.com]

B was apparently breaking with traditions at every turn and defiantly challenging consumers/critics to tune in on his wavelength not Haydn's or Mozart's. Biss states correctly that B loved enigmas/paradoxes and answered musical questions with a new musical questions. This form of humor is the key to understanding B's personality:abrupt. no time for inferiors.
JWRT

[hannah....@gmail.com]

I love Beethoven's "pushing personality." He was a confident musician who was not scared to see change in the field, and was able to contribute to the growth for which he pushed so hard. Beethoven had a great vision as to what else could be done with music, and was not afraid of what people thought of him as he expanded his writings to reflect the vision.

I particularly took note of what Mr. Biss said about Beethoven even pushing the instrument itself. Incredible to think that the piano only had five octaves at the beginning of Beethoven's life, and by his death, there was now 7 octaves, and Beethoven fell right in line with writing for them. It makes me think that it was like his mind was years and years beyond where he was in time, and he was just writing and waiting for everyone else to catch up to him.

The key relations between the first movement and fourth movement coda are so beautiful. I love how far away he "wanders" from the home key, and how he returns there again. It's such a journey that he took the listeners on just to get them to "grow" into his writing style.

[thhm...@telus.net]

Beethoven had a strong personality; creative but stubborn. Defiant and perhaps a bit arrogant, he did not want to be bound by formality or tradition. His early works reflect this in that they did just that; refused to be confined to traditional forms.

[Anastasia]

I hear passion in all of Beethoven's music. He must have an extremely sensitive person to compose in the way he does. He felt things passionately. He was sensitive to beauty.He was extremely emotional, brilliant, self-disciplined to produce so much. I hear all of this in his music.

[Cathy L]

What strikes me most about Beethoven is the unequaled breadth and depth of his emotions. 

[jxris...@gmail.com]

Beethoven was definitely an individualist, to say the least.  He sure knew how to get people’s attention, to hold it, and to give them something remarkable to think about.  He seems to like to shake things up.  I imagine he experience a lot of turmoil in his life.  Yet his music seems to suggest that he must have had incredible patience, and determination.

[rucke...@hotmail.com]

Beethoven dedicated himself to taking musical art in new, more emotionally powerful, directions. Though possessing a tempestuous personality, he dedicated himself to Beauty, Truth, and the Good. He puts the second movement in a distant key. He puts the 4th movement's coda in a distant key, brings back an unexpected theme, and expands the coda. He adds a fourth movement to a piano sonata.

[ge...@charter.net]

That Beethoven wrote so very many mature works before he ever assigned an Opus number to any of them shows a man never satisfied but always striving to take his Art to a higher level, and it did not matter to him how it was reacted to by his audiences. He was working out his artistic vision, and I think his emotional struggles as well, through his lifelong obsession with music. It is a stretch to say musical norms were no more important to him than social norms, but they did become less and less important as his Art became more and more advanced. My opinions.

[Shirley C]

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to this work.  Not for even one moment was it dull or boring and I could feel the depth, passion and intensity of Beethoven's personality throughout all the movements.  Although I am not an expert on Beethoven, I do love his music, both the listen and to play, and as I am learning more about it and listening more specifically, I can hear much about his personality and character ........strength, powerfully passionate feelings, gentleness and quietude, robustness, comedy and lightness of humour, articulation and attention to detail, fearlessness, playfulness with surprising gifts of pleasure........these are just a few of the many words that come to mind as I consider the delight I experienced in listening to Opus 7.  Thank you, Mr Biss, for all of your beautiful renditions of this work throughout the week, the helpful insights, your amazing knowledge and the wonderful ability to ignite understanding and deep pleasure in me as a student.  I am REALLY enjoying this journey.

[Chris Whiley]

We must always bear in mind that, until his hearing made it impossible, Beethoven performed his works as well as writing them, so the public nature of the former inevitably affected the private one of the latter. There are several contemporary anecdotes of Beethoven's competitiveness, such as putting a proffered theme upside down and then improvising amazing variations on it. So we might consider that the silences at the start of the second movement of Op 7 were, at least in part, designed to intrigue or wrong-foot his audience.

[william...@gmail.com]

I read all the comments with interest. I’m not convinced he set out to change the world of music; he composed what he heard in his head, perhaps more than other composers because of his impending deafness. Some people push the envelope because they don’t see an envelope and others are happily content to stay within the envelope. So his early works hint at the voices he would hear all the louder as he evolved. Still a bit of the introvert at this stage. The bombastic Beethoven coming later when others don’t hear what he’s hearing in his head.

[laureendibi]

Beethoven was never happy to merely compose using pre-exisiting paradigms. He was never happy sitting on his laurels, despite studying with Haydn.  Although is early works are reflective of the influence of Mozart and Haydn, he nonetheless did not want to feel restricted in any way. Besides, the piano was now fully in use and Beethoven wanted to use all of its colors, characteristics and range.  He really aspired to break ground and that he did in the Op. 7.  In the words of Angela Hewitt: "It is a wild piece, with almost jazzy syncoplations and stabbing sforzandos, but is constructed with meticulous care.  The colour change to C Major for the Largo, con gran expressione startles us but immediately calls our attention to expect something different and exceptional."  And that he does.  "This noble movement would have been a wonderful vehicle for Beethoven to show off his cantabile playing and generous spirit.  The expression opens up when the pizzicato bassis added— a wonderful effect. When the theme appears high up in the keyboard in B flat major, there is a sublime, peaceful radiance that is broken after only a few bars but which can be savoured nevertheless. As in the finale of Op 10 No 3, the silences brought on by the rests must be full of expression and not sound ‘empty’. The Allegro third movement returns us to playful mood in a less sophisticated manner than Op 10 No 3 but is full of humour and charm". As Tovey has suggested, if the first movement of this sonata looks forward to a new style of writing, the finale,Poco allegretto e grazioso, is one of the last examples of his early style. 

[robertg...@gmail.com]

Beethoven was a self-determined composer who follow his own way. His boldness of character had appeared since his first piano sonata, and of course in his fourth published piano sonata as well. The first one, written in F Minor, shows how Beethoven had used the four movements structure as early as in his first published sonata. The colours of F Minor also set a contrast compared to Mozart and Haydn first sonatas that were written in C Major. The restlessness and strong-willed emotions did appear in these early piano sonatas. Instead of balance and clarity being shown with a clear melodic line, Beethoven exploited a more, from my own words, impulsive motives. The sonata op. 7 opens with two note theme and followed by sequences and so on. Analytically speaking, it is not that complex like Mozart's melodies for example, but nevertheless the effect it brings (nuances, atmosphere, tension, and direction) is grand enough to be said. What i would like to say about his personality is always the evocative and poignant feelings that really appears in a sublime way in this sonata, well at list subjectively if one tries to use the emotional approach. All the 'deep thoughts, struggle of identity, and inner passion' did appear like no other sonatas in op. 7

[gavin...@gmail.com]

I think Beethoven is defined by extremes and contrasts. In Op. 7, the 'grand,' orchestral scope of the work is the first evidence of a monumental statement. Episodes of great activity vs silence are another important feature, although the huge scope and 'bigness' is apparent in both. The ffp in the third movement, its conventionality and pleasantry after the second movement, and the amazing contrast between the menuet and trio are all evidence of Beethoven exploring extremes and placing them besides each other. Key contrasts and daring, unexpected harmonic shifts within the music yet again highlight the bold, uncompromising element in Beethoven's greatest works. It reminds me of the time I spent at a music festival in St. Petersburg a few summers ago. Every day felt exceptionally long and full of both great inspiration and love, and deep melancholy and jealousy. Beethoven embodies and gives voice to these extremes of experience. 

[samir...@gmail.com]

The crucial components of his personality were his defiance and need to innovate. He wanted to change the way in which sonatas were written, implementing the 4-movement structure and using elements such as ffp which were rarely used or seen in his time.

[zull...@gmail.com]

Tradicionamente se cree que Beethoven era un hombre irascible y temperamental, pero su música refleja una ternura y una dulzura profunda. A partir de las explicaciones de los videos del señor Biss, se deduce que Beethoven, como genio creador, no era conformista, sino deseaba siempre innovar, ir más allá de lo que ya había hecho. A la vez, era respetuoso de sus contemporáneos, prueba de ello son las obras dedicadas a Haydn.

[esalcedo...@gmail.com]

Passionate, innovative and confident

[kyokas...@gmail.com]

I feel like Beethoven had a personality where he wanted to make a change in music. He broke 'rules' in music, which made his compositions even more iconic. It seems to me that Beethoven revealed his true emotions in his music, and works such as the 1st movement of the Pathetique sonata paints an image of tragedy in my mind. I also think that Beethoven was really detailed, and wanted everything perfect. I read about this somewhere about how Mozart composed a piece on the way to his concert and performed the 'last-minute' composition. However, Beethoven on the other hand, when people look at his scores, they would see lines, crossed out phrases, and scribbles all over the page. Someone once told me the Beethoven moved from house to house, leaving the last house in ruins. I think this is because Beethoven was hitting his piano and things in the house when he was deaf, hoping for some sign of sound. I guess he showed this devastation of not being able to hear in his music. 

In a way, Beethoven had a lot of perseverance, by not giving up on his life (after he became deaf) and continuing to compose, even though it was extremely difficult in his time.

[MI YOUNG YOO]

Beethoven seemed to take traditional forms as important, but he was not bound by them. He creatively destroyed the traditional form and created a new one. However, in Sonata op7, the first movement and the second movement looks like following the traditional sonata form and the minuet form, but they are beyond the old form. I learned in this lecture that the 4th movement Rondo shows consistency from Beethoven's early works to later works by using long-distance codes that were little used before Beethoven. I've learned a lot through this lecture. In particular, I fell in love with Largo, the second movement. Thank you.  

2015년 1월 10일 토요일 오전 5시 34분 52초 UTC+9에 Jill_Curtis Institute님이 작성:

Beethoven's Personality

What are the crucial components of Beethoven’s personality, and how are they in evidence in early works such as the Sonata Op. 7?

[Dalia King]

He certainly had a very large and defiant personality. He looked at the world in a different light. He didn't conform to the world around him; he made the world around him conform to him.

[Holly Anderson]

I think there is a clear drama and rebellious spirit in this sonata and in other early works by Beethoven as he discovers ways to disregard tradition, somewhat out of spite. I am less informed about Beethoven's personal life but I think it would be interesting if there is some kind of spiteful connection between potentially his childhood and the angry innovation of his earlier works.

[Emanuel Espitia]

Beethoven, from his earliest works and ages, all the time wanted to show the rebel he was, musically speaking. Because of this, he, for example, uses four movements in his Op. 7 along with other compositional techniques not commonly used in his time.

[Daniel]

I think that from this movement that has been studied, we can see, hear and feel this personality that is not only in search of greatness within this mortal and physical world, but also highly intuitive emotionally and shows aspects of his sense if emotional revolution in music leaving it completely changed forever.