So now, we move to the third and final sonata from this period, the Sonata op. 81a, the "Lebewohl" or "Farewell" sonata. I spoke about its first movement in very broad strokes in that "Crisis" lecture, but the piece merits much closer examination. It was written in 1809 and 1810, meaning that it is virtually contemporaneous with opp. 78 and 79. With all due respect to those pieces – and to the opinions of their composer – the Lebewohl is a serious cut above them in terms of not just innovation, but inspiration, and gravitas. It is not in itself a late work, but it definitely is among the pieces in which one can hear Beethoven working his way towards his late style. But while it isn't a late period piece, the Lebewohl, despite its scope and ambition, also stands clearly apart from the heroic sonatas of the true middle period, the Waldstein and the Appassionata. One of the ways in which this difference manifests is its compactness: opus 81a is, by most reckonings, one of the important sonatas–a "big" work– but it takes a mere fifteen minutes to play. Compare that to the Waldstein and Appassionata, both of which are about 23 minutes, which is to say, a full 50% longer. It’s not just those two sonatas: MANY of the bigger sonatas, starting all the way back in the 1790s, are 22, 23, 24 minutes – that seemed to have been a sweet spot for Beethoven with the sonata form. That the Lebowohl manages to make such an impact in a mere 15 says a great deal about its tremendous economy. On account of that economy, it's somewhat analogous to the String Quartet op. 95, the "Serioso" quartet, written shortly after and also one of the pieces that forms a gateway to the late period. The quartet is around 21 minutes, which makes it a significant departure from the rest of the quartets, which are generally 30 and over. While there are plenty of late period works that are hugely expansive, others, such as the sonata op. 109, are quite the opposite: playing with proportions, and making musical points succinctly were among the ideas Beethoven was "auditioning" as he wrote the Lebewohl and the Serioso. Now, the greatest, or at least the most obvious, novelty about op. 81a is that it is a programmatic work: it is called Lebowohl–Les Adieux in French, Farewell in English –because its composition was motivated by the Archduke Rudolph – the patron who was most supportive of Beethoven and to whom he dedicated the most works –being forced by Napoleon’s attack to leave Vienna. When I say that the sonata is "programmatic", I mean that it is supposed to tell a story in sound. I’ve talked frequently about music as narrative, but the idea of a piece of instrumental music being a literal narrative – telling a specific story, as opposed to offering the listener the opportunity to imagine one, or to simply feel the implication of one based on the piece’s structure – that was an extremely novel idea in 1810. Many pieces were inspired by specific events – Mozart apparently wrote his uncharacteristically tragic violin sonata in e minor in response to the death of his mother, for example – but that music makes no attempt to actually depict those events, to relay that story. In fact, I really struggle to think of any pieces that are true antecedents to the Lebowohl. Obviously, vocal music, which has words, has always told stories, but vocal music is from many points of view just a different animal to instrumental music. With instrumental music, the closest I can come is Bach’s magnificently titled "Capriccio on the departure of his most beloved brother"– interesting that one of the only earlier storytelling pieces I can come up with is also a piece about departure. But we know very little about the compositional circumstances behind the Bach, and there’s no evidence, particularly, that that music itself was intended to convey specific events. This is in sharp contrast to Beethoven’s Lebewohl, whose movements are like chapters, and are meant to depict the Archduke’s departure, absence, and return, respectively. Another possible antecedent is Scarlatti’s fugue in g minor, sometimes called the "Cat" fugue, because the subject was allegedly "composed" by his curious pet crawling on the piano. I hope this is true, but I sort of doubt it, and in any case, that’s a conceit – not an actual story. So, the only SERIOUS antecedent to the Lebewohl Sonata is Beethoven’s own Pastorale Symphony, written just a year or two earlier. Its movements have elaborate titles: "Awakening of cheerful feelings upon arrival in the countryside", "Scene by the brook", "Merry gathering of country folk", "Thunder, storm", and finally, "Shepherd’s Song: Cheerful and thankful feelings after the storm". Here, just as in the Lebewohl, we are given a specific image for each movement, and in the case of the last three movements, a sequence of events – the gathering, interrupted by the storm, and then what happens after the storm. But you may have noticed that the word "feelings" appears not just once, but twice in these movement descriptions. This is not incidental, or accidental: Beethoven himself said about this work that it was, quote, "more an expression of feeling than painting". That is to say: the Pastorale was primarily intended to convey emotion purely through its musical events, and the way that they follow one another – just like the rest of his music. Beethoven’s comment may have simply reflected a bit of unease or embarrassment at this piece not being "pure" music – perhaps the thought that music of the highest quality shouldn’t "need" a story was at play here. But at any rate, the Lebwohl sonata does not convey that sense of unease. On the contrary, the programmatic aspect seems to be its very reason for being: it is a public testament of Beethoven’s feelings for his patron, and his reaction to the patron's absence. In this way, Beethoven has really opened the floodgates to the romantic era: in the cases of Schumann and Liszt, not some but most of their pieces are meant to be evocative of places, people, or situations. Just off the top of my head, there is Liszt’s "Au Bord d’un Source"---"by the spring" in English– which is a piece of landscape painting, obviously; Then there's Schumann’s Carnaval, whose individual movements are named for real people like Chopin, fictional ones like his alter egos Florestan and Eusebius, and even Commedia del’arte characters such as Pierrot. While the Lebowhl is itself a sonata, and one that is in many ways structurally traditional, its emphasis on tone painting helped pave the way for the romantic era’s move away from the sonata, and towards character pieces.
