theme, nine variations, and a fugue whose subject is itself based on the opening theme. Reception After a performance of the sonata at a concert devoted to Szymanowski's works in December 1911, Willy Renz wrote in the magazine Die Musik:“If the composer forces himself towards greater transparency, to a sensible limit and concentration, if he can restrain his excessive fondness for contrapuntal tricks, polyphonic complications and orchestral excesses, we will have high hopes of him” After attending a 1912 performance of the sonata by Arthur Rubinstein in Berlin, feeling that he could never reach Rubinstein's level as a pianist nor Szymanowski's level as a composer, Heinrich Neuhaus attempted suicide. After the incident, Szymanowski and Rubinstein found him safe and recovering in a hospital in Florence. The sonata has developed a reputation of an extremely hard piece to master, both musically and technically, and after the Second World War it found its way into the repertoire of pianists such as Sviatoslav Richter or Marc-André Hamelin. References Piano sonatas 1911 compositions Compositions in A minor