This performance piece by a Tucson native explores Beethoven beyond the music

In the second letter, “The Heiligenstadt Testament,” meant for his brothers, Beethoven was becoming increasingly more deaf and frustrated with his fate. The letter, which the composer never sent, also hinted at thoughts of suicide.

“There are all these reveals about him, some funny, some somewhat poignant, some tragic,” Clark said. “That’s sort of what I wanted to get at with this. Not so much as a musician, because the music speaks for itself, but what made him an interesting person.”

“Beethoven Remembered,” which the 75-year-old Schuldmann said will be her final public performance, intersperses movements from several of Beethoven’s sonatas — he composed 32 piano sonatas in his career — including the slow movement from No. 14 in C-sharp minor “Moonlight” and a movement from No. 8 in C minor “Pathétique.”

Clark said the performance also will include short works from Beethoven’s contemporaries Haydn and Schubert.

Clark and Schuldmann will perform the piece twice in Green Valley, where they have lived for several years. It will be only the second public performance for the pair since 2013, when they ended their nine-year run with Chamber Music Plus in Tucson.

“Beethoven Remembered” is one of several “Rhythms of Life” works Clark has written over the past several years. He’s also been working on a collection of short stories that he is calling “Tales from Green Valley” that are based on composites of people he has met since moving to Green Valley, and a memoir of growing up in Tucson before leaving his senior year in high school in the 1960s.