Beethoven Again

More About Beethoven

   I have now finished Swafford’s major Beethoven biography; it covers a lot of ground—and pages. I need hardly say that the book tells me an immense amount about Beethoven and his world that I had not known. While I’ve heard a lot of his music, it turns out to be a much smaller fraction of his oeuvre than I had thought. He may not have been as prolific as Mozart or Haydn, but into many of his works he seemed to put in more time and effort—notes, sketches, drafts—than either of the masters he followed, though he was also capable of tossing off a piece with great rapidity.

   What are some of the things that were more or less new to me? While I was aware that Beethoven was an accomplished pianist, I was not aware that he was a virtuoso, prized by a broad public for his performances and especially by the cognoscenti, many of them major and minor nobility. Various pianists make their appearance in Vienna, then the musical capital of the world, and he certainly held his own in their company.
   Then, I was only vaguely aware of the practice of improvisation. Beethoven was clearly a master at that art. It “entertained” large audiences and specific listeners and clearly played a significant role in his composing. That activity supplemented, so to speak, the notes he constantly took of ideas that came to his head and that he quickly wrote down in his sketchbooks that seemed to be always with him.

   Swafford makes copious use of published reviews of Beethoven concerts. I’m impressed by their insightfulness, especially with a composer who deviated further and further from the modes of his forebears, Mozart and Haydn. Many of these critics were more adventurous than Olin Downes, the chief NYTimes critic of the forties. My “favorite” review of his (those are scare quotes) went on at great length about a performance of Brahms’s first symphony and concluded with this sentence: “And after the intermission, Mr. Mitropolis conducted Mahler’s First Symphony.” Mahler, like many composers of the 20^th century, was not on his list of approved composers.

   Then there are the letters, lots of them, quoted in this biography. Interestingly by many in the composer’s circle, but above all by Ludwig himself. Their styles vary, of course, but it is worth noting that even though, people, including Beethoven, got to say what they had to say, even if they were more flowery, less succinct than has since become common practice.

   Then there is his nephew Karl, born not long before his father, Ludwig’s brother, died. Ludwig becomes Karl’s guardian, squabbling with the boy’s mother of whom he disapproves; he thinks of himself as Karl’s father. It’s quite a saga which ends when Karl joins the army not long before Ludwig’s death.

  Most of the book is of course about the music, with a great many works extensively discussed. Many in considerable detail, section by section, with the surprisingly many key changes noted. If there were “world enough and time,” one should read these descriptions while listening to recordings of the music. I got the most out of the account of the Ninth Symphony, because I have more of it in my head, having several times sung it as a member of the chorus. But long before then, while in high school, I bought a copy of the miniature score, to follow one of my first records—they were then 78 rpms—conducted by my namesake, Felix Weingartner.

   I need hardly say that the book depicts in great detail how “original” a character Ludwig was or, more frankly, how cantankerous. He quarreled a lot and apologized almost as much. It was probably a good thing that he never married any of the women with whom he interacted.

   Finally a small bit of information that was news to me. While in German, the “von” before a last name indicates some degree of nobility, the Dutch “van” is more mundane and just means “from.” Perhaps the family originated in the Belgian village of Beethoven.