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Reading Beethoven #3 - The Speed Tells the Story
- Tiger Han
- Jul 23
- 2 min read
One of the biggest questions in studying Beethoven's piano sonatas is this:
How literally should we take the Beethoven's tempo markings?
I've been asking myself this while studying Beethoven's Piano Sonata Op. 81a.
The final movement, Das Wiedersehen (The Return), is marked Vivacissimamente, with a metronome marking of ♩ = 112. The first time I worked towards that tempo, I understood why so many pianists choose something slower.
112 feels almost impossible.
But instead of asking whether Beethoven's marking is practical, I began asking a different question:
Why did he write it?
The final movement isn't simply a celebration. It is the emotional climax of the sonata.
After months of separation during Napoleon's occupation of Vienna, Archduke Rudolph returned. Knowing the personal relationship between Beethoven and Rudolph, the final movement can be heard not merely as a formal celebration, but as an expression of emotional release and joy.
Perhaps that excitement isn't meant to feel comfortable at all.
Perhaps it is meant to feel unstoppable.
Perhaps he imagined a different sound.
At my lesson, my teacher encouraged me to work towards ♩ = 104 first.
Event at that speed, I had to stop trying to make every individual note beautiful.
Instead, I have to play and hear larger musical gestures.
The broken chords merge into a single sweep of sound.
The phrases become one continuous rush of energy.
The music no longer feels like a display of brilliant fingerwork.
Instead, it has a lightness, wit and forward momentum that reminds me of Haydn, yet with an emotional urgency that is unmistakably Beethoven.
That doesn't necessarily mean every pianist must perform this movement at ♩ = 112.
Perhaps some will ultimately choose a slightly slower tempo, and perhaps I will try to work towards to it. This changes the way how to practice this piece.
To me, that is what studying a score is about.
Tempo is not just a technical instruction. It is part of the composer's imagination. Every marking on the page is a clue to how Beethoven heard the music before anyone else did.
Before deciding how to play a piece, I think we should first ask what the composer was trying to make us hear.
Further Reading
Laura Tunbridge, Beethoven: A Life in Nine Pieces (Yale University Press, 2020).
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