Movement I - Measures 5 to 8

Measures 5 -6 seem straightforward enough to transcribe:

These measures almost make you wonder if Beethoven was thinking in terms of a string quartet when he originally wrote the sonata. If so, perhaps that's why he chose this particular sonata to arrange.

Curiously, Beethoven does make one change to these measures. In the viola part (first half of measure six), he adds a staccato to the quarter-note C. Why this C and not the corresponding Cs in the violin parts, I wonder. Is it a misprint?

Measures 7-8 are as follows:

Again, this is straightforward four-part writing. In the transcription audio below, my only changes were to the pianistic ornaments. I eliminated the arpeggio at the start of measure eight, and I executed the turn before the beat rather than on the beat as notated (since executing the turn in the first violin while the second violin was playing a unison C would sound muddy).

Beethoven's arrangement of these measures is as follows:

Beethoven also moved the turn before the beat. But instead of simply eliminating the arpeggio, he added a fortepiano to the cello part, which has a similar effect. Perhaps he would have written a fortepiano to begin with if the piano were capable of executing it.

He also strengthened this beat by adding a staccato chord in the second violin and viola and changed beat four of the previous measure to lead into this chord. He added an E in the second violin part to lead into the F. And, once he had the upper two parts moving on the last eighth note, it made sense to have the viola part moving on the last eighh note as well for a better ensemble sound. Thus he change the quarter-note B-flat to C followed by B-flat. These same changes occur at the end of measure eight.

One final change is to eliminate the tied C in the melody going into measure nine. He adds a staccato to the eighth-note C in order to rearticulate the C on the first beat of measure nine. So far, many of Beethoven's changes seem to consist of ensuring a firm articulation of the first beat of each measure.

You can hear the effect of Beethoven's changes below. I faithfully rendered the curious staccato in measure six. You can decide for yourself if it adds anything.