Piano Sonata No. 18 in E♭ major, Op. 44 \"The Farewell\"

Instrumentation

Musical Terms (2)

• Craw English
  Abbreviation for Howard Allen Craw's thematic catalogue of Dussek's works, developed in his 1964 University of Southern California dissertation \"A Biography and Thematic Catalog of the Works of J.L. Dussek (1760–1812).\" Because Dussek's output was published by many competing publishers — often assigning different opus numbers to the same work — the Craw catalogue (C. or Craw numbers) provides a consistent and chronological reference system. Most modern editions and recordings cite both the Craw number and one primary opus number.
  When researching or ordering scores, use the Craw number to confirm you have the correct work. Many Dussek works share opus numbers across publishers (e.g. \"Op. 16\" was used by both Breitkopf & Härtel and Corri for completely different sets) — the Craw number resolves all ambiguity.
• elégie French
  Elegy; a lament for the dead or for loss. In music, an elegy is a work or movement of grieving character, typically slow, lyrical, and harmonically dark. Dussek's \"Élégie harmonique sur la mort de Louis Ferdinand de Prusse\" (Op. 61) is one of the first large-scale independent piano elegies in the repertoire — a two-movement work of sustained grief and proto-Romantic harmonic intensity, composed in memory of his patron Prince Louis Ferdinand, killed at the Battle of Saalfeld in 1806. It anticipates the later Romantic tradition of memorial piano music (Chopin, Liszt).
  An elegy has a specific emotional task: to honour through grief. The tone should be noble, not merely sad — there is dignity in mourning. In Op. 61, the first movement's Lento patetico section requires patience; resist the urge to push the tempo even when the Agitato sections arrive. The second movement's Vivace con fuoco is not a release from the grief but an intensification of it — a relentless, driven lament. Throughout, maintain tonal depth: the elegy's meaning lives in the resonance of each harmony.