Muzio Clementi (1752-1832)
Sonata in G minor, Op. 34, No. 2 • Sonata in A major, Op. 50, No. 1
Sonata in E flat major, Op. 41
Muzio Clementi was born in Rome in 1752, the son of a
silversmith. By the age of thirteen he had become
proficient enough as a musician to be employed as an
organist at the Church of S. Lorenzo in Damaso and to
attract the attention of an English visitor, Peter
Beckford, cousin of William Beckford, author of the
Gothic novel Vathek and builder of the remarkable folly,
Fonthill Abbey. Peter Beckford, as he himself claimed,
bought Clementi from his father for a period of seven
years, during which the boy lived at Beckford’s estate in
Dorset, perfecting his ability as a keyboard player, and,
presumably, his general education. In 1774 Clementi
moved to London, where he began to take part in
professional concert life as a composer and performer,
playing his own sonatas, some of which were published
at this time, and directing performances from the
keyboard at the Italian opera.
Clementi’s success as a performer persuaded him to
travel. In 1780 he played for Queen Marie Antoinette in
France and early in 1782 performed for her brother, the
Emperor Joseph II, in Vienna. Mozart met Clementi in
January, when they were both summoned to play for the
Emperor. Mozart had a poor opinion of Clementi’s
musical taste and feeling, but grudgingly admitted his
technical ability in right-hand playing of passages in
thirds, otherwise dismissing him as a mere mechanicus.
It should be added that Mozart was often disparaging
about the abilities of his contemporaries, as he was of
Clementi on a later occasion.
In 1785 Clementi returned to England, winning a
reputation for himself there as a performer and teacher,
although as a composer he was eclipsed in the 1790s by
the presence in London of Haydn. It was in these years
that he involved himself in piano manufacture and music
publishing in London, first with Longman and Broderip
and from 1798, after the firm’s bankruptcy, with
Longman, and others. In the earlier years of the nineteenth
century he travelled abroad in the interests of the business,
accompanied at first by his pupil John Field, who served
as a demonstrator of Clementi’s wares and later left a
somewhat prejudiced account of his experiences after he
parted company with Clementi in Russia.
From 1810 Clementi was again in England, where
he was much respected, not least for his teaching
compositions, his Introduction to the Art of Playing the
Piano Forte of 1801, revised in 1826, and the famous
Gradus ad Parnassum, completed and published in the
latter year. He retired from business in 1830, settling
first in Lichfield and then in Evesham, where he died in
1832, to be buried in Westminster Abbey. His legacy to
pianists was a significant one, both through his
compositions and his teaching, an introduction to a new
virtuosity and exploration of the possibilities of a newly
developed instrument in a society that had changed
greatly since his own childhood in Italy.
The Sonata in G minor, Op. 34, No. 2, the second of
a set of two, was first published in Vienna in 1795.
According to Clementi’s friend and pupil, the Berlin
composer and pianist Ludwig Berger, it was based on a
symphony, now lost. The first movement starts with a
short solemn introduction before the principal theme is
heard, marked Allegro con fuoco, leading to a B flat
major second subject. A dramatic central development is
followed by a varied recapitulation. The E flat major
slow movement, marked Un poco adagio, opens with a
singing theme which returns after an intervening passage
of varied dynamics. The closing Molto allegro, a form of
rondo, finds room for a contrapuntal treatment of the main
theme in an E minor passage of canonic writing.
Clementi’s three Op. 50 sonatas were published in
London in 1821 by the composer, with other editions in
the same year in Leipzig and in Paris. These final
sonatas are dedicated to Cherubini and are examples of
the very considerable development of Clementi’s style.
The last of the set, Didone abbandonata – Scena tragica,
won more contemporary favour than the first two, but all
three mark the culmination of Clementi’s achievement
as a composer of piano sonatas. The Sonata in A major,
Op. 50, No. 1, opens Allegro maestoso e con sentimento,
its imposing first subject followed by a dramatic
transition, leading to the E major secondary theme. The
central development, with its chains of thirds, a feature
of Clementi’s technique as a player, explores the
dynamic possibilities of the pianoforte, before the return
of the principal theme in recapitulation. The A minor
slow movement, with the direction Adagio sostenuto e
patetico, soon introduces a contrapuntal element before
the Andante con moto, a thirty-bar canon at the fifth, a
reflection of Clementi’s debt to Bach. The Adagio
returns to complete the movement. The sonata ends with
a sonata-form movement. The central development finds
room for an opening passage in canon and there is
further scope for counterpoint in the recapitulation in a
work of marked originality.
There are two surviving versions of the Sonata in
E flat major, Op. 41, the first in two movements and the
second, in three movements, published by Clementi and
his partners, with a third unauthorised edition from
Mollo in Vienna in 1804. Clementi was to publish no
further sonatas until 1820. The second version of the
Sonata in E flat major is relatively undemanding, with
an opening theme that recalls the style of piano writing
familiar from Haydn’s sonatas, leading to a secondary
theme. The relationship between the two themes is
apparent in the contrapuntal opening of the development
and the thematic material is recalled in the final varied
recapitulation. The B flat major Adagio explores the
possible resonance of the piano, introducing more
elaborate decoration of the material. Rapid thirds open
the final Allegro and there is some hand-crossing before
the exposition comes to an end. The thirds of the main
theme start the development and make their inevitable
return to start the final recapitulation.
Keith Anderson