BaL 1.03.14 - Beethoven Symphony no. 7 in A

[Andrew Preview]

Wouldn't be this would it?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stravinsky-M...ethoven+rattle

I didn't think that DVDs were admissible.

[Andrew Preview]

I didn't think that DVDs were admissible.

Although I see there are a lot of them on EA's list, so they must be okay!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Sometimes the reviewer makes a DVD recommendation.

[gmw]

fyi, The Kleiber and a Karajan are on Spotify if any like to preview that way before purchase - or not.

[Hornspieler]

Errr... um.... what do you mean by 'Those trumpets: yikes'?
The trumpeters were playing - at the request of Sir Charles Mackerras - NATURAL therefore valveless trumpets, at least twice as long as the shrill, harsh 'modern' valved trumpet, with a smaller 'bore' ( tubing) therefore not as loud and of course able to 'blend' into the orchestral texture where necessary.
To my ears 'those trumpets' were superb!

Hello Tony,

I must confess that, as a horn player about to play the seventh, I had never really been aware of the presence of trumpets in the piece until ....

Charles Groves was on the box. Monday and Tuesday were rehearsal days for two programmes later in the week; Beethoven 3 in Southampton on Wednesday and Beethoven 7 in Bournemouth Winter Gardens on Thursday.

So Monday's music folders contained the manuscripts for both concerts.

Our second trumpet, Wally, was one of the survivors of the formerly named Bournemouth Municipal orchestra. A fine principal trumpet in his day, he was content to spend his final playing years in support of the new young principal, but he did seem a bit absent minded at times.

Southampton: The first half went well and we assembled after the interval to play the Eroica symphony.
Charles Groves brought the baton down firmly and everyone played a loud E flat - except Wally, who blasted out a strident A natural.

He had opened the wrong copy and Charles Groves stepped back in shock, almost falling off the rostrum.

Never again were programmes for different concerts placed in the same folder.

Wally retired from playing shortly afterwards but continued to work for the orchestra as Assistant Librarian!

At least that incident did make me aware that there were trumpets in Beethoven's 7th symphony.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

- priceless, HS

[BBMmk2]

- priceless, HS

Agreed! I must get a couple of composer/musician friends of mine on these boards, or encourage them too!

[amateur51]

- priceless, HS

beautifully told - have another

[Bert Coules]

The Mackerras Beethoven 7th just finished on Essential Classics. A bit fast and lightweight for my Klemperer-educated brain, but enjoyable nonetheless. But - and this is of course a purely personal opinion - I would happily dispense with those tedious repeats. Listening has progressed since then: twenty-first century ears can surely grasp this material at first hearing rather than needing it hammered home so unsubtly? We've got the point, now get on with it!

And, as always, I find it really hard to hear any of the seventh as a dance, whatever Wagner thought.

[Bryn]

The Mackerras Beethoven 7th just finished on Essential Classics. A bit fast and lightweight for my Klemperer-educated brain, but enjoyable nonetheless. But - and this is of course a purely personal opinion - I would happily dispense with those tedious repeats. Listening has progressed since then: twenty-first century ears can surely grasp this material at first hearing rather than needing it hammered home so unsubtly? We've got the point, now get on with it!

And, as always, I find it really hard to hear any of the seventh as a dance, whatever Wagner thought.

You would not have much liked the work's premier then, when the second movement was immediately encored before moving on to the third.

[Bert Coules]

Actually, I believe I would have enjoyed that: an unplanned (presumably) response to genuinely-felt audience reaction. I wish that concerts today could be so spontaneous and so free to ignore the conventions.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Listening has progressed since then: twenty-first century ears can surely grasp this material at first hearing rather than needing it hammered home so unsubtly? We've got the point, now get on with it!

I'm not sure that this is the case at all, Bert - it often seems that 21st Century listeners are so used to paying attention to melodic and thematic materials that they miss important features of structure that the cogniscenti of Beethoven's age would be paying equal attention to. Balance, structure, timing - these are all crucial aspects of Beethoven's genius: Music as architecture seems often to bypass many modern listeners who give the impression that these terms just mean "the way the tunes are connected". The repeats are an important part of "the point".

[Nick Armstrong]

- priceless, HS

...and another!!

[Bert Coules]

The repeats are an important part of "the point".

But only if their significance is understood, grasped and absorbed, surely? "Important features of structure" are all well and good, but not boring the audience (or at least the non-cogniscenti portion of it) seems to me to be more so. But, as I said, it's a purely personal reaction. For me, most repeats fatally diminish the impact of hearing the material first time round (in any one particular performance, I mean).

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

When Solti recorded the complete Beethoven symphonies with all the repeats, he almost reconsidered in the case of the 3rd movement of the 7th, but went ahead only because he was aiming to produce the first "complete" cycle.

My view is different. I see little purpose in long exposition repeats, but I think repeating development/recapitulation is quite crazy. Minuets/scherzi - short repeats make more sense. Repeats in Da Capos? In most instances, no.