Does it really take that long? ....

[Dave2002]

I noticed that BBC2 has a programme about Beethoven's 5th tonight. The programme is 90 mins long.

Does it really take that long to explain, or explore that symphony? Maybe - but I suspect it depends on how much detail one wants.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07dpqv9

There's this on BBC Four two hours earlier - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0078ssj

[french frank]

I noticed that BBC2 has a programme about Beethoven's 5th tonight. The programme is 90 mins long.

Does it really take that long to explain, or explore that symphony? Maybe - but I suspect it depends on how much detail one wants.

And you do get 'the story behind it' whatever that entails (first performance &c?).

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I noticed that BBC2 has a programme about Beethoven's 5th tonight. The programme is 90 mins long.
Does it really take that long to explain, or explore that symphony?

Only 90 minutes? So, they're just doing the first five bars, then?

There's this on BBC Four two hours earlier - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0078ssj

- very good series that.

[Stanley Stewart]

Tonight's programme, (28 May), The Secret of Beethoven's Fifth, BBC 2, 21.00-22.30hrs is, indeed, a documentary. A full performance of Sym 5 is tomorrow,(29 May, 19.00-1945hrs,
on BBC4,Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique/John Eliot Gardiner. A further 'treat' follows on BBC 4, 19.45-20.00hrs, Mozart Uncovered -Charles Hazlewood analyses arias and duets from Mozart operas; soprano Camilla Tilling, tenor Toby Spence and baritone Andrew Shore. I've set my recorder for the lot!

[greenilex]

Well, I found it illuminating...but tend to agree in the end with Goethe.

The Eighth Symphony is my favourite.

Most people wouldn't agree, I suspect.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The Eighth Symphony is my favourite.

Most people wouldn't agree, I suspect.

None of us has any reason to doubt it's your favourite.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

None of us has any reason to doubt it's your favourite.

My favourite, too - when I'm listening to it.

[Beef Oven!]

The Eighth Symphony is my favourite.

Most people wouldn't agree, I suspect.

Totally agree

My favourite is either the 4th or 9th.

[Dave2002]

Totally agree

My favourite is either the 4th or 9th.

Sir Humphrey strikes again.

"It is true that I agree". "I agree that most people wouldn't agree." .....

[gurnemanz]

A personal angle on a fact which they alluded to in that TV programme about the Fifth last night: Beethoven was a 19-year-old student when the French Revolution broke out. By coincidence, I was a 19-year-old student during the Paris student "revolution" of 1968 with an Athena poster of the great composer in Byronic pose on the wall of my student accommodation. I had added his famous comment with reference to the Missa Solemnis: Vom Herzen, möge es wieder zu Herzen gehen.

[Dave2002]

A further 'treat' follows on BBC 4, 19.45-20.00hrs, Mozart Uncovered -Charles Hazlewood analyses arias and duets from Mozart operas; soprano Camilla Tilling, tenor Toby Spence and baritone Andrew Shore. I've set my recorder for the lot!

Thanks for spotting this. Recorder duly set. Plus Wallander later on.

[cloughie]

My favourite, too - when I'm listening to it.

...and what's your favourite when you're not listening to it.

[Tony Halstead]

...and what's your favourite when you're not listening to it.

Hmmm... I don't quite understand the question but I can certainly say which is my least favourite both to PLAY and to listen to: The 6th ('Pastoral').
In August 1987 I had the misfortune to play in three different and obviously competing 'HIPP' recordings of it :
AAM /Hogwood; Hanover Band/Goodman; LCP/Norrington.
Listed in alphabetical order of course, not 'order of preference'...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

...and what's your favourite when you're not listening to it.

The one I am listening to.

[Petrushka]

Many years ago, Richard Osborne did an 'Interpretations on Record' broadcast on the Beethoven 5 and used about nine-tenths of the programme analysing the first 8 notes!