Part 3: Beethoven Shares his Creative Method with the World

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 23, 2020)

The Ninth Symphony

Part 3: Beethoven Shares his Creative Method with the World

A great work of art is almost always presented to the world as a finished product. We admire the artist for his or her creativity, but what their actual creative discoveries were, is something that usually cannot be shared with us.

Beethoven knew that he would have to doing something very unusual in this symphony, for all of the reasons discussed in parts 1 and 2. It did not require discoveries of the every-day sort, but creative breakthroughs. His aide-de camp, Anton Schindler remarked:

“When he reached the development of his fourth movement, there began a struggle such as is seldom seen. The object was to find a proper manner of introducing Schiller's Ode. One day, entering the room, he exclaimed 'I have it! I have it!'”

Why did Beethoven struggle so hard to find the proper manner of introducing the Ode to Joy? We believe that he wished to share his method of creative discovery with the entire world. As a section of the “Ode to Joy” marked 'chorus', says:

Seid umschlungen Millionen,

Diesen kuss der ganzen welt.

(We embrace thee, O ye millions',

This kiss is for all the world.)

One might expect the 4th movement to simply commence with the “Ode to Joy”. Put yourselves in the mindset of the audience at the world premier in 1825. They had been sitting listening for just short of an hour, and the chorus was patiently waiting to sing. They expected a resolution. Beethoven, however, was not going to simply give them the “Ode to Joy”; he would have them share in its discovery-its genesis! That is part of the joy!

The movement opens with a loud, dissonant fanfare by the entire orchestra, followed by the cellos and double basses playing a frantic single line of music, which almost sounds as if they were talking to us.

In fact, they are!

Beethoven instructed this section to be played “Selon le charactere d'un recitative, mais en tempo (According to the character of a recitative, but in tempo)”. A recitative in opera often has an unsettled, urgent quality to it; and it occurs when the singers are either speaking, or part-speaking and part-singing.

Beethoven did not write words for those recitative-like sections in the finished work, but he did in his sketch books. It shows that Beethoven begins in a state of profound crisis. It's a personal crisis for Beethoven as he asks himself how he can accomplish the task of setting Schiller's poem in such a way, that the music itself awakens the kind of joy that the poem does? How does he find something higher than what he has done up to now? He wrote in one sketch: “These raucous sounds will not do!”

Though his sketches can be difficult to decipher, some 19th century sleuths did an excellent job in making their meaning clear. Rather than describing them in one place, and playing the music in another, we put together this short 3-minute video, which matches them clearly.

Those who do not know the entire symphony are at a bit of a disadvantage. His short quotes from each of the first three movements will not unleash the spring of memories in you that they should. We hope that as you come to know the entire symphony, the richness of this introduction will grow for you. Even so, it is powerful.

The composer, Richard Wagner, once said that Beethoven was rejecting each of his previous movements in the opening of the fourth. That is not true! He composed them in order to lead up to the 4th movement. All first three movements are beautiful. But Beethoven is showing us how to surpass what we thought was even the highest beauty. He had to find a new level of humanity!

As you see, he walks us through that discovery in his sketchbook!

We also include this video of the fourth movement where you may follow the score!

For more Daily Dose, go to: www.ffrcc.org

The Ninth Symphony: Beethoven's Great Gift to Humanity Part 2: The Apollo Project

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 22, 2020)

In 1961, President John F Kennedy gave a speech at Rice University that electrified Americans young and old. He said:

"We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills."

The speech gave birth to the Apollo Project. The nation rallied, and on July 20, 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon for all mankind.

Beethoven's Ninth Symphony was like the Apollo project, in that it required creative discoveries to accomplish something new for all mankind.

It was also composed under conditions of tremendous adversity. In 1815, after the final defeat of Napoleon, the Congress of Vienna came together to create a balance among the European powers: to prevent future wars and maintain peace and stability; and to restore Europe’s royal families to the thrones they held before the Napoleonic Wars. The conservatism of the Congress of Vienna also gradually introduced police-state measures in the name of peace.

Europe was war-weary, and people willingly sacrificed their freedoms in order to be assured peaceful lives. The 1819 German satirical cartoon (picture below), of gagged members of a "Thinkers Society", expresses the situation well.

Many poets of the time decided that it is safer to write about nature than politics, which could get one into trouble. While many poets willfully "dumbed themselves down'' in order to get along, a few brave souls went in the other direction. The great English poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley, was one of them. His famous states that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world", echoing Schiller's admonition to artists: “The future of mankind is in you hands. With you it shall sink, or with you it shall rise."

In 1819, the growing repression of civil rights in England led to the Peterloo Massacre, ordered personally by the then British Prime Minister Castlereagh. Shelley, in his poem “The Mask of Anarchy”, addresses it heads on:

I met Murder on the way-

He had a mask like Castlereagh-

Very smooth he looked, yet grim,

Seven blood-hounds followed him;

In such environment, one can either degenerate or meliorate. Beethoven decided to organize his energies and skills, in order to develop his creative powers. He wants to find a way to unite and uplift mankind in such a way that great music can do. But that music had not been written yet!

In 1823, he began working out an idea he had carried around for at least three decades: the setting of Schiller's “Ode to Joy”. He knew though, that it could only work if he did something creative, something entirely new and unprecedented!

What did that involve? It required introducing the human voice into a symphony, something that had never been done before. It also required creating an entirely new form. Modern critics throw up their hands and pronounce the fourth movement "free fantasy form". As we shall see, the form of the movement, and the entire symphony, is determined by the poem.

We leave you with another video that introduces a single step in the process: the first time in the work that those 8 lines of the poem are sung with the melody.

The 9th Symphony: Beethoven's Love for all Mankind Part 1: The Poem

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 21, 2020)\

In the 4th movement of his Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125, Beethoven accomplishes a miracle. It combines the most advanced contrapuntal development, with one of the most the beloved songs in the world: a song that most people know, and everyone can sing.

The song is his setting of a poem, "An die Freude" (Ode to Joy), by the great poet Friedrich Schiller, whose importance to Beethoven we have discussed in several of the Daily Doses. Beethoven once remarked: "In order to set a poem correctly, the composer must rise above the poet... Who can do that in the case of Schiller?”

Beethoven expressed his desire to set this poem to music as early as 1793. The Ninth Symphony was premiered in 1825. What did Beethoven see in this poem that motivated him for over 30 years? What challenges did it posed for him that it took 30 years?

Here are the first 8 lines, in the original German.

An die Freude

Freude, schöner Götterfunken,

Tochter aus Elysium,

Wir betreten feuertrunken,

Himmlische, dein Heiligtum!

Deine Zauber binden wieder

Was die Mode streng geteilt;

Alle Menschen werden Brüder

Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.

There are a couple of points that are important to know. The first line: “Freude, schöner Götterfunken”, means “Joy, the most beautiful of God's sparks”.

“Götterfunken” (God's sparks), is a word coined by Johann Georg Adam Forster (1754-1794), a German naturalist, ethnologist, travel writer, journalist, and revolutionary, in his tribute to a great American, Benjamin Franklin. What are “God's sparks”? Why, the electricity Franklin was investigating; but also, the divine spark of reason that resides in every human soul, that allows us to make such scientific discoveries! Thus “Götterfunken” is a great pun, which Schiller seized on.

Here are a few quotes from Forster's beautiful tribute to Franklin:

“As long as humanity requires the power of example, we will have the name of Benjamin Franklin. He preached with incorruptible reason of Freedom, Justice, Peace, Brotherly Love, Love and mutual Tolerance...The moral freedom, the holy respect for Reason in every individual human being... we owe to him.

“Benjamin Franklin! Noble shadow! Let your teachings move the peoples of the world, let them know your great, unforgettable example. I hear your voice, I hear your words, I will never forget them! “You, children of Europe! Honor the divine spark (Götterfunken) of Reason within you, and perfect it through its use. Freedom can be achieved by virtue alone. Virtue is possible only through reason."

Thus joy, for Schiller, is the joy of creativity, the joy of making the kind of scientific and artistic discoveries which contribute to human progress; discoveries made possible by the divine spark of reason, of creativity, that resides within every one of us.

Schiller considered substituting "Freiheit” (freedom), for “Freude” (joy). It seems like a higher concept. He stuck with Freude though, because the joy of creativity in art, science, and statecraft, is the very source of freedom.

Continuing on:

Tochter aus Elysium

(Daughter of Elysium)—Elysium, for the Greeks, was where heroes went in the afterlife.

Wir betreten feuertrunken,

(We approach, drunk with fire)—meaning filled with the divine spark, Götterfunken )

Himmlische, dein Heiligtum!

(Heavenly one, your Holy throne!)

Deine Zauber binden wieder

(Your magic will bring together)

Was die Mode streng geteilt;

(What stern customs have kept apart)

Alle Menschen werden Brüder

(All mankind will become as brothers)

Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.

(Where your gentle wings abide.)

What a beautiful idea! Schiller is talking about uniting humanity and ending discrimination (what stern customs have kept apart). He does not propose that be done by an artificial means (he was not a Social Justice Warrior), but by the only means possible, that which makes us all human: by developing that divine spark of creativity which resides in each and every human being, regardless of race, creed, or sex.

What could be more joyous, and how big of a challenge was it, to set this poem to music, in a way that the music itself would create that sense of universal brotherhood?! It was a life-long project for Beethoven, but a successful one.

We provide this video of a flash-mob performance in Peru. You will see how people cannot help but become happy! Little kids conduct from lamp-posts. The joy is infectious.

Beethoven's Sense of Humor Part 2: "To beat, or not to beat."

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 20, 2020)

Beethoven's Sense of Humor

Part 2: "To beat, or not to beat."

On April 13, in part 1 of Beethoven’s humor, we wrote about “Rage of a Lost Penny”. Today, we talk about the humor in Beethoven’s 8th symphony.

Johann Nepomuk Maelzel tried his hand at Artificial Intelligence about two centuries ago. It did not work out so well for him. In 1821, he brought an automaton chess player called “the Turk” to the United States and toured widely with it, claiming to have invented it and that the “automaton” had the intelligence to regulate its moves. This fraud was later exposed by Edgar Allan Poe in an essay. It turned out that his automatic chess player contained a man hidden inside it (picture below). The machine was in fact invented by Wolfgang von Kempelen and bamboozled the public for decades before being discovered.

Maelzel also claimed to have invented the metronome. Actually, he did not invent that either.

In 1813, Maelzel encouraged Beethoven to compose what could possibly be his worst piece, "Wellington's Victory", which celebrates Wellington’s military victory over Napoleon. Maelzel laid out all of the parameters and special effects to make it sound like a battle, including quotes of "Rule Britannia." Performances featured interludes by Maelzel's automaton trumpeter and his Panharmonikon, an automatic orchestra.

Despite the composition’s commercial success, Beethoven ended up suing Maelzel when he tried to pass the work off as his own. Beethoven described him as "a rude, churlish man, entirely devoid of education or cultivation."

Listen to this canon that maked fun of Maelzel and his metronome.

These days, scholars who love to spoil all the fun, claim that the canon was actually written by Beethoven's aide-de-camp, Anton Schindler, and passed off as praise for Maelzel by Beethoven. That does not quite make sense. Here are the words of the canon:

Ta ta ta, dear Maelzel

ta ta ta, live well, very well

ta ta ta, you Banner of Time

ta ta ta, you great metronome.

ta ta ta ta ta ta.

Faint praise indeed. Besides, Schindler was very critical of taking Beethoven's metronome markings literally, because he personally had experienced Beethoven change his mind about what tempo his works should be taken at. Beethoven alleged comment to Schindler: “No more metronome! Anyone who can feel the music right does not need it; and for anyone who can’t, nothing is of any use; he runs away with the whole orchestra anyway.”

Now to Beethoven's 8th symphony. The second movement resembles this canon. The same scholars argue that the symphony came before Maelzel patented his metronome, so it could not be a parody of it.

Give us a break! In the symphony, Beethoven is clearly making fun of a too strict tempo. But we ask you, the audience to listen and tell us what you think!

The Third Symphony's Finale: Creativity, and Heroic Humor

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 19, 2020)

The Third Symphony's Finale: Creativity, and Heroic Humor

In two recent episodes of Daily Doses of Beethoven, we examined the monumental first movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 “Eroica”, which addresses the idea of a hero—a world-historic figure. We also heard his epic second movement, a Funeral March, expressing the loss felt at the demise of such a Heroic. How did Beethoven combine such seemingly irreconcilable opposites, to bring about a satisfactory conclusion to his "Eroica" symphony?

Today we present the amazing fourth movement. The great French poet, Francois Rabelais, expressed it best when he said "laughter is appropriate to man”. Heroism always involves creativity, and thus laughter and joy!

After a brief fanfare, we hear a simple, yet playful theme, in 2/4 time, played pizzicato, with long rests between the notes.

Eb /Bb /Bb /Eb /Eb /D /Eb /E /F /D /Eb /A /Bb (repeat).

Bb Bb Bb/ /Bb /A /G /A /A /Bb /Bb /Eb (repeat)

https://soundcloud.com/user-385773006/creativity-and

At first hearing, the audience must have been asking themselves if Beethoven was being serious. Such a trivial theme to end such a titanic work? The theme however, came from the Finale of Beethoven's only ballet, “The Creatures of Prometheus”. In ancient Greek drama, Prometheus was a God, a Titan, who defied the head God, Zeus, by giving the gifts of fire—the gift of knowledge of science and art to man. Beethoven would never have treated such a concept in a trivial manner. He lived for it.

Sometimes though, Beethoven would put a theme forward as an hypothesis. The proof of that hypothesis lie not in itself, but in its contrapuntal development. He developed this theme in three different works, The Finale of “The Creatures of Prometheus”, his Variations and Fugue for Piano in E♭ major, Op. 35—so called the “Eroica Variations”, and this symphony. It starts out simple, but grows.

However, if you compare the opening of the symphonic movement to the Finale of the ballet, you might be hard pressed to find the resemblance. That’s because Beethoven does not quote the main theme, but the underlying, and scarcely heard bass line—the foundation—as his source.

This symphonic movement is a “Theme and Variations”. We have heard two such movements in this series, the “Variations on God Save the King” on April 7th, and the slow movement of his Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1 No. 3, on March 31st (look back on those posts to see where we gave the times of each variation.)

If you wish to hear Beethoven's tremendous progress over a few short years, simply make the comparison. The earlier works are inventive, but relatively linear by comparison. The Finale of the Third Symphony is easy to follow as a set of variations for a short time (though the melody as presented in earlier versions does not enter until 2:12). At 3:09 it suddenly becomes a fugue! Try following in a linear way now!

From here on, Beethoven overturns the form, while remaining true to it. Reason, not form, must lead, if you desire to follow him. Reason alone, will allow you to understand what he is doing.

We have omitted discussing the short third movement of this great work. We leave it to your genius, to figure our where it fits.

Part 5: The Funeral March of the Third Symphony “Eroica”

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 18, 2020)

Beethoven and the Heroic

On April 14th, we presented the first movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 3, “The Eroica” (Heroic). Today, we present the second movement, “The Funeral March”. What does a funeral march have to do with the joyous celebration of creativity and courage that we heard in the first movement?

One might see the introduction of a funeral march as "killing the Vibe," and might see the sudden switch back to joy in the third movement, as undermining the seriousness of the second movement.

We again turn to Friedrich Schiller for guidance. In his “Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man”, Schiller wrote that the purpose of art is to educate our emotions so that we are able to pass from joy to sorrow, and back to joy, without losing a beat, because our intellects and emotions becomes developed in such ways that they are integrated. We remain the same person in both joy and sorrow; because we have thought through these matters and developed an inner strength, depth, and sense of self, that "looks on tempests, and is never shaken."

Beethoven's deep grief in this movement, mirrors his profound joy in the first. This movement invokes something greater than personal loss: Perhaps the grieving of an entire society over the loss of a universal leader; the changing of the course of history itself when no-one arises to fill their shoes. The cases of Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, John F Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Indira Gandhi, Socrates, and Beethoven himself, are but a few that come to mind.

At 5:00, the performance invokes a happy memory of that unique individual’s life, and of what they gave to humanity that lives on after them. At 8:12, we hear a fugal section that summons the crisis posed for the whole of society by the hole left, from the death of an unique person. That hole can come, not just at the moment of death, but at the moment of sell-out, like Napoleon.

There is a lot of life in this Funeral March. Rather than going on, we invite you share your own personal relation with Beethoven, and tell us what you hear.

Beethoven and the Heroic Part 4: The Egmont Overture

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 17, 2020)

Beethoven and the Heroic

Part 4: The Egmont Overture

The cause of human liberty and freedom led political discussion around the late 18th-early 19th century, and the poets Goethe and Schiller collaborated to tell the story of Switzerland's fight for freedom. In his play Wilhelm Tell, Schiller updated the “Rutli Oath” (taken in the year 1291), in a manner that echoed the U.S. Declaration of Independence, written almost 500 years later:

“No, there is a limit to the tyrant's power, when the oppressed can find no justice, when the burden grows unbearable-he reaches with hopeful courage up unto the heavens and seizes hither his eternal rights, which hang above, inalienable and indestructible as the stars themselves.”

It is no accident that Schiller's played was staged, with Goethe directing, in 1804, the same year as Napoleon crowned himself emperor.

Both men also wrote about the 16th century fight for the independence of the Netherlands from Spain: Schiller in his “Don Carlos” and “History of the Revolt of the Netherlands”; and Goethe, in his play “Egmont”.

If you wish to see the level of brutality presented by the Spanish Inquisition in the Netherlands, examine Pieter Breughel's 1562 painting, “The Triumph of Death”. (Painting below).

Count Egmont was a Dutch nobleman who sided both with his people and King Phillip of Spain. His peer, the much wiser William the Silent, fled Brussels, and warned him of potential betrayal by Spain's treacherous Duke of Alba. Egmont foolishly accepted a dinner invitation to discuss his grievances with Alba. He was arrested at that dinner, and soon executed, along with 1,000 others in 1568.

Though Alba was seeking to dominate through a reign of terror, it backfired on him. “Sometimes a long train of usurpations and abuses, leads people to think that they have no recourse, but to throw off such government."

Though not immediate, the execution of Egmont contributed to a popular uprising. Beethoven's “Egmont” Overture to Goethe's play, condenses the long historical process into one optimistic moment of change. Listen to this recording, and you will hear the representation of the public executions, beginning at 6:42, with the execution of Egmont coming at 7:02. After a moment of quiet sorrow and reflection, something begins to swell up, out of the silence. Beethoven's magnificent ending displays the spirit of the people, rising up against tyranny.

Beethoven and the Heroic Part 3: Leonore's Aria: A study in finding one's courage.

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 16, 2020)

Beethoven and the Heroic

Part 3: Leonore's Aria: A study in finding one's courage.

An aria in opera, is like a soliloquy in a play. The actor shares his or her struggle with their innermost self, directly with you, the audience.

Leonore gains great courage in this aria. To comprehend that though, we must return to an earlier installment, where we quoted Schiller's, "On the Pathetic":

“It is not art, to become master of feelings, which only lightly and fleetingly sweep the surface of the soul; but to retain one's mental freedom in a storm, which arouses all of sensuous nature, thereto belongs a capacity of resisting that is, above all natural power, infinitely sublime.”

If Leonore were not upset, something would be wrong. The warden of the prison, Pizarro, not knowing who she is, has just told her of his intention to murder her husband Florestan. She lacks any means to oppose him. In the first section of her Aria, she displays great anger and rage. There is no melody, and little rhythm. At 1:09 in this recording, the image of a rainbow begins to introduce a calming influence, and a degree of self control.

“You monster! Where will you go?

What have you planned in cruel fury?

The call of pity, the voice of mankind,

Will nothing move your tiger's wrath?

Though ire and anger

surge like ocean's waves

in your heart,

A rainbow still shines on my path ,

Which brightly rests on somber clouds:

It looks so calmly, peacefully at me,

Of happier days reminding me

And soothes thus my troubled heart.”

Upon contemplating the idea of a rainbow, she begins to regain her composure.

The second section of her aria, is a beautiful, slow song of hope, and inner peace, starting at 2:15

“Come hope, let not the last bright star

Be obscured in my anguish !

Light up my goal, however far,

Through love I shall still reach it.”

In the third, fast section, starting at 5:11, she finds her resolve, and becomes determined to act!

“I follow my inner calling,

I shall not waver

I derive strength

From faithfulness and love.

Oh you, for whom I bore so much,

If I could penetrate

Where malice has imprisoned you

And bring to you sweet comfort!

I follow my inner calling,

I shall not waver,

I derive strength,

From faithfulness and love.”

This is an amazing transformation, and gives us a comprehensible notion of finding one's courage, rather than a static image of a fixed courage.

How many pieces are dedicated to youth, to falling in love? Leonore sings specifically of married love, Gattenliebe. Here is a work of art dedicated to the strength of married love, and in that, it is unique.

Beethoven and the Heroic ; Part 2: Leonore

Beethoven and the Heroic

Part 2: Leonore

No-one ever portrayed a woman more heroically then Beethoven. His only opera, Fidelio, is about a woman named Leonore, who courageously disguises herself as a boy, goes into prison, risking her life, in order to rescue her husband, Florestan, who is a political prisoner. The opera was inspired by the real-life story of Adrienne LaFayette, who went into an Austrian prison, to free her husband, The Marquis de LaFayette, a hero of the American Revolution.

An Overture condenses the highlights of the entire opera into a few minutes. Beethoven was so concerned to capture her quality correctly, that he composed three different versions of a Leonore Overture to get it right. We offer here, Leonore 3, in our opinion, the best of the three.

Beethoven's enthusiasm led to a very long overture, and he ended up composing a fourth, shorter one called the Fidelio Overture. Leonore 3 is so great though, that in the early 20th century, composer/opera conductor Gustav Mahler started using it to introduce the third act of the opera. That practice became standard.

Beethoven and the Heroic; Part 1: The Eroica Symphony

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 14, 2020)

Beethoven and the Heroic

Part 1: The Eroica Symphony

Beethoven lived in a time of great hope and optimism. The world was changing, and the future looked bright.

The poet Friedrich Schiller, expressed this in “The Artists”:

“How beautifully, O man, with your branch of palm,

You stand on the century's slope

In proud and noble manliness,

With open mind, with spirits high,

Stern yet gentle, in active stillness,

The ripest son of time.”

Schiller further said to his fellow artists that they must be leaders:

“The dignity of Man into your hands is given,

Its proctector be!

It sinks with you! With you it will be risen!”

It seems that Beethoven heeded Schiller’s words. In his admiration for the success of the American Revolution and the ideals of the French Revolution, Beethoven dedicated his 3rd symphony, "The Eroica" (Heroic), to Napoleon Bonaparte, at a time when it seemed he might actually liberate mankind. When Napoleon crowned himself Emperor in 1804, Beethoven ripped out the title and said " Now, he too will trample on the rights of mankind." He rededicated it to "The memory of a Great Man."

You can hear that heroic and inspiring quality in the first movement: The crisis-ridden middle (development section) of the movement, was the longest ever written up to that point. In this recording, it lasts a full 6 minutes from 3:12 to 9:12. The Coda, or ending, is also magnificent. If the main theme, reminds us of a hero on horseback, the last minute and a half sounds more like Pegasus, the horse with wings!

Part 1: Bach's Crucifixion and Resurrection

DAILY DOSE Easter part 1! (April 11, 2020)

Part 1: Bach's Crucifixion and Resurrection

Beethoven longed to obtain a score of Bach's B Minor Mass, but never did in his lifetime. His attitude towards Bach was unambiguous. He called him the "Father of all Harmony." Bach means “stream” in German. Beethoven punned "nicht Bach, sondern Meer" (not a stream, but an ocean).

The transition from the Crucifixion to the Resurrection in Bach’s mass, is one of the most powerful moments in all of music. Yet, to hear that power, one has to reach back to performances from half a century ago, made by people who very very old back then.

Why? Is it the weakening of religious ideas? The idea is a philosophical one, about the very nature of humanity.

Beethoven's Pathetique sonata, in 3-PARTS (the second of the C-Minor Series)

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 10, 2020)

Beethoven's Pathetique sonata, in 3-PARTS (the second of the C-Minor Series)

Part 3: The slow movements

There is a dialogue between Mozart and Beethoven about {beauty}, in the slow movements of the Piano Sonata in C-minor K457 (Mozart) and Piano Sonata No. 8 “Pathetique” (Beethoven)—movements which sang! Later, Johannes Brahms joined in the fun. So, we also include the slow movement from Brahms’s Piano Sonata No. 3.

This short audio isolates the passages where the great composers lovingly quote their predecessors.

AUDIO FILE: https://soundcloud.com/user-385773006/brahs

For your enjoyment, we include good performances of the slow movements from all three composers!

https://youtu.be/jrpeZHWrx5Q

https://youtu.be/0DiWHX8JNxw

https://youtu.be/rrX9dz1HHoo

Beethoven Irish and Scottish Songs

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 9, 2020)

Beethoven and the Folk Song

Folk song and Classical music are not commonly linked as equals. Yet, contrary to common conceptions, Classical music has never been high-brow or elitist. It always been an intervention to educate and up-lift people. That includes the Folk Song. Dvorak set to do that for the African-American spiritual, Brahms made arrangements for many German folk songs, and earlier, Bach made entire Cantatas out of simple Lutheran hymns.

Beethoven made equal contributions to this effort. Haydn and Beethoven were commissioned to make arrangements for several Irish and Scottish folks. Here is Beethoven’s setting of “Auld Lang Syne”, written by the Scottish poet, Robbie Burns. We ask you to ask the question: is Beethoven's setting adequate?

https://youtu.be/dhfCtq3Vzi8

Because these works were commissioned and because he did not speak English, it is sometimes assumed that Beethoven just casually whipped off the lot and they are often treated accordingly. Good performances can be hard to find. However, we offer here a set of powerful performances of both Beethoven’s arrangement of Scottish and Irish songs. If you click on “show more”, you will see the names, artists and starting times.

If one studies the score, Beethoven's “Auld Lang Syne” is full of riches. Perhaps some of our readers will undertake realizing them.

Beethoven Piano Sonata "Pathetique" In C-Minor part II

DAILY DOSE OF BEETHOVEN (April 8, 2020)

Beethoven's Pathetique sonata, in 3-PARTS (the second of the C-Minor Series)

Part 2: The key of C Minor: Music as Science

Part 1 discussed the nature of pathos and passion. Now, we address the science of the composition. Albert Einstein wrote of how his scientific discoveries were often inspired by musical intuition. Great composers followed the lead of great scientists in passing investigations down, often from generation to generation, for the benefit of humanity. Yet, that science is not a mere cold reason. Passion plays deeply into the scientific discovery. (We urge you to consider this together with the Daily Dose on Beethoven's Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1 #3).

First, we provide a short audio file to accompany the text. Though the text and the audio are complimentary, we strongly suggest following both at the same time. Even professional musicians may not be familiar with some of the ideas presented here.

CLICK HERE FOR AUDIO: https://soundcloud.com/user-385773006/beethoven-pathetique

Main Text and audio:

The first 5 tones of the Royal Theme in Bach's Musical Offering, go as follows, C-Eb-G-Ab-B.

That consists of a minor triad, C-Eb-G, and a downward leap of a diminished 7th, Ab-B.

It has several polyphonic implications, i.e.: what will happen as other voices are added?

C-G is a perfect fifth. There are half-tone intervals implied in that diminished 7th, Ab-B, and its relationship to the fifth, C-G. G to Ab is a half tone up. C to B is a halftone down. Those two inverted motions, change the perfect 5th, G to C, to the diminished 7th, Ab-B. The diminished 7th implies the tritone, or Lydian interval, that divides the octave in half, such as C to F#.

Bach had addressed the half-tone motions, over 20 years earlier, in his G Minor Fugue (Well-Tempered-Clavier, Book 1, https://youtu.be/_YYAY8fgd5w?t=129)

D-Eb-G-F#-G

Mozart, after discovering Bach, composed his sonata in C Minor, K457. It begins with the C Minor triad, rising over 2 octaves C-Eb-G-C-Eb, and is answered by the fifth, G-CCC and the diminished 7th, Ab-BB.

Mozart was not satisfied and subsequently, composed his Fantasy in C Minor, K475. It adds another implied interval—the tritone, or Lydian interval. In the case of C Minor, that tone is F#.

C-Eb-F#-G-Ab-C-B. -Compare that to Bach's C-Eb-G-Ab-B.

There is a signature here. Mozart begins both pieces with three voices singing a single line, in octaves. The opening tones of the sonata are the octaves, C3, C4, and C5. The same holds true for the Fantasy.

Beethoven begins his "Pathetique" Sonata, Op.13, with the same triple octave (though other notes are filled in.) It is a clear, and deliberate reference to Mozart (and Bach). His earlier Op.1 #3, also began with a single line of music in octaves.

Please listen to the audio for ease of reference.

The tail of Beethoven's first phrase, F#ACEb to GBD, matches Mozart's F#ACEb to GBD, followed by AbCF#—GBD.

So here we have it! The greatest passion, integrated with the coolest science! Yet, we are only scratching the surface.

We include again the entire performance of this great work, performed by Claudio Arrau.

Stay tuned for Part 3!

Beethoven Piano Sonata "Pathetique" in C minor

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 7, 2020)

Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata, in 3-PARTS (the second of the C-Minor Series)

Part One: Why is this work called "Pathetic"?

We first discussed the C-Minor Series around Beethoven Piano Trio in C minor, Op.1 #3, composed in 1795.

Beethoven's electrifying Piano Sonata #8 in C minor, op.13, known as the "Pathetique”, was composed three years later in 1798, when he was 28 years of age. It shook the musical world. Nothing like it had ever been heard. Today, we often listen passively, like it is old hat. Put yourself in the shoes of someone hearing it for the first time, and imagine the shock they felt.

Though it was his publisher who chose to call it "Grand Sonate Pathetique", Beethoven approved of the title! Why would he approve of his work being called pathetic? Perhaps the word meant something different back then than it means today. Throughout this series, we will identify how the kindred spirits of Beethoven and the great poet Friedrich Schiller collaborated, though they never met. We have to consult Schiller in order to understand what pathetic actually means.

In his essay, On the Pathetic Schiller wrote:

“Representation of suffering (pathos)-as mere suffering-is never the end of art, but, as a means to that end, it is extremely important. The ultimate end of art is the representation of the super-sensuous, and the tragic art in particular effects this...in that it makes sensuous, our moral independence from the laws of nature, in a state of emotion.

“Only the resistance, which it expresses to the power of the emotions, makes the free principle in us recognizable; that resistance, however, can be estimated only according to the strength of the attack...nature must have first demonstrated... its entire might before our eyes..

“It is not art, to become master of feelings, which only lightly and fleetingly sweep the surface of the soul. But, to retain one's mental freedom in a storm, which arouses all of sensuous nature, belongs to a capacity of resisting that is above all natural power; that is infinitely sublime.”

Thus, the Pathetique sonata, is not born out of personal suffering, nor does it wish to make us feel sorry for the individual who suffers—a feeling which, however heartfelt, cannot change anything. Rather, it demonstrates to us the potential to bring about change, by summoning something deep within, that rallies us to: "take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them."

We provide a recording of the first movement, by the late Claudio Arrau, who resisted an overly-rushed tempo. We will discuss the scientific aspect, in the next episode.

Stay tuned.

Seven Variations on God Save the King

DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (April 6, 2020)

Intermezzo: Beethoven on the Banjo? Is this sacrilege?

Classical musicians often rightly resent so-called crossover deeply. Definitions of what is classical have over the years, evolved (or devolved) and standards lowered. So, what happens when a bluegrass musician study classical intensely enough not only to imitate it, in a vague way, but perform It competently? What if we told that a beautiful version of Beethoven could be performed on the banjo? Would you call us mad, "plucky" jerks?

Bluegrass musician, Bela Fleck, who was born into a family of classical musicians, decided that if he was about to embark in performances of classical music, he had better not just imitate it, but do it right. He sought out the perfect banjo, a 1920's GIbson, and strung it with gut strings. He teamed up with famed classical guitarist John Williams, to produce a version of Beethoven's piano piece, Variations on God save the King, for banjo and guitar.

What ? God Save the King? Banjo and guitar? Beethoven wrote that he must show the English what treasures resided in their national anthem. Not treasures in the words, but musical treasures.

We will not identify each variation, as they are easily identifiable. To our minds, the banjo-guitar combination captures the humor, far better than the solo piano version.

Beethoven Symphony No. 5, Op. 67 Part III

DAILY DOSE OF BEETHOVEN (April 5, 2020)

The Motivfuhrung and the Fifth Symphony-A detective story in 3-PARTS

Part 3: Beyond the Flatfoots

Detectives who go by the book are sometimes known as "flatfoots". In Edgar Allan Poe's great short story "The Purloined Letter", the Parisian police act like flatfoots. Although they are very thorough and can tell if a letter has been hidden in a table leg by using a micrometer, Poe's detective, C Auguste Dupin, knows that they will not find the letter. Because he knows the MIND of his adversary. His adversary is both a mathematician, and a poet, who knows how the Parisian police thinks, and hides it in a way that he knows they will never think of.

Here again is the timing of each 5th Symphony movements:

https://youtu.be/aacV7XqTo-E

Movement 1: 0:00

Movement 2 8:14

Movement 3 18:49

Movement 4 24:36

There is a difference between the "flatfoot" method of identifying every single motif, as though it were the same as finding all the hidden airplanes in a cartoon, and motivic LEADING. That process is what we call "Think like Beethoven", and what it means to discover Plato's "The One and the Many."

The what and the what? A symphony is long, and requires a lot of concentration. In previous symphonies, each movement was integrated, and though they went together well, like a beautiful bouquet of flowers, they were separate. In Beethoven's Fifth, one have a sense of a single, unified work, that divides itself into movements, but is primarily a unity: a "one".

As Beethoven progressed, his works became longer, with many more sections, changes, phrases and notes. Yet, as his "many" grew, his unifying "one", became even stronger. What integrates the"many" into a one? A motif? It is a motivating part of the process, but the one cannot be a "thing". The work is unified by a process of change, that is guided by creative discoveries made by the composer, in the domain of the well-tempered musical system. That process of change itself, IS "the one".

What are the discoveries only a great detective would find in this work? We have to think like Beethoven. Look at the tender lyrical theme, in movement 1 at 0:59. Listen to the end of the movement at 6:45. Do we not hear the same theme in a different way? Is it still tender, or does it have the same powerful quality as the opening? Beethoven follows the poet Schiller, in the idea that the strong and powerful must also be tender and loving, and the gentle and tender must also be resolute and strong. Much as in Poe's story, Beethoven is both a musician and a poet! Through a process of change, a single motiv can take on both tenderness and strength!

Furtwangler delivers the transition from the 3rd to the 4th movement in a unique, and electrifying way, so that we hear the joy of making a great creative discovery that changes everything, as if to say " Yes, this is it!"

We recommend listening to the entire transition, from 23:45 to somewhere after 25:00

The symphony ends in a playful way, with Beethoven keeping us guessing as to whether it is finished or not!

For more daily dose, go to: https://www.ffrcc.org/daily-dose-of-beethoven

Daily dose is written by Fred Haight.

Beethoven Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, Opus. 67 Part II

DAILY DOSE OF BEETHOVEN (April 4, 2020)

The Motivfuhrung and the Fifth Symphony-A detective story in 3-PARTS

Part 2: A cold trail

We start by advancing our definition:

Motive: 1: something (such as a need or desire) that causes a person to act

2: a recurrent phrase or figure that is developed through the course of a musical composition

3: of or relating to motion or the causing of motion

Here again is the starting times of each movement of the 5th Symphony conducted Furtwangler:

Movement 1: 0:00

Movement 2 8:14

Movement 3 18:49

Movement 4 24:36

Movement 2 has puzzled many fans who love to identify the Motivfuhrung. While that four-note motif is present throughout the symphony, it is conspicuously absent in this one. The trail has gone cold. In the works of Haydn, who first discovered this type of motivic leading, it was typical for a single movement to be organized by the motivfuhrung, but not the entire four-movement piece. Is it possible that Beethoven is leading us to believe that that is the case here, by omitting that motif, so he can shock us when it comes back? What is his motive?

The third movement (starting at 18:49) begins somewhat furtively, almost tip-toes around, when suddenly at 19:16, that motif explodes onto the scene in a rather heavy-handed (or heavy-footed) manner. It's a surprise. We have not heard it for over 10 minutes. It is also different. The motiv repeats 4 times, in a long phrase of 16 notes. But, one note repeats 12 times! GGGG GGGG GGGG BbAGF. How is that possible? While it is true that other voices are moving against it, the mind hears, not in terms of notes, or even phrases, but in IDEAS. We are not hearing this as an isolated phrase, but, like a good detective, we are thinking about how it changes everything we thought we knew, up till now. We are in a new domain, uncharted waters. A cold case has been re-opened., and nothing like it has ever happened in a symphony before. Mozart had used the same motivic idea for an entire symphony, but not in such a powerful, and conspicuous way! This is something new on the face of the earth, like discovering a new continent.

The motiv adopts that furtive, sneaky quality later in the third movement. Find it!

This is obvious in the 4th movement (at 28:00), when the music stops, and puts it right under the spotlight.

But it is time to elevate the discussion. Stay tuned!

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