Ludwig van Beethoven (1770 – 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank among the most performed of the classical music repertoire and span the transition from the Classical period to the Romantic era in classical music. His career has conventionally been divided into early, middle, and late periods. His early period, during which he forged his craft, is typically considered to have lasted until 1802. From 1802 to around 1812, his middle period showed an individual development from the styles of Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and is sometimes characterized as heroic. During this time, he began to grow increasingly deaf. In his late period, from 1812 to 1827, he extended his innovations in musical form and expression.

Beethoven was born in Bonn. His musical talent was obvious at an early age. He was initially harshly and intensively taught by his father, Johann van Beethoven. Beethoven was later taught by the composer and conductor Christian Gottlob Neefe, under whose tutelage he published his first work, a set of keyboard variations, in 1783. He found relief from a dysfunctional home life with the family of Helene von Breuning, whose children he loved, befriended, and taught piano. At age 21, he moved to Vienna, which subsequently became his base, and studied composition with Haydn. Beethoven then gained a reputation as a virtuoso pianist, and was soon patronised by Karl Alois, Prince Lichnowsky for compositions, which resulted in his three Opus 1 piano trios (the earliest works to which he accorded an opus number) in 1795.

Beethoven's Piano Sonata No. 27 in E minor, Op. 90 was written in the summer of 1814 – Beethoven's late Middle period – and dedicated to Prince Moritz von Lichnowsky, a friend and benefactor who was also the dedicatee of the Eroica Variations. His previous piano sonata, popularly known as Les Adieux, was composed almost five years before Op. 90. Beethoven's autograph survives and is dated August 16. The sonata was published almost a year later, in June 1815, by S. A. Steiner, after Beethoven made a few corrections. His friend and biographer Anton Schindler reported that the sonata's two movements were to be titled Kampf zwischen Kopf und Herz ("A Contest Between Head and Heart") and Conversation mit der Geliebten ("Conversation with the Beloved"), respectively, and that the sonata as a whole referred to Moritz's romance with a woman he was thinking of marrying. Schindler's explanation first appeared in his 1842 book Beethoven in Paris and has been repeated in several other books. Later studies showed that the story was almost certainly invented by Schindler, at least in part, and that he went so far as to forge an entry in one of Beethoven's conversation books to validate the anecdote.

According to Wilfrid Mellers, "Opus 90 belongs neither to Beethoven’s middle nor to his late phase. Denis Matthews sees the work as having "more claim to kinship with the great sonatas of the last period than to the previous ones." Hans von Bulow declared that this is the work "with which the series of pianoforte works of the Master’s so-called ‘last period’ begins." Schiff has drawn attention to the apparent connection between the ending of this sonata, which closes in the key of E.

Source: Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piano_Sonata_No._27_(Bee thoven)).

Although originally written for Solo Piano, I created this Interpretation of the Piano Sonata II in E Major (Op. 90 No. 27) for Flute & Piano.