I absolutely LOVED that show and the overture!
My Dad had an LP with several Rossini Overtures, Dona Diana, and Zampa.
I loved Zampa too.
Beethoven was cautious in his first set of violin sonatas because he wasn’t quite ready to take on the late Mozart for the crown. That would come later. These sonatas were dedicated to Tony Salieri, one of his two great teachers, and they were written for Lou himself and Rudy Kreutzer, a French violinist that he had come to respect for his technique.
It starts in a rolling 6/8 in A Major, marked “allegro vivace”, which means it should be pretty fast. Lou’s use of two-note fragments against a basic three borders on the hilarious; he had quite a sense of humor. The transitional material sounds like something out of a Mozart Italian opera before he settles into the second subject in E Major with some wonderfully misplaced accents. The exposition repeats. At 3:20 he opens his development in C Major before turning to a darker A minor. At 4:00 he recaps with everything in the correct keys, and he ends it in a quiet, sneaky manner.
The second movement, marked “andante piu tosto allegretto”, in 2/4, isn’t all that slow. This movement in A minor is one of the heartfelt early Beethoven slow movements.
The finale in A Major and 3/4 time is marked “allegro piacevole”, which means “quick and pleasant”. From the returns of the first theme, you can tell this is a rondo.
This video is from a student recital at the Curtis School of Music in Philadelphia earlier this year. Keep your eye out for these two ladies in the future.
Tomorrow night it’s the third sonata of the Opus 12 set.