Biamonti 113 – Rondo for Piano (sketch)
The texts and music are by Graziano Denini
Biamonti 113 – Rondo for Piano (Sketch). It is found in the Kafka collection, held at the British Museum in London, on a sheet that also contains sketches for the Rondo of Sonata Opus 49, No. 1. Cited by Shedlock (M.T. 1892, page 461), who considers it as a possible initial idea for the Rondo of the Pathetique Sonata; on the other hand, it is akin to a passage from the Third Piano Concerto Op. 37 (coda of the first movement) and could also, if desired, be related to the theme of a Bach fugue for organ (Peters, V, No. 6).
[By Biamonti Giovanni – Catalogo cronologico e tematico delle opere di Beethoven comprese quelle inedite e gli abbozzi non utilizzati, Torino, ILTE 1968]
It is found in the Miscellanea Kafka on sheet 66 verso, lines 1-9. It is probably a study for the third movement of the Piano Concerto in C minor; indeed, in the title, we find the indications “Rondo”, “Concerto”, “Presto”, and shortly after, we find the markings “Tutti” and “Violin”. This is one of the typical Beethovenian themes full of inner strength. In Shedlock, The Musical Times, August 1982, no further indications are given apart from those written by Biamonti […and also the following – and it is marked Rondo mit (?) presto. This reminds one slightly of the principal theme of the Rondo of Op. 13. Also of the passage in the Coda of the first movement of the C minor Piano Concerto – and, indeed, of a theme of one of Bach’s organ fugues…].
In measure 23, we find the theme in the left hand, which seems to lead to an interplay between the right and left hands, or, being a “Tutti”, between the bass (cellos?) and treble (violins?), followed by the return of the theme in the bass. Further along, after a separation that should imply a continuation of what we have heard so far, we encounter a small episode in triplets marked for “violin”, and once again, a passage with alternating left and right hands (in this passage, Beethoven does not indicate the treble clef for the left hand); in the third measure, the left hand is not indicated, but from the repeat signs, it can be inferred that the notes to be played are the same as those in the right hand, an octave lower.
In lines 6-7, there is a sketch for a piece in the key of A flat major, which could still be part of this Rondo, as in the following lines (8-9) we find the left hand, while the right hand replicates the sharp sixteenth-note pattern found at the end of line 6. The initial theme is written in two voices. This is followed by a roughly sketched cadence and the marking d.c. (daccapo).
(Graziano Denini)
