Beethoven's Piano Sonatas are at a fundamental turning point, a turning point that, as in a feedback phenomenon, was provoked by themselves. The first part of this book outlines an "ecology" of the piano sonata, trying to get closer to the way Beethoven and his contemporaries thought and lived this musical genre. The second part is an introduction to the study of form theory that was born around Beethoven's Sonatas, seen both in historical sources and in recent theories on classical form.

Th...