BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Tuesday, October 18, 1825 (approximately)

Sometime about now, Beethoven assembles and begins using his final desk sketchbook, usually referred to as the Kullak sketchbook, named after composer Franz Kullak (1844-1913), who donated it to the Berlin Royal Library. Beethoven will use this sketchbook over the next year as he completes the last of the three string quartets commissioned by Prince Nikolai Galitzin, op.130, and then writes two additional quartets, opp.131 and 135.

The sketchbook is today in the Berlin Staatsbibliothek, Beethoven Autograph 24. It consists of 62 leaves presently. Neither Gustav Nottebohm nor Ludwig Nohl appears to have ever seen it; its first mention in the literature is an 1893 article by J.S. Shedlock in The Musical Times. All of the paper is of the same type, with 16 staves per page. Douglas Johnson notes that although the paper is uniform and the gatherings are well structured, the stitching is not professionally done, and it was probably assembled by Beethoven not long after his return to Vienna on October 15th. Johnson also notes that there may be leaves missing; at only three places does one find clear continuity or connection by ink blots between pages. However, no obvious candidates for inclusion in the book have surfaced.

On folio 6v are found the sketches for the Waltz for piano WoO 85 and the Ecossaise for piano WoO 86, which in their final form are dated November 14, 1825. At the end of the book is work for the substitute finale for op.130, which was delivered to Matthias Artaria on November 22, 1826. Thus the use of this sketchbook covers about 13 or 14 months, with the very last sketches (for a string quintet) possibly dating from December 1826.

Other works sketched in this desk sketchbook are:
The third and fifth movements of the quartet op.130 (1r and 7r).
Grosse Fuge op.133, though it was at this point still intended as the sixth movement finale of op.130 (1r-5r, 7v-10r, 12r).
The replacement finale for op.130 (52r, 59r, 60v-62r).
Canon Freut euch des Lebens WoO 195, which will be delivered to its recipient on December 16, 1825 (10v).
String Quartet in C# minor op.131 (10r-12v, 14r-47r).
Revisions for the bass aria “Mit Mädeln sich vertragen” WoO 90 (16r, 20r).
Canon Bester Magistrat in A, Hess 299 (35r). Although Willy Hess had tentatively assigned a date of 1820 to this canon, chronologically it appears much more likely to have been written in mid-1826.
String Quartet in F major op.135 (47v-58r).
Canon Esel aller Esel, Hess 277 (51v).
Unfinished string quintet for Diabelli (60v).

The Kullak sketchbook can be seen online here:

https://digital.staatsbibliothek-berlin.de/werkansicht/?PPN=PPN1027497306