Just a thought. Why do students often learn to play JUST the 1st movement of a concerto be it piano or violin? Does that not detract from its beauty or its natural flow in totality? I'm only curious and wondering...not a serious discussion.

Tess

Maybe because the other movements are more technically advanced, and too difficult for them at this stage of their study? Take the Cimarosa-Benjamin Oboe Concerto as an example - the Siciliana is a Grade 5 piece, but the other movements are on the list for Grade 7; right now I can hack through the other movements but wouldn't be able to play them well enough to perform them as the composer intended.

If it's of any interest, for list B of the AVCM piano syllabus you only learn the first movement of one sonata from a choice...not sure why, but it's the first movement for all of them

The first movement in most major sonatas and concertos is usually the longest and most serious movement. In sonata form, you will have two contrasting themes which gives the movement balance and variety as well as unity, which makes the first movement satisying as a whole.

Also bear in mind that some young musicians would find it difficult to learn and/or memorise and entire sonata/concerto. The first movement enables them to demonstrate many of their skills, whereas slow movements are usually just for expressive playing, finales for virtuosic skill (to generalise). First movements are usually the most famous for their memorable themes.

I think as oboebunny says it's simply a matter of technical ability and time constraints. (Although we could ask why Classic FM only play a recording of one movement of a concerto when leaving the CD on isn't hard but that's a different question ). It's not only the technical difficulty of the other movements being harder than the chosen movement but the fact that learning a whole long piece is quite an undertaking in itself.

I seem to recall that for some woodwind instruments (I use this example as it doesn't happen so much in piano music as the repertoire is larger) certain sonatas/concerti appear with, for example, one movement on the grade 5 syllabus, one on the grade 7 syllabus and one on the grade 8 syllabus, with the entire sonata being on the dipABRSM or LRSM syllabus. One could argue that a grade 8 student would be able to play the whole piece as it's all within their technical grasp; but the stamina required to play the whole piece, and the ability to tackle long works are skills in themselves. It can be quite a daunting undertaking to tackle a long piece, knowing where to start is important. Of course a performance at diploma level will be expected to be better than one at grade levels as well. Furthermore, if a diploma level player has to tackle a grade 5 level movement it will consume less of their time than it will for a grade 6 level player: thus more can be taken for granted and more ground can be covered in the same time (not that it will take no work on expression etc.): it's not trivial that a grade 8 player can musically play grade 6 pieces instantly for example.

It's actually quite usual to find the middle movements at the grade levels (in piano sonatas, I don't know about other instruments) since, as Hannah points out, these are usually the technically easier movements requiring expression more than technical wizardry.

Quite!