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January 16, 2012

The 'Hundred Dollar Baby' Soundtrack

Season 2, Episode 5 of the show "It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia" is titled "Hundred Dollar Baby". The episode closes with a piano solo that makes me want to hang myself. I tried Shazam a few times, but wasn't able to get a match.

It turns out that the soundtrack was written by Ludwig van Beethoven in 1801, and dedicated to his student in 1802. The official title is something like "The Piano Sonata #14 in C-sharp minor "Quasi una fantasia", Opus 27, No.2 'Moonlight', Adagio Sostenuto", but it's commonly known as the "Moonlight Sonata". The piece has three movements, but the 2nd and 3rd movements don't really do anything for me. The first movement really strikes me though.

From Wikipedia:

"The Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor "Quasi una fantasia", Op. 27, No. 2, popularly known as the Moonlight Sonata, is a piano sonata by Ludwig van Beethoven. Completed in 1801 and dedicated in 1802 to his pupil, Countess Giulietta Guicciardi, it is one of Beethoven's most popular compositions for the piano."

The sonata consists of three movements:
1. Adagio sostenuto
2. Allegretto
3. Presto agitato

The adagio sostenuto has made a powerful impression on many listeners; for instance, Berlioz said of it that it "is one of those poems that human language does not know how to qualify".[13] Beethoven's student Carl Czerny called it "a nocturnal scene, in which a mournful ghostly voice sounds from the distance".[14] The movement was very popular in Beethoven's day, to the point of exasperating the composer himself, who remarked to Czerny, "Surely I've written better things."

Here's a link to a youtube video of Stephen Malinowski playing the first movement of Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata".

Update: 1/1/2023 I heard the song Moonlight Sonata again, this time on Arrested Development, Season 1, Episode 9, Storming The Castle.16:36.

Posted by Rob Kiser on January 16, 2012 at 11:46 PM

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