The opening five bars firmly establish the piano’s leading position in the musical dialogue, and also establish the key of G major, which seems almost to be strengthened by the orchestra’s subsequent pianissimo entry in B major
 in bar 6.

The opening also makes it clear that the concerto is indeed to be a dialogue rather than a contest. Thus when the soloist reappears after the ensuing orchestral tutti, it has less need to reassert its authority than is the case in concertos of normal style when this would be the soloist’s first appearance. Having at the outset said the most important thing in the movement, it now contents itself with some gentle questioning figures turning into passages of trills and rapid scales to which the orchestra has little to add beyond some quiet supporting chords. This continues with increasing ornamentation and brilliance in the solo part until a companion second subject is reached. In the recapitulation the order of the two second subjects is reversed, but before this comes one of Beethoven’s noblest and most eloquent development sections. Throughout the movement the piano seems to maintain an easy ascendancy.

The unprecedented slow movement has a significance and poetic content out of all proportion to its mere seventy-two bars length. It consists of a dialogue between urgent rhythmic declamations from the orchestra which are in each case answered by the piano with a spacious dignity and calm beauty entirely of its own. The gentle persuasions of the soloist’s argument gradually calm the orchestra, and after a strange and original bridge passage the orchestra eventually settles on a grave E minor chord above which the piano utters its final, most lovely phrase.

In a manner as quiet and also as assertive as that of the opening of the first movement, the orchestra announces the strongly rhythmic theme of the finale, wherupon the soloist, having in the previous movement managed to subdue the orchestra, now perversely begins to urge them to a more lively style and pace. Before long Beethoven introduces an entertaining variant for the soloist, but it is not until the second subject is reached, with high melody and deep pedal harmony, that it becomes apparent how large in both scale of thought and general dimensions the movement is. The rondo is a perfect and proportionate ending to what amounts to an isolated monument among the great concertos.