Eroica

Well, for one thing, it was long (about an hour). It also had many modulations which baffled the audience. He altered the variation forms a bit. NoteBoat's just coming off of his Beethoven binge...

what movement is the variations in??

i need the score for that, all i have is hard to read PDF score's.

there will be an interesting page somewhere on the net explaining every fine detail of it i bet (there always is for stuff like this).

how long where symphony's before this one?

The last movement has the free variations.

Enough Beethoven for me for a while :)

"Enough NoteBoat for me for a while"

**

hehehe

Isn't this also the one where the constrasts between the louds and softs were beyond what the acceptable conventions had permitted? In many ways, the trick is to determine what people expected to hear and then to determine how a specific work changes expectations. Beethoven's celebration of the turbulence of the French Revolution and reflection of that turbulence in his music, such as the Eroica, changed musical sensibility. The highly structured forms of the Baroque period gave way to a more subjective sensibility.

At least that's the kind of thing I tell my students. I have no idea if it's correct though. :?

Alex, given your interest in this stuff, you should read Thomas Mann's Dr. Faustus someday. It actually takes on a number of these issues in a literary way through the story of a composer who sells his soul (Robert Johnson, anyone?) and who resembles Nietzsche in many ways (for whom Music was fundamental).

Sorry about all that. I'll stop now.
Tim

ahh so many books to buy..

first on my list is Orchestration (one that greybeard (i think) recommended).

Besides a lot and lot of stuff is on the internet that is very useful..

Where did you learn all your music history?

Me? I make it up.

I teach German studies so I get to dabble in a lot of areas. (As I said, I make it up!)

Tim

The normal Classical symphony was about a half hour.
I don't think the dynamics were an issue; the main criticisms of Eroica at the time were that it was too long and had strange modulations.

A review of the premiere performance (April 7, 1805) at the Theater an der Wien, reads:

“…the symphony would profit immensely (it lasts a whole hour) if Beethoven would decide to shorten it, and bring more light, clarity and unity to the whole thing. These are characteristics which the Mozart Symphonies in G minor and C, those by Beethoven in C and D Major, and by Eberl in E-flat and D major never lose, even with their richness of ideas, even with all the interweaving of instruments, and even with all the changes of surprising modulations.” [Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 7, May 1, 1805]

The same publication later states:

“…the symphony certainly contains much of both the sublime and the beautiful, but that these are also mixed with many that are all too long-winded, and that only by a re-working can obtain the pure form of a consummate work of art.”[ Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 10, January 6, 1808]

According to Thayer, Beethoven's response to this sentiment was, “If I write a symphony an hour long, it will be found short enough!”

One of the things that we get out of it today, is that this symphony has elements that we find in the Romantic period. Beethoven is considered the bridge between the Classical and Romantic periods.

You might want to check this review of Jost Hermand's Beethoven book (if you've got some German):

Beethoven's "Revolutionary" Style

This site also goes into the revolutionary aesthetics of the piece:

Vienna Symphony Review

Here's their statement of the innovative aspects of the symphony (not thematic this time but musical):

In absolut-musikalischer Hinsicht wieder fällt der neuartige Umgang mit dem thematischen Material auf. Der Stirnsatz bewegt sich gänzlich im Spannungsfeld zwischen Diatonik und Chromatik. „Die Elemantarkräfte entfalten dabei eine Sprengkraft, die in der Durchführung zu einer völligen Auflösung der Taktordnung führt, in der dann die berühmte e-moll-Episode eingeschoben wird“ (Matthias Walz). In der Reprise und weiter in der Coda erscheinen die Themen in erhöhter, „endgültiger“ Form, eine Idee, die bis dahin einzigartig dasteht. Der Finalsatz wieder ist eine komplexe Überlagerung verschiedener Formmodelle: Variationssatz, Fuge und Sonatensatz sind zur Vollkommenheit verschmolzen. Darüberhinaus sind sämtliche Sätze untereinander motivisch verzahnt, was den zyklischen Charakter der Gesamtkomposition unterstreicht.

They speak (I'm paraphrasing quick excerpts) of the tension between diatonic and chormatic elements, of the explosive energy of the piece and its rhythmic changes, of the insertion of the E minor sequence, of the heightening of the themes in a recurrent form in the coda and of the conflation of forms, especially of sonata and fugue forms.

If you consult that article, it also mentions how the avantgarde formal aspects relate to the thematic consideration of revolution.

Hope that helps a bit too. (I wish I knew enough music theory to make some good sense of this for you.)

This site also suggests that contemporary reviews are in a sense problematical because they didn't yet possess the musical vocabulary, as it were, to describe Beethoven's symphony. It changed the rules. Just as critics couldn't yet comprehend Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps at its debut, or the Impressionists, or Picasso for that matter.

Now I think this site is getting too academically heavy. Let's get back to guitar!

German scares me, i couldnt understand a word off that site lol.

My final word on the subject (well, okay, so it's not really my word, it's my motto though):

Well gonna write a little letter
Gonna mail it to my local D.J.
It's a rockin' little record
I want my jockey to play
Roll over Beethoven
I gotta hear it again today

You know my temperature's risin'
And the jukebox's blowin' a fuse
My hearts beatin' rhythm
And my soul keeps singing the blues
Roll over Beethoven
And tell Tchaikovsky the news

I got a rockin' pneumonia
I need a shot of rhythm and blues
I think I got it off the writer
Sittin' down by the rhythm review
Roll over Beethoven
We're rockin' in two by two

Well if you fell you like it
Well get your lover and reel and rock it
Roll it over and move on up
Just jump around and reel and rock it
Roll it over
Roll over Beethoven
A rockin' in two by two , oh

Well early in the mornin'
I'm a givin' you the warnin'
Don't you step on my blue suede showes
Hey little little
Gonna play my fiddle
Ain't got nothing to lost
Roll over Beethoven
And tell Tchaikovsky the news

You know she winks like a glow worm
Dance like a spinnin' top
She got a crazy partner
Oughta see 'em reel an rock
Long as she's got a dime
The music will never stop
Roll over Beethoven
Roll over Beethoven
Roll over Beethoven
Roll over Beethoven
Roll over Beethoven
And dig these rhythm and blues"

I'd say Chuck got it right and that George and John played the definitive version!

:)

Alex, not to kick a dead Beethoven, but here's a lengthy passage from the Grove Dictionary of Music:
In the first movement, one must marvel at the expansion in dimensions on every level; at the projection of certain melodic details of the main theme into the total form – the bass C (D) instigating moves to the keys of the supertonic and the flat seventh degree in the recapitulation, the violins' G–A returning vertically as the famous horn-call dissonance; at the masterly coagulation of diverse material into the second group; and at the whole concept of the panoramic development section, with its passage of deepening breakdown redeemed by the introduction of a new theme (if it is indeed really new). The moving thematic ‘liquidation' at the end of the Marcia funebre, the four alla breve bars in the da capo of the scherzo, the novel structure of the finale, the powerful fugatos throughout – none of these could have been predicted. Also astonishing is the quality of ‘potential' that informs the main themes of the three fast movements. Two of them require (and in due course receive) horizontal or vertical completion, and the other is presented in a state of almost palpable evolution.

These themes were made to order for the new ‘symphonic ideal' which Beethoven perfected at a stroke with his Third Symphony and further celebrated with his Fifth, Sixth, Seventh and Ninth. The forcefulness, expanded range and evident radical intent of these works sets them apart from symphonies in the 18th-century tradition, such as Beethoven's own First and Second. But more than this, they all contrive to create the impression of a psychological journey or growth process. In the course of this, something seems to arrive or triumph or transcend – even if, as in the Pastoral, what is mainly transcended is the weather. This illusion is helped by certain other characteristic features: ‘evolving' themes, transitions between widely separated passages, actual thematic recurrences from one movement to another, and last but not least, the involvement of extra-musical ideas by means of a literary text, a programme, or (as in the ‘Eroica') just a few tantalizing titles.

In technical terms, this development may be viewed as the projection of the underlying principles of the sonata style on the scale of the total four-movement work, rather than that of the single movement in sonata form. This view takes account of the impression Beethoven now so often gives of grappling with musical fundamentals. He had the power – and it must be called an intellectual power – of penetration into the gestural level below sonata form. He could manipulate the basic elements of the sonata style in a more comprehensive, less formalistic way than ever before. One senses the same grasp of essences when Beethoven now isolates a melodic, harmonic or rhythmic detail of a theme and then appears to ‘compose it out' – to spell out its implications later in the piece. Doubtless this also happens in earlier music, by Beethoven or by other composers, but in the middle period he began to draw attention to the process in a much more pointed fashion.

JOSEPH KERMAN, ALAN TYSON (with SCOTTG. BURNHAM) (§§1–18), SCOTT G. BURNHAM, Ludwig van Beethoven, Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (30 April 2004), < http://www.grovemusic.com >

lol, and what language was that one in??

just kidding

Next topic, Holst "The Planets"