Reconstruction of unfinished Beethoven Violin Concerto in C major

Based on a fragment by Ludwig van Beethoven WoO 5

There are four known works of Beethoven for the violin and orchestra genre. They were written during the 1790-1806 period. These are the Violin Romance in G major Opus 40, the Violin Romance in F major Opus 50, the Violin Concerto in D major Opus 61 (1806) and the earlier Violin Concerto in C major WoO 5 (Hess 10). The latter was left to us as a fragment which Beethoven most probably composed in Bonn, between 1790 and 1792. The fragment contains 259 bars, fully written out and than stops abruptly….as if the score was torn in two. The composition is broken off exactly 15 bars into the development. The motif in the last known bars 258 and 259 initiated the task of joining the development as reliably as possible to the rest of the work.

In the additional 258 bars, Cees took Beethovenꞌs material into consideration; also in the development, reprise and coda. The most remarkable is the coda. Cees uses a third related key here, which may seem strange at first but was used more often by Beethoven himself, for example in his Violin Concerto in D major Opus 61. It was necessary to compose this work backwards in a manner of speaking. In other words: Cees had to give all the global lines that Beethoven had so masterfully written as correct a place as possible in the score. With respect to earlier completions by colleagues, Cees did not set out by literally copying and transposing the exposition in the reprise. His aim was to write a completion as creatively as possible and still use Beethovenꞌs material and intricate weave ofvoices to the full. Hopefully this completed version will be a respected contribution to the rich violin literature.

Are you interested in performing or recording The Beethoven Violin Concerto in C major? Please contact us!

The score can be ordered here.