Piano Sonata in D major: "Kurfürstensonate" (Electoral) #3 (1783)

Biamonti 2; WoO 47, #3

Throughout his career, Beethoven had a predilection for beginning works in the middle of things, establishing his opening tonality, not with a steady statement of I-IV-V-I as you might find in the opening of a Bach French Suite, but instead beginning obliquely jumping in on the V or the V of V before cadencing on the I. This technique is actually pretty well-known in the world of the Great American Songbook, look at the opening of many of the Gershwin favorites, for instance, but is not something that is generally taught in textbook beginnings. In Beethoven, the most well-known example of this is perhaps the long introduction to his First Symphony, but other examples are equally legion. These include, Beethoven’s first usage of this technique, in the first and last movements of this, the most successful of the Kurfürstensonaten. In the first movement, a jolly pastoral with a strong Mozartean cast, though still an element of pastiche, the theme begins on an upbeat, giving a sense of V-I that is very appealing. In the final, we begin in the middle of a circle of fifths sequence before cadencing on the tonic. Presumably from a semiotic standpoint Beethoven is trying to signal that we are beginning in medias res, and perhaps reflecting in the pastoral of the first movement a more heroic or classical form.
Oddly, until recently this was viewed as an anomaly, an anomaly that L. Poundie Burstein has tried to rectify with his award-winning article of 2005: The Off-Tonic Return in Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58, and Other Works. In it, Burstein outlines four different normative strategies for bringing back a theme that doesn’t start on the tonic. The first movement here evidences the technique of using the end of the development as a half-cadence, while the final movement ends the development similarly but takes longer to get to the tonic.
The second movement is a series of variations on a minuet in the greater diminution style that is also appealing. All three movements are pleasurable to play, but not masterpieces in any reckoning.

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