Ludwig von Beethoven (1770 - 1827)

Seven Bagatelles, Op. 33
Eleven Bagatelles, Op. 119
Six Bagatelles, Op. 126

It was the French composer Couperin who, in 1717, first used the title Bagatelle for one of his harpsichord pieces. The name proved useful, but it was with Beethoven, a hundred or more years later, that the Bagatelle received an assured position. He wrote 26 short piano pieces under the title, the first group of seven appears to have been completed in 1802 and was published in Vienna and in London the following year. The manuscript carries the apparent date 1802, the 8 changed to 7 and the 0 to 8, providing too early a date for the whole set, although they may contain earlier material, here reworked. The first of these pieces is a graceful little composition, in E flat major, with a contrasting central section. It is followed by a C major Scherzo, its first section followed at once by a section in A minor. There is a central Trio, with passages