Piano Sonata No. 20

At a glance

• What it isthe first movement of Piano Sonata No. 20 in A major, marked Allegro, fast.
• Who, when, whywritten in Vienna in September 1828. The last three sonatas were published only a decade after his death.
• What to listen forthe contrast between the stately chords of the opening and the songlike, gentle second theme.

Listen for

• Statelinessover a walking bass in the left hand, the right hand sounds large chords. It is as if a wide stage were opening.
• Songthe second theme sings gently like one of Schubert's songs, a passage where you feel he was a composer who wrote songs all his life.
• A quiet endat the close the opening theme returns quietly and softly, ending calmly instead of with big chords.

When it was written

In 1828, even as his illness deepened, Schubert wrote at an astonishing pace. A symphony, the String Quintet, songs and the last three piano sonatas all date from that year. In March of the same year he also gave the first and only public concert devoted entirely to his own works.

Schubert died in Vienna that November. The three sonatas were published only around 1838, and the publisher dedicated them to the young composer Robert Schumann. Long seldom played, these sonatas became important works for pianists only in the twentieth century.