Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata Season Opening Concert

Teatru Manoel launches its Season Programme 2024-2025 with a concert of two of Beethoven’s Sonatas: the Hammerklavier Sonata (opus 106) and Sonata Op.90, performed by renowned pianist Joanne Camilleri. Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 29 in B♭ major, Op. 106 (known as the Hammerklavier) is widely viewed as one of the most important works of the composer’s third period and among the greatest piano sonatas of all time. Completed in 1818, it is considered to be Beethoven’s most technically challenging piano composition and one of the most demanding solo works in the classical piano repertoire. The first documented public performance was in 1836 by Franz Liszt in the Salle Erard in Paris to an enthusiastic review by Hector Berlioz. It is massive in both its technical challenges and emotional capacity, opening with an explosively heroic first movement, followed by a capricious Scherzo, then a central, profoundly lyrical and introspective Adagio, and concluding with a dazzling and massively intricate fugal Finale, full of intellectual vigour. Beethoven’s Piano Sonata in E minor, Op. 90 was written in the summer of 1814 and dedicated to Prince Moritz von Lichnowsky, a friend and benefactor who was also the dedicatee of the Eroica Variations. It is a charming piece of raillery, with the first movement being full of passionate and lonely energy, while the following movement is devoted to a luxuriant lyrical melody which unofficially Beethoven referred to as ‘Happy Conversation with the Beloved’.