The Kreutzer Sonata (op. 47)

[cow168]

hey all,
just wondering if anyone could help me out.
i'm writing a hs research paper on Tolstoy's "The Kreutzer Sonata", it's a short story about this man, his wife, and their dysfunctional marriage. the wife begins to regularly play music with a mutual friend of theirs. they perform Beethoven's sonata no. 9 and at the end of the story the man murders his wife. my paper is on the affect of music on the human psyche. i was just wondering if anyone has studied this sonata extensively and could help me out a little. also, i haven't found any really good sites or books, so if anybody has some reccomendations i'll gladly give them a try. the story is interesting but a little on the depressing side, if you're a newly-wed, do not read it, it'll only scare you. for anyone else who is interested in that sort of stuff, i reccomend the book to you. it's only about a hundred pages long and can be found in basically any collection of Tolstoy's short stories (like the death of ivan ilych, or master and man). thanks.

[Luis]

Originally posted by cow168:
hey all,
just wondering if anyone could help me out.
i'm writing a hs research paper on Tolstoy's "The Kreutzer Sonata", it's a short story about this man, his wife, and their dysfunctional marriage. the wife begins to regularly play music with a mutual friend of theirs. they perform Beethoven's sonata no. 9 and at the end of the story the man murders his wife. my paper is on the affect of music on the human psyche.

Have you heard the piece?
Well, I would suggest you to do so!
I’m not a Beethoven or Tolstoy expert, but I don’t think on the story this piece could have a degradating effect on the murderer psyche.
Having Beethoven so many obscure music this is not the case at all. May be the name of the sonata has more significance than the music itself, but this is just a matter of marketing: “The Kreutzer Sonata” sounds better than the “ghost trio” (a really scary piece!!), “The Pathetique sonata”, “The seventh symphony” and so on…
There is some frenetism in some passages and little mystery on others, but the sonata stands out as a cheerful and peaceful one.

[Peter]

Not quite sure what you're after but here's some info on the 'Kreutzer' Sonata. It dates from 1802 and is named after the French Violinist Rodolphe Kreutzer, whom Beethoven admired and dedicated the work to, although it seems that he never played it in public .It is a very passionate piece, but I'm not sure that it would inspire anyone to commit murder ! There is no doubt that music inspires all sorts of emotions, and people respond in very different ways - I think the effect caused is not so much by the music itself, rather our state of mind at the time - e.g if we have just lost someone close to us, the death march is probably more likely to move us, than if we've just won the lottery !

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'Man know thyself'

[Luis]

More info:
The sonata was originally dedicated not for Kreutzer but for the mulatto violinist George Augustus Polgreen Bridgetower, son of the black page of Prince Esterhazy, Frederich August and pupil of Haydn. According to my CD notes, in 1802 Bridgetower visited his mother and brother and give the first performance of the piece, which was hastily finished by Beethoven, who had no time to have the violin part decently copied and on that occasion, left much of the piano part unwritten. (Punctuality was something many people had to leave aside in favor of good art). The final movement had been intended to close the A major sonata, op. 30 No. 1.