Clementi – Who’s that?
April 21st, 2006 by Jerry
In my early years of piano lessons, I played several sonatinas by Muzio Clementi (What piano student hasn’t?). Since then, I never thought much about this composer, since everything I’d heard or played was simplistic – charming, but not challenging or particularly interesting… At least this is the impression I remember. He wrote around the same time as Mozart, so most people probably consider Clementi’s music bland by comparison. But then, who’s heard anything by Clementi other than the beginning piano student’s friendly sonatinas?
Music of this era was very formulaic (still is, isn’t it?). There were strictly-followed guidelines about how many movements, the manner of each movement, and even the melodic patterns within the movements. I would think this kind of composing method would stifle creativity or disguise the lack thereof, but miraculously, Mozart and others managed to write some very interesting and enjoyable pieces in these kinds of musical frameworks.
Recently, I listened again to some of Clementi’s sonatinas and found recordings of a few of his sonatas (“harder” than a sonatina). I think everyone’s overlooked how good Clementi was at writing this kind of music. Because of the sonata framework, some of it is repetitive, but then even Mozart could take a theme and bludgeon you to death with it. Don’t get me wrong – I love Mozart’s piano works, but I think some of Clementi’s music rivals Mozart in creativity. If I heard a Clementi sonata on WCPE or another classical station, I would probably guess it was Mozart. (I’m usually pretty good at picking out a Mozart tune.)
So I’ve added a section to my wishlist: sheet music I want to acquire to look at and maybe learn. Clementi wrote 110 piano sonatas; I have recordings of 5 and I’ve found books containing about 20 in all, so I have a lot of searching to do. I usually like to listen to something before seeking the sheet music, but I doubt there are very many Clementi CDs out there.