Welcome to LivingPianos.com, I’m Robert Estrin. In today’s video, I have a really interesting listening test for you! Can you hear the difference between Mozart and Beethoven? Many of you might think you can easily tell the difference between Mozart and Beethoven. Well, can you? Well, if you are already familiar with the works that I’ve chosen, you’ll understand the significance of this question and the interesting listening test that I’m presenting for you.
To make the test fair, I’m going to play two excerpts from sonata movements that are both in the key of C minor.
I’m going to play these excerpts for you in a moment. I will give you a chance to decide which one is Mozart and which one is Beethoven before I reveal the answer. And in the comments below, if you are not familiar with either of these pieces, I’d like for you all to comment and see if you chose correctly or not. This will be a very interesting test! So leave your comments here at LivingPianos.com as well as on YouTube.
Watch the video to take the test!
They’re both very dramatic pieces of music, aren’t they? I hope all of you have decided which one you think is Mozart and which one you think is Beethoven. If you haven’t decided yet, stop reading now so you can make the decision before I reveal it. Be honest in the comments about which one you chose. I’m very interested in this. First of all, I’m going to tell you why I chose these two works. They are both in the minor key. Mozart in the minor key has a lot of fire, which is typical of what you might think of as Beethoven. If I had chosen one of Mozart’s sonatas in the major key, it might have been easier to tell the difference, for example, his C major K 330. That would not be mistaken for Beethoven! Of course, Beethoven wrote many sonatas that are very dramatic and would not be confused with Mozart. So many of them are so famous, though, like the Appassionata or the Pathetique. Those are very robust emotional works.
Now I will reveal the answer!
The Mozart sonata I played is K. 457 in C minor. And by the way, it has a companion fantasy that is really a gorgeous piece. It’s very experimental with its harmonies and such. That is a companion to this sonata in the same opus. The Beethoven sonata I played is Op. 10 no. 1 in C minor. I chose these excerpts to try to trick you as much as I possibly could!
The first excerpt was Mozart, and the second was Beethoven!
The first excerpt is from the Mozart Sonata K 457 in C minor, and the second is indeed from the Beethoven Sonata Opus 10 No. 1. With the Mozart sonata, I played the recapitulation of the first movement because it goes into the minor key for the second subject, which I thought was more dramatic and Beethoven-esque. Whereas with the Beethoven sonata, I did exactly the opposite. I played the exposition of the Beethoven sonata because it goes into the major in the second subject. I was really trying to trick you with this! So if you got it wrong, don’t feel bad. Mozart and Beethoven were both great composers with a wide range of music, as you could hear today. I hope this has been interesting for you! Thanks again for joining me, Robert Estrin, here at LivingPianos.com, Your Online Piano Resource.
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18 thoughts on “Can You Hear the Difference Between Mozart and Beethoven?”
You tricked me, and I got it wrong.
It worked!
I got it wrong.
Super great! And ending the fanfare in C minor did not go unnoticed!
That was my little cheat!
Also worked!
Not tricked–in part because I know all the sonatas of both composers. However, I see how someone might be, though with this caveat: the Beethoven is unmistakably idiomatic in every respect; the Mozart, however, has certain remarkable harmonic adumbrations of Beethoven: what is incidental in Mozart becomes a fixture in Beethoven. In an essay from the 1930s titled “The Expert and the Amateur,” the music critic W.J. Turner noted that when Schnabel resurrected (for the first time) Beethoven’s at-the-time-forgotten cadenzas to Mozart’s K.466 concerto in public concert, the critics were baffled: they felt these weren’t among Mozart’s own, yet the voice seemed strangely familiar. Turner draws from this an important observation: experts, who pride themselves that they can tell who composed a piece, often do so because they simply know the piece. When an amateur makes a mistake, he is not to be laughed at, but commended, for having been misled by an actually quite astute perception of resemblance.
In regards to the cadenza of the D minor Mozart Concerto, it is startling when suddenly Beethoven appears in the middle of a Mozart Concerto for those who play that cadenza. It’s a great piece of Beethoven writing, but it’s stylistically so different from the rest of the piece!
The cadenza of the D minor Mozart Concerto is startling when suddenly Beethoven appears in the middle of a Mozart Concerto for those who play that cadenza. It’s a great piece of Beethoven writing, but it’s stylistically so different from the rest of the piece!
I got it right, I decided that was Mozart the first piece and then I was less sure about the second piece.
They both sound more like what you would expect of Beethoven!
Beautiful piece, beautifully played. Thanks
I guessed incorrectly.
You almost tricked me. At the first chord, I thought I would be Beethoven, then after hearing the second piece, I decided that was the one of Beethoven!
There are a few tell-tale signs of Beethoven that come through!
I got it right, but I wouldn’t have bet on it. Well played and great examples, thank you.
Mozart in the minor can sound a lot like Beethoven!
I would say that the Beethoven sounded more like Mozart than vice versa. Beethoven admired Mozart and met him in Vienna in 1887. (Thayer’s Life of Beethoven Vol 1, p. 87)
That makes sense since Beethoven lived after Mozart.