Beethoven: Piano Concerto No.2 in Bb. Op.19 (Helmchen)

The Op.19 is the only one of Beethoven’s piano concertos that can properly be called a work in the High Classical tradition – it was mostly written between 1787 and 1789, when Beethoven was in his teens and well before he started work on what is now known as the 1st Piano Concerto, deploys a small orchestra without any timpani, trumpets, or clarinets, and uses (especially in the first movement) a lot of figuration that could pretty reasonably be called Mozart- or Haydn-like. But it’s also remarkable that even at this early stage, Beethoven was producing moments which really chafed against the classical idiom. The most obvious of this is the rapt “con gran espressione” passage in the slow movement (20:37), which seems to draw a line straight to late Beethoven, but there’s also the lyrical flight at 17:39, and all those accents in the last movement aggressively misplaced in the middle of the beat (22:42; 23:58, 24:55). Even the first movement, which has a typically neat Mozartean structure and a Haydnish profusion of thematic material, features a bunch of unusually intense gestures, such as extended chromatic colour (4:30), the ominous bass oscillation at the end of the development (7:49), and the obsessive diminished 7th harmony at 7:16 – let alone the whole cadenza, which was written down long after most of this was composed.

As usual, Helmchen delivers a superb performance – he really is just incapable of generating an uninteresting texture, and his ability to pull off even the most fleeting and subtle variations of articulation is unparalled among the Beethoven concerto recordings I’ve come across. Some highlights: the rarely-observed but lovely pianissimo at 5:17, the burbling LH at 7:06, the gorgeous slurs at 17:26, the agogic accent on the first note of the syncopated phrase at 22:42, and the way that intensely dramatic LH counterpoint leaps into the foreground at 25:28.

[AshishXiangyiKumar]

MVT I, Allegro con brio
Exposition I
00:00 – Theme 1. Opens with two motifs: a march-like dotted descending arpeggio (m.march), followed by a short lyrical phrase (m.lyr). At 0:15, a motif comprising 3 repeated notes following by an upwards slur enters (m.repeat), and at 0:42, a chromatic staggered descent (m.chr). After a shift to Db, there enters
1:11 – Theme 1*. This sounds like a typical second theme, but is really a variant of (m.lyr). Theme 1 proper returns at 1:45.
Exposition II
02:32 – The piano enters with a short 5-note descending melodic fragment in the upper registers (m.frag). The phrases which immediately follow borrow (m.lyr)’s rhythm. The scale at 2:47 references (m.frag), while the orchestral interlude at 2:50 references (m.repeat), by having three emphasised beats on the same note.
02:57 – Theme 1, in the piano, diverted into (m.repeat – extending the orchestra’s variation on the idea), and modulating. At 3:17, a move to the dominant of F begins.
03:31 – Theme 2 proper, introducing the second complex. In its 4th measure, a reference to (m.repeat). the closing measures at 3:58 use (m.frag).
04:09 – Theme 3, cool, ethereal variant of Theme 2, in Db. Its tail contains (m.repeat) at 4:23 in the strings. At 4:29, it radically extends (m.chr), and eventually leads into a running piano passage (5:08) built entirely off an augmented/trimmed (m.frag), until reaching the cadential trill at 5:29.
05:31 – Theme 1 in F, now tucked into the bass of the tutti.
Development
05:56 – The piano enters much as it did in Expo II.
06:12 – Piano slips into Gm, while (m.lyr) is taken up by the strings.
06:27 – Theme 1* in Eb. At 6:48, yet another reference to (m.lyr).
06:51 – (m.repeat) in the woodwinds, interrupted by piano arpeggios.
07:06 – (m.repeat) now moves into the piano, eventually taking over the texture entirely (7:12).
07:29 – Theme 3 (recalling 4:16), incorporating a lot of colour by borrowing the iv from the parallel minor.
07:49 – Dominant prolongation with lots of lovely minor 9th colour, while the orchestra plays (m.march).
Recapitulation
07:56 – Theme 1, with the piano entering at (m.repeat). The passage at 8:21 incorporate the piano arpeggios from the development.
08:39 – Theme 2, in Bb.
09:16 – Theme 3
10:40 – Dramatic tutti combining (m.march), (m.repeat), and (m.chr – 10:47) leading to the
10:59 – Cadenza. Opens with a fughetta based off (m.march), which at 11:33 leads to a dramatic F pedal, over which the RH plays a version of (m.march) which has been stripped down to little more than its dotted rhythm. (m.lyr) enters at 11:44, the LH harmonies under it gradually growing restless and eventually incorporating (m.lyr). Eventually (m.lyr) is presented in augmentation and is joined by its inversion in the LH, creating an intense running passage (12:08). At 12:19 (m.march), now in Eb, enters majestically in the LH, but is quickly diverted into a kaleidoscopic descending passage that drops through the circle of 5ths (12:31). At 12:19 (m.march) asserts itself as a series of double-note broken arpeggios in the RH, the LH rising as the RH falls, before the hands switch roles. At 13:02, a rumbling measured trill on Bb, over which the RH plays counterpoint which combines (m.march) in both its original and augmented forms.
13:42 – Theme 1 closes.

MVT II, Adagio
14:02 – A section.
15:35 – B section. Not so much a contrasting melody as much as a sort of semi-free figural complex. 16:41 quotes a harmonically modified version of the A theme (A*).
17:34 – A section. Melody first taken by the woodwinds, until the piano enters at 18:06 at the emotional peak of the melody. The orchestral tutti at 18:19 quotes material from the B section, as do the piano entries which follow. After an lovely passage in triplet semiquavers, we arrive at the
19:44 – Coda. Begins in a kind of harmonic wilderness, before three ecstatic rising trills (20:01) lead into A*. This builds into a 6/4 which looks like in would lead into a cadenza. Instead – in a wonderful moment which leaps decades ahead to late Beethoven, we get a rapt recitative (20:38), marked “con gran espressione”. The orchestra eventually interpolates the A theme’s opening phrase, which also closes the movement.

MVT III, Rondo: Molto allegro
22:42 – Theme, with fun accents in the middle of each beat.
23:06 – Transition 1.
23:32 – Episode 1, in F.
23:58 – Transition 2.
24:24 – Theme, modulating to Gm.
24:55 – Episode 2, starting in Gm but wandering through many keys. Very earwormish, and, like the theme, misplaces the accents in the middle of the beat. The orchestral interruptions borrow from Transition 1. At 25:22, having arriving in the remote Bbm, the syncopation is pushed even earlier in the melody, which is now harmonised in thirds notes and joined by sudden counterpoint in the LH (25:27).
25:45 – Theme.
26:25 – Episode 1, in Bb.
27:21 – Theme, returning in a pretty ridiculous way: it’s in the wrong key, and its defining syncopation has been “corrected” so that the accents now fall on the beat. It now sounds meek, or even a bit confused. After a rather tongue-in-cheek modulation the theme finds its footing at 27:31.
27:39 – Coda, laden with virtuoso figuration. At 28:00 a new closing theme is introduced, built off the second measure of the rondo theme. The piano dies off via an extended double trill, before the orchestra closes.

[howardchasnoff]

if Mozart heard this piece he would suddenly realize that this genius is now doing what I do. Just as imaginative and structured. Just as brilliant. At this point Beethoven has taken the baton from Mozart and is going ahead. It's a continuum. Of course what comes later on is very different.

[AshishXiangyiKumar]

00:00 - Mvt 1
14:01 - Mvt 2
22:42 - Mvt 3

[JoUllo-rd]

Ah! What a beautiful second movement. How musically expressive, and in what an touching way does the piano enter into it, cantabile style.

[markito]

Following your comment, Uchida said that Beethoven's late was all there at the begining of his compositions, that one can hear it already in his first opuses.

[johnchessant]

27:13 I love this key change. It reminds me of a similar one at the end of his Piano Sonata No. 3, fourth movement

[herbertortiz]

I love the second movement so much. I find it very evocative.

[Anthonyprinciotti]

Fantastic playing. Every phrase is filled with a persuasive intention, and the left-hand definition is incredibly vivid.

[OmarFernandesAly]

Marvelous, thank you for this beautiful concerto, precisely interpreted with a valuable score sincronized.

[penzio]

Thanks to you, now I'm listening to his Beethoven Piano Concerto no.1(new released CD). It's amazing! He's so close to my ideal op.15, and especially I love his Beethoven-like dynamic very much. Thank you Kumar!

[gerzonsosa]

Beautiful Beethoven Concerto for Piano and Orchestra #2.

[timward]

I like this better than the 1st Concerto, especially the finale, which so joyous and energetic and never fails to put a smile on my face.
It's not as great as 3, 4, or 5 but that's a pretty damn high bar to clear.

[Schubertd]

First movement just sounds like a masterclass in 'How to write a Mozartian piano concerto better than Mozart.'

Also, Schubert's D960 4th movement at 4:31

[doctorfoster]

The reason it's called "Number 2" is because it was the second to be published. But it was written before what we now call Number 1.

[m.calloway]

Superb performance. And thanks for score.

[jimwinchester]

Thank you for the program notes. I've learned many parts of this concerto (roughly half - didn't like the 2nd movement!), and never knew what you stated about it actually being written before #1. It kind of makes more sense this way, since the 3rd movement of #1 presents what is essentially the birth of ragtime as its secondary theme, and I doubt even Beethoven wouldn't start out of the blocks with something like that.

[pianiman]

20:59 - that A-flat is everything... such poignancy in one stray note (phrase starting 20:38)

[xavierortega]

Wow 20:40... he plays in such a marvelous way with the pedal and the resonance 😍

[Bruce.-Wayne]

There is something very Mozartian about this piece

[shodanart]

Your explanation of the score is brilliant! Thank you so very much! ❤️