Beethoven began work on his fifth and final* piano concerto shortly after finishing his Fourth Piano Concerto and the Triple Concerto for violin, cello and piano at the end of 1808. It was dedicated to his then patron Archduke Rudolf (dedicatee of the Archduke Piano Trio and the Missa Solemnis) and premiered in 1811 in Leipzig.
Like the fourth concerto it opens with a piano solo, and it is longer than previous concerti. It’s scored for double woodwind, two horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings.
The movements are a very grand Allegro, an Adagio un poco mosso in B major (a tertiary modulation from the first – from Beethoven…), and then finishes with a seven-part Rondo (ABACABA) in Allegro ma non troppo.
*There is a fragment of a sixth piano concerto started in 1814/15, which Beethoven never finished, despite having another 12 years to live.
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