Prom 21 - 30.07.17: Beethoven – Symphony No. 9, ‘Choral’

[Prommer]

It really would be very good if we could decide either stick to the rule, or have a free for all.

I note your below the line thingy... "Government is the entertainment division of the military-industrial complex."
Frank Zappa.

[teamsaint]

I note your below the line thingy... "Government is the entertainment division of the military-industrial complex."
Frank Zappa.

No point arguing with Zappa.
Unless you happen to be Beefheart......

[Bella Kemp]

Don't retreat!

There's more than one way to perform a work like this, and I learnt at a very early age not to be swayed by critics. They can only express their personal opinions, which are often interesting, but never definitive.

And fashions change, but I'll make a quiet retreat...

No, you are welcome to stay with trumpets fanfaring, Alpensinfonie: I love to read the critics but only a few do I ever think worthy of real consideration - and actually Peter Stadlen was one such. Not only his musicianship but his history made him well-qualified to comment on interpretations of Beethoven.

[Bryn]

I remember when I was about fifteen and heard Colin Davis conducting the 9th at the proms. I was ecstatic and came home wildly proclaiming that this was surely the greatest performance of the greatest work. The next day, my father read me Peter Stadlen's review in the Daily Telegraph. Alas, the performance had not been, after all, so great. 'Colin Davis is too young yet to give us his Beethoven interpretations,' said Mr Stadlen (or words to that effect). Of course Peter Stadlen was right and now I am older and have learnt also how to be critical and discern nuance and appreciate what makes for a truly great realisation of a piece of music. These days I can be deeply moved on hearing, say Klemperer conduct Mahler, or Brendel play Schubert; but, gosh, it would be so good to experience again that intensity of emotion when one just loves a piece of music regardless of how it is performed.

Hmm. Colin Davis's early recording of the 7th with the RPO was and remains a classic or the gramophone. You'll find it in the Colin Davis Icon box (EMI/Warner). I reckon the young Colin Davis has a better handle on Beethoven than Peter Stadlen. That said, I do not know the particular performance of the 9th you refer to.

Here's John Steane on a CD transfer of that RPO/Davis recording.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I have a vague notion that Freiheit was replaced with Freude? Before saying more, is that even true?

Yes he did.

So: was Bernstein's act one of excavation/authentication, especially poignant in the moment, or pure fiction and opportunism?

As Bryn says, the idea that there was a version (even sometimes "the original") version by Schiller, but there is no evidence for this - as Bernstein made clear in his introductory notes to the performance (he cites Frederich Ludwig Jahn as the originator of the idea, but the sources of this attribution aren't given, and no one has since discovered them). Bernstein suggested that for this one moment, "Freedom" was an appropriate substitution.

For me, the film and performance together is a record of a particular historical moment. I think "opportunism" is far too ungenerous a comment: Lennie had a naive idealism that nonetheless was deeply felt, the event was a sincere act of belief; self-indulgent belief, perhaps, but not the cynicism suggested by "opportunism". The performance itself, taken as a recording of Op 125 without the film doesn't really float my boat - it's far, far too slow ... and, worse, too "heavy" (some passages in Furtwangler's various recordings have timings similar to Bernstein's, but somehow - through articulation and a feeling for forward movement within each beat of each bar - Furtwangler gets the Music to "surge" more). WF takes each moment as contributing towards a goal, making the whole more than the sum of its parts - LB seems stuck in each moment, like wading through a field of mud. I'm not sure if that makes sense?

Bernstein recorded at least two other Ninths that for me are much, much superior - but, for sentimental reasons as a reminder of those short-lived, pre-Bosnia days of optimism, I wouldn't be without it. (And, for all its otherwise ignoring and ignorance of HIPP considerations, the Ode to Freedom was the first recording to include boys' voices - as did Beethoven for the first performance(s) - I don't know if there's another recording which has boys in the choir?)

[Maclintick]

No point arguing with Zappa.
Unless you happen to be Beefheart......

Zappa's statement of 30 years ago was: "Politics is the entertainment branch of industry, and government is what we need". With a soupçon of imagination this morphs into TS's postscript & is probably as true today as when FZ originally made it.

[Darkbloom]

The performance itself, taken as a recording of Op 125 without the film doesn't really float my boat - it's far, far too slow ... and, worse, too "heavy" (some passages in Furtwangler's various recordings have timings similar to Bernstein's, but somehow - through articulation and a feeling for forward movement within each beat of each bar - Furtwangler gets the Music to "surge" more). WF takes each moment as contributing towards a goal, making the whole more than the sum of its parts - LB seems stuck in each moment, like wading through a field of mud. I'm not sure if that makes sense?
)

Timings often seem irrelevant when you listen to WF. If you haven't heard a performance before you might feel a slight jolt at the beginning, if it's particularly slow, but then it somehow makes sense, and by the time you reach the end you realise that this Eroica (for example) lasted about 55 minutes. Other 'slow' performances by other conductors feel like they are always resting on their heels, but even the most relaxed Furtwangler recordings have a sense of direction towards the eventual goal.

[teamsaint]

Zappa's statement of 30 years ago was: "Politics is the entertainment branch of industry, and government is what we need". With a soupçon of imagination this morphs into TS's postscript & is probably as true today as when FZ originally made it.

Ah yes looks like you are right. This is widely misquoted it seems.
Time to change it, and thanks, Mac.

[cloughie]

Timings often seem irrelevant when you listen to WF. If you haven't heard a performance before you might feel a slight jolt at the beginning, if it's particularly slow, but then it somehow makes sense, and by the time you reach the end you realise that this Eroica (for example) lasted about 55 minutes. Other 'slow' performances by other conductors feel like they are always resting on their heels, but even the most relaxed Furtwangler recordings have a sense of direction towards the eventual goal.

I think you could apply this to other conductors eg Klemperer!

[Darkbloom]

I think you could apply this to other conductors eg Klemperer!

A slow Klemperer performance feels slow, at least to me, but that's part of the appeal. There's an unbending rigour about him that is totally different to WF, who was much more flexible about tempo.

[Prommer]

A slow Klemperer performance feels slow, at least to me, but that's part of the appeal. There's an unbending rigour about him that is totally different to WF, who was much more flexible about tempo.

Nowhere more apparent - and thrilling - than in the Funeral March from the Eroica, which builds and builds, and then sails majestically on.

[cloughie]

A slow Klemperer performance feels slow, at least to me, but that's part of the appeal. There's an unbending rigour about him that is totally different to WF, who was much more flexible about tempo.

Possibly so, arguably Furtwangler takes more liberties, they both produced some gems which I would not be without - OK's unbending rigour shows in Beethoven 6 but less so in the Eroica,(1955) which prompted my comment.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

And, just to reiterate - Klemperer's "slow" performances are mostly examples of what he did in the last decade of his life in the studio. Live recordings from concerts earlier in his life reveal a very different conductor - the fastest Bruckner #8 I've ever heard in his Cologne recording: the fire of this (complete - unlike the studio amputee) performance!!!

[BBMmk2]

Probably ageism but the older he got, the slower he became. Much that I admire Klemperer, but for his Brahms 1, also, sounding rather ponderous!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

There's nothing slow about his 3rd movement of the 9th. He takes it at quite a brisk tempo, as was demonstrated in BaL.