Moonlight Sonata is one of Beethoven's most popular compositions for the piano. Its original title Sonata quasi una fantasia translates as Sonata Fantasy. The name Mondscheinsonate comes from descriptions used by Ludwig Rellstab, a German music critic and poet who likened the effect of the first movement to that of moonlight shining upon Lake Lucerne. Beethoven's student Carl Czerny called it a nocturnal scene, in which a mournful ghostly voice sounds from the distance.
