New Beethoven Piece Discovered in Berlin

An Australian musicologist has uncovered what he believes is the last piano work ever written by Ludwig Van Beethoven in a Berlin library. Peter McCallam, professor of musicology at Sydney University made the discovery whilst studying Beethoven's final music sketchbook.

Deciphering the composer's notoriously tricky shorthand, McCallam found 32 bars of piano music yet to have come to the public's attention. The professor believes they were written just months before the composer's death in March 1827.

The Telegraph reported McCallum as saying that the 54 second piece was quite melancholy but "rather charming and quite simple. It's also got a rather nice quality and it's not difficult to play so it would suit young children. It's got a few little unusual harmonic features which we don't normally associate with Beethoven."