For your blog post due Tuesday, January 21 at 9 am, please
consider our class discussion on Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony as led by Prof. Takács
from the afternoon on Monday, January 20, and comment in 250-500 words on the
following points:
· What did you know
about today’s subject before the listening and/or discussion session?
· What did you find
most surprising about today’s subject?
· What would you
like to know more about after experiencing today’s class?
Your post should be placed directly in the comments to this blog
entry, and is due at 9 am on Tuesday, January 21.
Prior to today’s listening session, I’ve already heard the complete fifth symphony more than once, which makes me easier to follow the score and think about the structure while listening to the recording again in the morning. Technically speaking, I haven’t studied on the 5th symphony in detail, and what Prof.Takacs was talking about today about this symphony is all new for me. However, since I’ve been learning piano with him and played some of the Beethoven piano sonatas under his instruction, some of the topics mentioned today are particularly familiar to me.
ReplyDeleteAn important point Prof.Takacs pointed out is the tempo controlling of a piece. He mentioned in the class that the tempo marking might be only appropriate for the very beginning of the piece, and when the gesture of the phrases change, the tempo will also change. He showed the example in the first movement: started the strong and explosive motive in the opening in its original tempo marking, and then used the same tempo in its following phrases. Apparently, it does not work well. The music has its own tendency to slow down in order to express more emotions. The choosing of tempo does not only rely on the tempo marking, but also on how the music developed and how the performer feels about the music at that point in time. This reminded me of taking lessons with him, and we always discussed a lot on the tempo. There was a sonata we decided to open it in quarter notes for 96 at first, but we changed our mind the next week since it sounded already inappropriate, actually too slow, that week. We keep exploring the possibilities of the tempo, and finally narrowed it into the range of quarter note for 94 to 100, but it is impossible to fix the rhythm to a specific value. We’ve also been working on finding the phrases, using the exact same method: play out the melody (or the most outstanding voice) in a fast speed to feel the shape of the phrases --- it is the same method Prof.Takacs used to indicate the phrase in the second movement.
After taking all these discussions, there’s more I feel that a degree of similarity between piano sonatas and orchestral symphonies exist. The sonata form can be applied to the symphony, and also the whole structure. Different layers of voices in the orchestra can be reproduced in the piano. Sometimes I even feel like the sonata is actually a piano version of a symphony. Is there any historical or musicological connection between the sonatas and symphonies?
I was very familiar with the fifth symphony going into today. I’ve listened to it many times and played it in two different orchestras. I was also familiar with how Professor Takacs talked about tempo, phrasing, and the form of the movements.
ReplyDeleteI’m a violist, so I play the second movement as an excerpt (sometimes audition lists specify certain measures, like the theme, secondary theme, and variations thereof, sometimes audition lists simply say Beethoven 5, movement ii). Just the opening phrase is full of difficulty. Tempo giusto is vital, as is a sense of meter, a sense of line, good low intonation, good pure but singing tone, bow distribution (difficult with longer bows in one direction than in the other), impeccable characteristic rhythm, and not too much vibrato. Professor Slowik says that you can’t win a job by playing this Beethoven excerpt well, but you can lose one by not playing it adequately. I think that orchestral performances of the second movement are poorly served by the fact that all of the cellos and violas have practiced this theme and variations countless times. It never sounds fresh and organic: it’s difficult for conductors to get an orchestra to do anything differently when the measures are so ingrained. “Perfecting” it takes the magic and music out.
What surprised me - it was a pleasant surprise! - was that Beethoven apparently always asked about tempos when someone got back from a concert. I know Professor Takacs said the source for this might be unreliable, but I hope this tidbit at least is true. Tempos are always the first thing I am interested in where concerts and recordings are concerned - especially orchestral. Did the tempos serve and clarify the music? Did the tempos serve and inform the interpretation? My working hypothesis is that if tempo doesn’t align with the music and with the interpretation, the resulting performance will be unsatisfying.
Like many recent classes, this one left me wanting to do some score study. I also want to read some biographies of Beethoven to learn more about what he thought about music. I’ll be playing the fifth symphony in orchestra soon, and I’m really looking forward to exploring it again from inside the orchestra.
It was a pleasure to listen to Professor Takács talk today about Beethoven’s fifth symphony. Prior to today, I was already pretty familiar with the fifth symphony. I have listened to it numerous times, I’ve performed it at Interlochen and elsewhere, and I’ve conducted through it for fun as well. I was aware of the tempos of the movements, their themes, and the way that Beethoven uses the “short short short long” motive throughout the entire piece of music.
ReplyDeleteWhat I found most interesting today was the professor’s description of the relationship between key areas that defines this symphony and a few of Beethoven’s other works – c minor to Ab Major. I thought it was really cool to learn about the personalities attributed to those keys. The movements in c minor are filled with drama, while the slow second movement is enveloped warmly in Ab. This also ties into the point that Dr. Miyake made in her discussion of “Eroica” that the flat 6th scale degree is the most important note in the minor diatonic scale. It carries the most weight, and I think that’s the reason that Beethoven likes to target Ab Major in this context of c minor. Lastly, I wanted to comment that singing the exposition of the first movement on the cello part was a great window into the experience of another instrument’s part of the piece!
I would love to do more singing…just because I think that it was super fun. But I could also learn more about the phrasing structure of the other movements, 3 and 4, because I understand the first two movements pretty well after today’s lecture.
At last, we get to the most recognized four-note motif in the world! Before the listening session and discussion from today, I had only heard the first movement and main theme of the last movement of Beethoven’s Symphony no. 5. I had also heard about the importance and prevalence of the “short-short-short-long” motif, throughout all the movements.
ReplyDeleteA common theme in our discussions about Beethoven’s symphonies seems to be about tempo choices. I was surprised to hear that Beethoven, when he was deaf, asked the audience about his tempos in concert. However, Beethoven wrote after one of his metronome markings, “yes, but feeling has its own tempo.” Prof. Takacs and I both believe that finding the “tempo giusto” (suitable tempo) is subjective, because it depends on the musician’s interpretation, and even upon the musician’s changing state of mind! I also agree on his stance that the tempo can be flexible within the piece. He feels that Beethoven’s metronome markings shouldn’t be slavishly followed, and in some cases, the written markings can determine the tempo only at the beginning of the piece or movement.
I was interested in Prof. Takacs' discussion on the different ways of conducting the opening bars of the symphony. It is definitely a challenging opening, because the music starts on an upbeat, and as if that weren’t enough, Beethoven writes a fermata (dead stop), then repeats the same gesture on different notes. Yet, for a conductor, there are indeed many ways of marking the beats. Prof. Takacs believes it is best to move his arms down on the beat before the music starts, and cut the sound off in the fermata to prepare for the next gesture. Prof. Jimenez, however, barely includes any preparation, which could also work (but this would have to be rehearsed many times to eliminate confusion). Of course, one could also take Furtwangler’s approach and completely scramble the rhythm!
I was amused when Prof. Takacs gave critique in real time while we were all listening to excerpts of Kleiber’s interpretation of the second movement. Prof. Takacs felt that Kleiber’s tempo is too sluggish for “Andante con moto”. He believes that the music should propel itself forward. I can definitely relate to this; however, I do enjoy Kleiber’s tempo and style. I believe if you take it faster it loses its soulful quality and warmth, however graceful it may be. This is just my personal opinion.
Overall, I enjoyed Prof. Takacs’ discussion of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, one of the most famous works in the classical canon. It was nice to learn about the historical background, structural aspects, and the different artistic interpretations of this piece.
After our short discussion on what aspects of Beethoven's Fifth were responsible for its not inconsiderable popularity (morse code for V, opening similar to a laugh or a child's taunt), I decided to do some individual research onto why exactly this symphony became so incredibly popular. What I hadn't realized was that the opening rhythmic motif acted as the opening for BBC radio during WWII. This motif and the fact that the entire symphony seems to come from this motif are some of the reasons why the piece was so revolutionary and modern at the time, and why people have always been drawn to it. I had thought Beethoven's Fifth was famous largely because of its attachment to some specific piece of pop culture (i.e. the Jaws theme) so I was surprised to find that it was famous on its own merits rather than those of another piece of art.
ReplyDeleteThat it is in C minor I hadn't realized was significant. It was interesting to learn that the C minor was emblematic of drama or conflict which Beethoven often wanted to represent in his work. I was struck by some of the professor's closing comments, particularly the ones wondering what Beethoven would think if he found out we were still obsessed with his music today and that in all likelihood he'd tell us to "make our own music." This is an impossible question to answer for now, but I wonder how much longer Beethoven will be such a mainstay of musical performance.
Coming into today’s class, I was familiar with Beethoven Symphony No. 5 through listening to it on multiple occasions, and learning about it in Music History 101. I was familiar with the prevalence of the short-short-short-long motif in all the movements, as well as the expanded orchestrations and what that added to the symphony. I was happy to finally hear trombones.
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoyed Professor Takacs’s lecture. I wasn’t necessarily surprised by much of what he said, but I certainly learned a lot. I wasn’t intimately familiar with the second movement before class, and seeing Professor Takacs’s analysis really helped bring the movement to life for me. Our discussion of tempo in Beethoven’s music was also very interesting and informative. We had heard about Maezel’s metronome and Beethoven’s markings, but I loved Professor Takacs’s insight into Beethoven piano sonatas, and how these markings are often a starting off point and unreliable. “Feeling has tempo” is something that will definitely stick with me. In the context of the second movement, I enjoyed that Professor Takacs gave his opinion on what the tempo should be, while also playing recordings that are slower than his preference. I find it very informative and interesting with teachers/musicians share their interpretation and why they choose to interpret music in the way they do. I think I agree with Professor Takacs about a brisker tempo in the second movement to accomplish a ‘one’ feel, but I also really enjoyed the Kleiber interpretation. I’m glad there is a variety of interpretations to keep performances fresh.
I’d love to hear more about Beethoven’s piano sonatas, especially from Professor Takacs. He alluded to some sonatas and how they might relate to the fifth symphony or the heroic period, but it’d be interesting to hear about this in detail, though after this class I’ll have a good enough framework to discover much of this on my own.
Symphony No. 5 is probably my favorite symphony of Beethoven’s, and is certainly the one I’m most familiar with. We spent a while on this piece in Music History 101, learning about the short-short-long motive, and how this piece pushed the horizon of expectations of what was expected between an audience and a composer. I also learned about this piece in Music of the Romantic Era, where we talked about the structure of the piece (interesting sonata form, long developments, strange key relations) and the sublime. I really liked doing the ETA Hoffman readings when we were in this unit; I may be grossly misremembering, but he had one quote that went something like “from night to bright, from struggle to that stars,” which I thought was nice wording.
ReplyDeleteProfessor Takacs asked the class why we thought Symphony No. 5 was so famous, and I wish we had spent more time on this question. People brought up that the short-short-short-long motive is catchy, but I remember in Music History 101, we took some time to notice that Symphony No. 5 is not a very singable piece– parts of where the short-short-short-long motive appear are catchy, but there are many other parts of the symphony that are too fast and convoluted to sing. In class, I was thinking that possibly the reason Symphony No. 5 is so popular is because it is so unlike anything else that existed when it was first written, but I think that is probably true for other symphonies. I would have liked to hear what Professor Takacs thought about this question.
This isn’t something surprising, but something I really liked about this class was Professor Takacs’s joke about Beethoven’s girlfriend breaking up with him.