DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (June 20, 2020)
We already discussed the deep influence that the poet, Friedrich Schiller, had on Beethoven. This was not limited to the Beethoven’s composition of the Ninth Symphony.
Beethoven and Schiller shared a common love of Shakespeare. Schiller wrote a poem called “Shakespeare's Ghost”, and many of his plays addressed Shakespeare's themes. As a boy, Beethoven was privileged to see several Shakespearean plays presented at the National Theater in Bonn. The Elector Max Franz had made it a public theater, and the theater director Gustav Grossman presented many works by Schiller and Shakespeare, as well as operas that Grossman co-wrote with Beethoven's piano teacher Neefe. Shakespeare's genius was regarded as universal. The Jewish philosopher, Moses Mendelssohn (grandfather of Felix Mendelssohn), translated “Hamlet” into German:
Sein, oder nicht sein
Das, ist die Frage!
Beethoven owned a 12 volume translation of Shakespeare by Eschenburg, and later acquired what he found to be a better translation by Schlegel, which he later offered to his friend Countess Malfatti.
References to Shakespeare pepper Beethoven's correspondences. He especially liked to invoke the notion of Sir John Falstaff, Shakespeare's overweight, over-sensuous comedic knight. Notice Shakespeare’s pun on Falstaff's name: The prophet Isaiah refers to bread as the "staff of life." But if you over-consume in whatever the sensuous delight, you are basing your life on a "False Staff." Beethoven made fun of his own overweight string quartet leader Schuppanzigh, in this hilarious canon, “Falstafferel”:
We have already identified Shakespeare's role in the "Ghost Trio"(May 5th post), and in the "Coriolan Overture" (May 29th post).
Other references to Skakespeare include the Piano Sonata No. 17 in D minor, Op. 31, No. 2 (composed 1801-2). When Schindler asked Beethoven what this new sonata was about, Beethoven replied, " Read Shakespeare's Tempest." It has since been known as "The Tempest" sonata.
ROMEO AND JULIET: In his sketches for his String Quartet Op. 18, No. 1, 2nd movement, Beethoven invoked Shakespeare's scene where Romeo enters Juliet's tomb. When his friend Karl Amenda, after hearing it remarked that it reminded him of two lovers parting, Beethoven responded: "Good, I was thinking of the burial vault scene of Juliet."
Shakespeare's play was already over 200 years old when Beethoven was born. Yet, composers of the time lived and breathed poetic ideas. It is as if they could read each other's minds! Near the end of the second movement, Beethoven clearly elicited the death scene. Over his sketches, towards the end of the movement, he wrote, in French:
“il prend le tombeau,” (he enters the tomb) “despoir,” (despair) “il se tue,” ( he kills himself),
and “les dernier soupirs,” (the last sighs)
You can hear how that idea dramatically changes the movement beginning at 7:17, without disrupting it. It has been prepared. Beethoven did not enter those words into the final score. He was wary of the type of literal representation that would soon arise. Yet, the reference is unmistakable.
On June 15th, we posted a little known gem. Piano Sonata No. 7 in D major, Op. 10, No. 3. Although we have no direct reference, the slow movement also strikes us as a work that must have such a dramatic scene from great literature as its origin. We post that single movement again. Tell us if you hear the drama in this context.