Beethoven Symphony Cycles

[Richard Barrett]

It was of course the pure musical argument that drove him on rather than the depiction of incidental felicities

The problem for me is that the "pure musical argument" (whatever that actually means) in Beethoven's symphonies is something that excludes subtlety of instrumentation, which as kea points out is not the case in his piano and chamber music, where timbre as such is included in the way the music unfolds its structure and expression.

[vinteuil]

I find it very difficult to get involved in Beethoven's orchestral sound, which has come to sound to me predictable and/or bombastic. Maybe I should listen to Immerseel and Harnoncourt, both of whom I would think might have the potential to change that impression.

Beethoven was a remarkable orchestrator... but not for orchestra, for some reason. (The late quartets and last three piano sonatas are very unusual and effective in terms of "orchestration" if one can apply that term to them.) In terms of small bands Immerseel and Krivine are probably the most successful.
... Beethoven's symphonies are... not his best work, nor among my favourite symphonies in general, possibly excepting the last.)

... o, I so wish roehre was still among us to give a view.

I suspect I'm largely with kea and Richd: Barrett, in that my 'saving from a burning house' Beethoven wd be the quartets and the piano sonatas. All the rest can be left behind... (tho' of course there is stuff I wd miss. )

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Beethoven was a remarkable orchestrator... but not for orchestra, for some reason.

But would you want to change anything?

[kea]

But would you want to change anything?

Well orchestration is not an abstract thing, it's built into the musical material. So you're basically asking whether I'd want to listen to a different piece. Often the answer is yes (I think I listen to the Beethoven symphonies maybe two or three times a year?). When the answer is no, I want the Eroica (or whatever), I take what I'm given. For some reason Beethoven was proudest of his ability to create "conventional" music that could be divorced of its sound—see the Sonata Op. 22 for a non-symphonic example—perhaps because he grew up playing Bach (whom he greatly admired) on modern instruments, or hearing arrangements of it for chamber groups, and therefore lost sight of the fact that Bach's music is always conceived not only for the limitations of his instruments but also for the act of performance itself. >_> So the Eroica can be played on the fortepiano (and has been, quite well, by Yury Martynov) and still is essentially the same. Listening, I guess, basically requires accepting that—apart from a few passages (the trio of the scherzo, for three horns) which in themselves can come across as very naïve and banal vs. say a Haydn symphony, or in Beethoven the extraordinary use of voicing, bowing, register, etc that creates the instantly recogniseable "sound" of the quartets from Op. 59 onwards—this is music whose sound is so basic it cannot even be called trite. Just the late eighteenth century orchestra used as a way to deliver a lot of volume and counterpoint and rhythm and so on. It's interesting to hear small band PI performances mostly because they make the music sound quite a bit more... brutalist, if that's not an anachronism. It's certainly a mixed metaphor.

[EdgeleyRob]

... o, I so wish roehre was still among us to give a view.

I suspect I'm largely with kea and Richd: Barrett, in that my 'saving from a burning house' Beethoven wd be the quartets and the piano sonatas. All the rest can be left behind... (tho' of course there is stuff I wd miss. )

Roehre would maybe say leave LvB alone for a few years and come back to him afresh.
Yes I could, but don't, live without the symphonies but not the chamber or piano music.

[Richard Barrett]

I could, but don't, live without the symphonies but not the chamber or piano music.

Indeed I have no problem at all with the chamber or piano music and there are whole weeks when I listen to nothing else. But there is a problem with the symphonies, which is maybe connected with them being big public statements of some kind (Schubert's 9th is another problematic example) which somehow brings out a less radical side of the composer, I mean as concerns instrumentation in particular.

[Sir Velo]

I suspect I'm largely with kea and Richd: Barrett, in that my 'saving from a burning house' Beethoven wd be the quartets and the piano sonatas.

Ah, don't forget the string trios, op.9! Those prestos - ruddy marvellous!

[ahinton]

Ah, don't forget the string trios, op.9! Those prestos - ruddy marvellous!

Op. 9 especially! One of his best single-digit opus-numbered works.

Whilst it's probably too off-topic here, it occurs to me that, since "orchestration" has been mentoned in various guises, what does anyone think of Liszt's "pianisations" (as Grainger might have called them) of all of Beethoven's symphonies?

[Bryn]

... o, I so wish roehre was still among us to give a view.

I suspect I'm largely with kea and Richd: Barrett, in that my 'saving from a burning house' Beethoven wd be the quartets and the piano sonatas. All the rest can be left behind... (tho' of course there is stuff I wd miss. )

You'd leave the Diabelli Variations and the Op.126 Bagatelles to the tender mercies of the flames? I'd save those even before the piano sonatas, though the string quartets would be the first grabbed.

[cloughie]

Op. 9 especially! One of his best single-digit opus-numbered works.

Whilst it's probably too off-topic here, it occurs to me that, since "orchestration" has been mentoned in various guises, what does anyone think of Liszt's "pianisations" (as Grainger might have called them) of all of Beethoven's symphonies?

I like them and also his Berlioz Fantastique.

[Beef Oven!]

I like them and also his Berlioz Fantastique.

[silvestrione]

Indeed I have no problem at all with the chamber or piano music and there are whole weeks when I listen to nothing else. But there is a problem with the symphonies, which is maybe connected with them being big public statements of some kind (Schubert's 9th is another problematic example) which somehow brings out a less radical side of the composer, I mean as concerns instrumentation in particular.

I think this is just wromg. There is a marvellous new sound going with the musical invention/argument in the symphonies. Examples abound, but think of the Trio of the second movememnt of the 9th, the trombones in the coda of the first movement of 9th, the whole slow movement of the 6th (see Tovey's analysis: he thinks the instrumentation there a matter of genius), the magical scoring of the last (is it?) variation of the slow movement of the 5th, the scoring of the return of the Scherzo in the 5th (twice of course)....etc., etc.

[Bryn]

I think this is just wromg. There is a marvellous new sound going with the musical invention/argument in the symphonies. Examples abound, but think of the Trio of the second movememnt of the 9th, the trombones in the coda of the first movement of 9th, the whole slow movement of the 6th (see Tovey's analysis: he thinks the instrumentation there a matter of genius), the magical scoring of the last (is it?) variation of the slow movement of the 5th, the scoring of the return of the Scherzo in the 5th (twice of course)....etc., etc.

Yeh, but Lenny Bernstein (who IIRC got someone else to orchestrate his East Side Story) said Beethoven was a mediocre orchestrator so ...

[Richard Barrett]

I think this is just wromg.

Certainly there are moments when the instrumentation becomes more imaginative, and I did already mention that I listen to the 6th more often than the others (and sometimes the slow movement on its own), but in general I would say his treatment of the orchestra is less radical than his treatment of string quartet or piano. Whether this is actually the reason I prefer the sound of his work in the latter areas I don't really know. I wouldn't claim Beethoven was a "mediocre orchestrator", I'm sure he knew exactly what he was aiming at and how to achieve it.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

but in general I would say his treatment of the orchestra is less radical than his treatment of string quartet or piano.

I wonder if this is because the sound of the Beethoven orchestra became the fundamental sound of orchestral performance in the 19th Century and into the 20th? Certainly, Beethoven's contemporaries were astonished by the new orchestral sounds that he produced, right from the First Symphony - referred to as the Harmonie Symphony because of its radical use of woodwind instruments: far more prominent and independent than anything even in Haydn and Mozart.

(JEG's Beethoven Symphony cycle always sounds "bombastic" and glaring to me - for what that's worth: ideas about phrasing and articulation, too, about as subtle as a Millwall fan's boot in the face of a Chelsea supporter. And yet his Missa Solemnis recordings are astonishingly good: and that work, too, demonstrates Beethoven's mastery of orchestral colour and texture.

One of the multitudes of wonders of the Krivine Beethoven cycle is the gleeful rediscovery and realization of the potential of the instrumental timbres of these becoming-underrated masterpieces. Along with pulse, rhythm, attitude, balance ... and the sheer joyful swagger.)