Truly angry and full of wrath? Composer and music critics of the 19th century, Robert Schumann wrote of the work that "it would be difficult to find anything merrier than this whim... It is the most amiable, harmless anger, similar to that felt when one cannot pull a shoe from off the foot", citing the work as an instance of Beethoven's earthliness against those fixated upon a transcendental image of the composer.
The Rondo alla ingharese quasi un capriccio in G major, Op. 129, is a piano rondo by Ludwig van Beethoven. It is better known by the title "Rage Over a Lost Penny, Vented in a Caprice" (from German: Die Wut über den verlorenen Groschen, ausgetobt in einer Caprice). This title appears on the autograph manuscript, but not in Beethoven's hand, and has been attributed to his friend Anton Schindler. It is a favourite with audiences and is frequently performed as a show piece. Despite the late opus number, the work is now dated between 1795 and 1798. Beethoven left the piece unpublished and incomplete; it was published in 1828 by Anton Diabelli, who obscured the fact that it had been left unfinished.
The piece is Allegro vivace (fast and lively). Here, the influence of some classical-ear greats (notably Haydn, perhaps Mozart) is somewhat conspicuous. Simple melody running in broken chords would be much expanded throughout the whole piece, testing almost any modulation one could have imagined. But the sharp contrast on dynamics, mood and temperament swing is truly Beethoven's. The indication alla ingharese is of interest, as no such word as "ingharese" exists in standard Italian. To people of Beethoven's day, "gypsy music" and "Hungarian music" were synonymous terms. Beethoven seems to have conflated alla zingarese (in the gypsy style) and all'ongarese (in the Hungarian style) to come up with a unique term alla ingharese.
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