So, the exposition of op. 22 might not break new ground, but it has a wealth of distinct material, and bags of personality. The development, it must be said, is less distinctive. It begins, a bit like the development of op. 2 no. 3, with a riff on the closing theme. Here's op. 2 no 3's closing theme: (MUSIC) and then the start of the development. (MUSIC) Now, here is the start of the development of op. 22. (MUSIC) All of the elements from the end of the exposition are there. First we pick up exactly where we left off. (MUSIC Then we riff on the big, final fanfare that just preceded it. (MUSIC) Then finally, we get the closing theme itself. (MUSIC) That slightly sinister note in the closing theme is now played up, as the development takes one big step to the darker. Now, all of that is reasonably imaginative and resourceful. The next bit of the development, however, is more prosaic and dutiful. It's a series of two sequences. The first again plays on that closing fanfare from the exposition. (MUSIC) And now the sequence. (MUSIC) and then the second is vaguely based on the opening theme. (MUSIC) And now the sequence. (MUSIC) One of Beethoven’s greatest gifts, as so often discussed, is his really extraordinary resourcefulness with his material. But in this instance, he really doesn’t DO much with his materials, and simply uses them to cycle through key after key. It’s meant to be dramatic, but beyond the fact that there’s lots of modulating going on, there’s nothing really inherently dramatic in the music – neither in the materials themselves, nor in the way that Beethoven is treating them. It’s the kind of passage about which performers say you have to "make something happen"— to impose a kind of shape and character on the music. Typically in Beethoven’s music, that shape and character is sharply etched, and unmistakable. But I will happily forgive this lapse in inspiration (if Beethoven will forgive me for calling it that?), on account of what follows: the end of the development, which is marvelous both on its own, and by virtue of its effect on the movement as a whole. . It is, again, a harmonic sequence – more or less the same music, in three different keys – and it is again based on material from the exposition. But whereas the first two sequences didn’t engage in any particularly striking way with the material they were based on, this one takes the closing fanfare (MUSIC), and transforms it from proud to vulnerable and moody. (MUSIC) As you hear, it eventually does the necessary work of leading us back to B flat major, and the happy-go-lucky opening. But while the source material is that fanfare from the exposition, what it really refers back to, in character, is the closing theme. (MUSIC) That was the only dark note in the whole exposition, and by fleshing it out, this end-of-development sequence gives the movement as a whole a far wider emotional range. I don’t feel the need to delve into the recapitulation, because it is so very literal: it does the necessary work of taking the second theme group -- so, this: (MUSIC) and this: (MUSIC), and restoring it to the tonic, this: (MUSIC), and this (MUSIC), but otherwise sticks very closely to the exposition’s script. What is worth noting, however, is that this movement has no coda: it ends just as the exposition did, with those two "The End" chords. (MUSIC) This strikes me as significant. If you look at those big-boned, ambitious early period sonatas, their first movements have codas. Opus 7’s arrives in dramatic fashion, (MUSIC) and then sticks around for a long while, making quite a ruckus. Op. 2 no. 3 had not only a coda, but a cadenza, (MUSIC) which hugely expanded the movement’s scope. So for Beethoven to conclude the first movement of opus 22 with those matter-of-fact chords, (MUSIC) just as he did the exposition, that is unusual, and telling. There is plenty to love in this movement – and I do – but if it wasn’t already clear, that bare-bones ending really confirms that Beethoven didn’t struggle too much over it.
