Haydn's sense of humor is often brought up in reference to the broad joke of the "Surprise" Symphony, but there is more to it than that. Many works possess a durable wit that rewards the careful listener; the twists of imagination in the present sonata displays Haydn's wit at its best. The work was composed in 1773; its minuet and trio, interestingly, are arrangements of those in the Symphony No. 47.

The music of the first movement is formal, with voice weaving against voice, and powered with arpeggiated chords and outbursts of rapid short notes imaginatively slurred. A steady left hand keeps the music on course, restraining its extravagant abundance. The pace is brisk. The second movement (the minuet) is a short piece of cleverness. Its themes are reversible, and the effect is that of impudent humor, with a brash display of legerdemain. The last movement is remarkably even shorter, less than a minute in length. Its helter-skelter theme flies on a run of notes and plunges to an end that is less an end than a stop.

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