Beethoven Piano Concertos

Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-flat major, Op. 73, was written between 1809 and 1811 in Vienna, is the last of his piano concertos, and is often called The Emperor Concerto. Carl Czerny, who was a student of Beethoven, was the soloist at the Vienna debut of this work. The following from excerpt from the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra's website provides some interesting background to this famous work:


"There is a certain irony in the subtitle of "Emperor" that was later given to Beethoven's Fifth and final Piano Concerto, but never used by the composer himself. By the spring of 1809 when Beethoven was creating his "Emperor" Concerto, the last person he would have wanted to honor was the emperor of the day, Napoleon Bonaparte. Years earlier, he had angrily obliterated a dedication to the French leader he'd once admired from the title page of his Third Symphony, the "Eroica," after he learned that Napoleon had just crowned himself Emperor. "Now he will become a tyrant like all the others," the composer raged.

"Now in May 1809, Napoleon's armies were actually besieging the city of Vienna. Beethoven’s home was in the line of fire of the French cannons, and he was forced to flee to his brother’s house, where he holed up in the cellar with a pillow pressed to his still sensitive ears. But his work on his new Concerto did not cease."

The music of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 - 1827) is one of humanity's greatest treasures. Unsurpassed in its power of expression as well as its depth and diversity of ideas and feelings, it provides boundless joy to listeners and performers.


Tutorials


Piano Concerto No. 3


Piano Concerto No. 4


Piano Concerto No. 5, Emperor