Sonata No. 21, Op. 53, “Waldstein”

Though Beethoven’s deafness was deepening in the first five years of the 19th century, his tremendous productivity during the same period suggests that his ability and desire to compose were stronger than ever. The Op. 53 sonata, often known as the “Waldstein,” was composed between 1803 and 1804, just after the “Eroica” Symphony (Beethoven’s third). The ambitious scope and often triumphant character ( 1) of the “Waldstein” are reminiscent of the “Eroica”; one commentator described the sonata as “heroic pianistic deeds.”

The sonata also has a second connection to the “Eroica” Symphony, which was to be dedicated to Napoleon until Beethoven learned that he had declared himself emperor, at which point he ripped the title page in two. The composer dedicated Op. 53 to Count Waldstein, his friend and patron from Bonn. The count nearly went bankrupt raising and funding an army to defeat Napoleon; when he appeared in Vienna in 1805, he had assumed a disguise to avoid his creditors.

The “Waldstein” stretches the limit of the piano ( 2) , making use of the piano’s newly enlarged range—an expansion that Beethoven’s music had helped to encourage. The use of repeated chords, trills, broken octaves, and glissandos were among its other innovations.

Beethoven was initially furious when a friend suggested the sonata’s original slow movement was too long, but he eventually composed a second, shorter slow movement ( 3) that functions almost like an extended introduction to the third-movement finale ( 4).