William Strother wrote:

>Beethoven had a miraculous ability to take great pains over a long period
>of time to create a musical moment that sounds completely spontaneous.

Exactly and that's tricky.  He sounds very spontaneous indeed, but he
wasn't.

>His works were anything but spontaneous, but infinite reworking to reach a
>kind of perfection.  He spent so long working out his music that whatever
>emotion generated a piece, that emotion was long gone before he finished.

Keeping in mind what I know about Beethoven I tend to agree, though there
must have been some exceptions.  See, for instance, the cavatina of op.130.
If we may believe pupil/colleague Czerny (and why not, for mostly he's
reliable witness) Beethoven himself once said that every time when he heard
(insofar possible after 1825 when he was almost stone-deaf) the cavatina,
it "cost him some tears." The sad event that must have been the background
of the composition (the "program", if you like) most probably had passed
away, but nevertheless he obviously very easily could recall the underlying
emotion.

And Jeremey McMillan on the same topic:

>When you want to argue whether Beethoven acted on impulse or not, think
>about how he used to improvise the cadenzas in his concerti.  It wasn't
>later until composers started to actually write down the cadenza.

Don't overlook that it was Beethoven who began to change the habit
of improvising the candenzas, who obviously was not a great lover of
improvised candenzas, at least not for his own concertos.  It looks like a
process, a change of mind.  He decided to write down more or less obliged
cadenzas after he had already published and premiered the concertos, at
least the first four.  #4 received at least 3 candenzas for both the first
and third movements, for piano concerto #1 he sketched a handful and for
the concertos # 2 and 3 he wrote candenzas for the first movement.

Greetings,
Joyce Maier
www.ademu.com/Beethoven