Bridge to Beethoven
Bridge to Beethoven is a four-program project that juxtaposes Beethoven’s ten violin and piano sonatas with newly commissioned works. These contemporary pieces engage a musical dialogue with Beethoven’s evolving compositional voice, as traced through his violin and piano sonatas written over the course of nearly fifteen years. Each program explores the development of individual artists and the violin and piano sonata form itself in response to Beethoven both as a historical figure and a musical revolutionary.
—Jennifer Koh
Bridge to Beethoven Programs
PROGRAM I
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in D Major, Op. 12, No. 1
VIJAY IYER Bridgetower Fantasy (new commission & companion piece to the Kreutzer Sonata)
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in A Major, Op. 47, Kreutzer
PROGRAM II
ANDREW NORMAN Bridging I (2016)
BEETHOVEN Sonata No. 6 in A Major, Op. 30 No. 1
ANDREW NORMAN Bridging II
BEETHOVEN Sonata No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30 No. 2
ANDREW NORMAN Bridging III
BEETHOVEN Sonata No. 7 in C minor, Op. 30 No. 2
PROGRAM III
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in A Major, Op. 12, No. 2
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in A minor, Op. 23
TANIA LEÓN Para (2025)
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in F Major, Op. 24, Spring
PROGRAM IV
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in E-flat Major, Op. 12, No. 3
NEW WORK TBD
BEETHOVEN Violin Sonata in G Major, Op. 96
Composer Note
Bridgetower Fantasy (Bridge to Beethoven I)
The "Kreutzer" Sonata was originally dedicated not to Rudolphe Kreutzer (who never performed it) but to George Bridgetower, a famed 18th-century Afro-European concert violinist. In an early draft, Beethoven jokingly labeled the piece in starkly racialized terms: "Sonata Mulattica composed for the mulatto Brischdauer, big wild mulatto composer.
Beethoven and Bridgetower performed the premiere, which was by all accounts a success, and even featuring some improvised embellishment by the violinist. While celebrating afterwards, the two quarreled about what Beethoven construed as Bridgetower's insult of a female acquaintance; the composer then revoked the original dedication, adding Kreutzer's name instead. The work gained acclaim, while Bridgetower's career languished; he eventually died in poverty.
Bridgetower has been the subject of considerable research and speculation, most notably in poet Rita Dove's book, Sonata Mulattica. From our 21st-century vantage, considering Bridgetower's unique circumstance, we can only see him as an ambiguous figure who, in embodying difference, provoked inspiration, fantasy, desire, anger and, finally, erasure.
My piece is a collection of imaginings about George Bridgetower. It is not programmatic, but it takes on an episodic character, assembled from contrasting fragments. The dance rhythms, recurring figures and gestural contours are intended to feature the embodied expertise and expressivity of the performers, who at times must access liminal sounds and execute complex synchronies. I am grateful to Jenny Koh and Shai Wosner for involving me in their beautiful, virtuosic music-making.
—Vijay Iyer