Variations in music is a special genre often regarded by many as less important or inferior to sonatas, symphonies. Although many great composers created variations, it was Beethoven who had elevated this genre to a high(er) level and convinced critics to accept it.
What is a variation? It is a musical structure, where a main musical idea called a theme is being played and then played again, but varied into something else. Something else is where the magic comes in! At the end, each variation is different, but all can be traced back to the original theme.
How can a composer vary a theme? There are many musical elements that can be changed. One way is to change the rhythm of the music, or the tonality (harmony) of it by shifting to a different key. The melody also can be changed by addition (adding a note), subtraction (take away a note) or melody inverting (going in opposite pitch direction). Further options for variations are the time signatures (playing faster or slower), dynamics (silent or loud) or instrumentation.
As mentioned in the introduction, before Beethoven, variations were in general considered as too frequent and cheap, aiming to please amateurs and harvest income for the composers. It was Beethoven’s Six variations on an original theme (op. 34) that was first praised universally and considered as a “beautiful rounded whole”.
There are many great examples for this musical genre from many other Masters. Most notable ones are the Bach Goldberg variations, Haydn’s Sonata for Violin and Piano in C Major, Mozart’s Sonata in F Major for Violin or Schubert’s Piano Quintet in A Major (Trout Quintet).
Even among these excellent composers two stand out for making extraordinary works in variations: Beethoven and Brahms. Brahms, to name one of the many, created the famous Haydn’s variations – believing he found an unknown woodwind octet by Haydn.
It was Beethoven, who was the real Master of the variations and this magazine plans to cover all great pieces, such as the Eroica variations, the Diabelli variations or the Seven variations on Mozart’s The magic flute.
