carulli: petite concerto in e minor

This is probably my favorite Carulli concerto (though his Concerto for Flute and Guitar has in it's second movement one of the prettiest themes I've ever heard) written around 1820 or so. The opening theme on the guitar is very cool and not too hard to play but sounds like it's hard to play -- this sort of rare occurrence needs to be relished!

When I first heard the piece I wondered why the 3rd movement had the same theme as the first. I then realized that the entire work (in it's petiteness) is really just one movement -- a sonata-allegro form movement -- spread out over three movements in this concerto. This works well, of course, because the sonata form is in its broadest consideration tripartite, consisting of an Exposition, Development and Recapitulation.

So in this particular instance Carulli distributes this form as follows:

1st movement: 1st theme in e minor, 2nd theme in G major.
2nd movement: a slow movement in G major (the 2nd movement usually being a slow movement) which works its way back to e minor.
3rd movement: 1st theme in e minor, 2nd theme in e minor.

This seems like a very inventive way to get a lot of mileage out of a little bit of material -- an eternal quest after all. Not to mention that the material is exceptionally beautiful, at times sounding like parts of Beethoven's Violin Concerto (really it does), and at other times using themes that would not sound out of place in Vivaldi.