Roger Allen, ‘Das, was eigentlich Musik’: Richard Wagner’s reception of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 28, Op. 101

July 2019, Volume 13, Number 2, 49–65.

In a diary entry for 14 November 1882, Cosima Wagner records Richard as making the following observation about Beethoven’s Piano Sonata no. 28, op. 101: ‘the first movement of this A major sonata is an excellent example of what I mean by unending melody. That is what music really is.’