For your blog post due Friday, January 24 at 9 am, please consider
our class discussion on Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy, op. 80 as led by Prof. Whiting
from the afternoon on Thursday, January 23, 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 Friday, January 24.
I was not familiar with the Choral Fantasie before today. I knew that it was for piano, orchestra, and voices, that it was premiered at the end of the Academy that also saw the premiers of symphonies 5 and 6, and that it was an early version of sorts of the finale of symphony No. 9, but I had never listened to it besides maybe hearing the theme. I also knew that the hall for the concert was unheated and that the players were underrehearsed and struggled to the point of stopping in concert.
ReplyDeleteI was most surprised that Beethoven and the players in the ensemble for the Academy had such animosity between them that the orchestra made Beethoven sit in the lobby during rehearsal. As a frequent orchestral player, I find this hilarious. We’ve all played for conductors we’ve wished we could banish to the lobby.
I really liked how Professor Whiting showed that the Choral Fantasie was a summary of the evening of music - C minor like the fifth symphony, A major like part of the mass, F major like the Pastorale (even though this one goes awry and the piano has to call everyone back to order - I liked this logical narrative explanation). I also liked Professor Whiting’s explanation of the first variations as the piano teaching the theme to musicians from different walks of life - peasants with oboes, street musicians with clarinets and bassoon, accomplished amateurs with a string quartet. Because of yesterday’s class on the Pastorale, I immediately noticed the oboes in thirds during the listening session this morning and I was glad that Professor Whiting had a logical reason for the use of this orchestration.
I want to read about Beethoven as a conductor - both of his symphonies and from the keyboard. What did he prioritize? What kinds of things did he ask for? We learned from Professor Takacs that he was concerned with tempo, but I want to know what else he prioritized.
-Maggie
I had only heard Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy once before the listening session, and alas, the performance wasn’t good, so it wasn’t a memorable experience. After listening to it today, I really love it.
ReplyDeleteOne of our first observations in the listening session was that the main theme in Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy theme is quite similar to “Ode to Joy” in the Ninth Symphony. In my opinion, there are actually quite a few other parallels. Both pieces (in the case of the Ninth, a movement) are in theme-and-variations form. Before the chorus is introduced, the music is aggressive and disturbing in both pieces; Beethoven is working with the same idea of aggression that melts away into the beautiful theme. In the Ninth, it is pacified by the bass singer’s plea “Nicht diese Töne” (not these mean-spirited sounds!). It is so fascinating to me that Beethoven already had a related musical concept in his mind fifteen years before he composed the Ninth symphony. There are, however, a few notable differences. In the Choral Fantasy theme, there are less rhythmic twists (such as dots, long notes, or syncopations) than the “Ode to Joy” melody. It also uses elegant, melodic trills where the Ninth does not. The trills are a very “classical” compositional technique; Haydn and Mozart both used them extensively. In fact, when you speed up the Choral Fantasy’s melody a lot, it almost resembles tunes from Papageno’s character in Mozart’s Magic Flute! Is it possible that this inspired him?
It was fun when Prof. Whiting sang the melody to the poem “An die Freude”—the syllables work with Beethoven’s melody! However, I think it doesn’t work as well as the Ode to Joy because some of the German syllables don’t sound pleasant with the natural musical emphases present in the Choral Fantasy melody. For instance, the singers would have to sing ge-TEILT and flügel WEILT with this melody, because it is the natural phrasing. In the “Ode to Joy” melody these syllables are naturally de-emphasized.
As an aside, Prof. Whiting told me after the lecture today that Beethoven had 20 pages in his notebook dedicated to his ideas and experiments with the Ode to Joy theme in the Ninth Symphony. Just for this three-line melody! It is amazing to me how much he labored over this melody to make it as simple as possible, but it sure paid off—it is one of the most majestic, inspirational, and, of course, well-known melodies of all time!
I enjoyed Prof. Whiting’s lecture today. He talked about the Choral Fantasy’s historical context, and shared his analytical interpretation based on this. Since Beethoven programmed it as a finale to the 1808 Akademie in Vienna (in which four hours of only Beethoven’s music was performed), Prof. Whiting views the Choral Fantasy as not just a finale, but a “summary” of the concert. Every section of the Choral Fantasy takes its musical or artistic concept from a piece played earlier in the concert. First of all, the variation with the 2 oboes as well as the poetry’s meaning is derived from concepts in the Pastorale symphony; secondly, the pianistic “recitative” has its roots in the slow movement of Beethoven’s 4th piano concerto; thirdly, the A major variation is akin to the mass excerpt; and lastly, the C minor variation, which is furious and passionate, is derived from the Fifth Symphony, with the same mood. The only element in the music that seems to come out of left field is Beethoven’s Turkish, janissary variation. It is in F Major, but is not even close in character to the Pastorale symphony. This is one of Beethoven’s surprises; you don’t expect to hear janissary music in F Major! Other than this black sheep, the Choral Fantasy sums up the 1808 concert really well.
Overall, I feel like Prof. Whiting’s way of analyzing this piece as a “meta-work”, in context of the other works on Beethoven’s program, is very appropriate. He also gave us a way of viewing the piece independently of the 9th Symphony. As he said, too often we find ourselves thinking of the piece as the baby brother of the Ninth!
I have to admit that prior to this class, I know nothing about this Choral Fantasy. By nothing I mean I haven’t heard it by chance before, I haven’t read any information around this piece, and I don’t even know that Beethoven composed this piece. This is unbelievable - how come I’ve never heard this piece before? Anyway, I really enjoy today’s listening and discussing session. I love this fantasy a lot, and I’m really surprised and admire about how brilliant that Beethoven combined the orchestra, the choir, and the piano - which honestly, I never thought will be heard in this course - together to create this whole fantasy.
ReplyDeleteProf. Whiting’s lecture was wonderful. I especially like one of the points he made, that these variations of the finale give the audience an impression of the theme is taught and passed on from instrument to instrument. The theme is first performed by the solo piano, with the whole orchestra as accompaniment. Then, the flute starts to replay the theme, like it is imitating from the piano. After the flute solo, two oboes take their turns to play the same theme. And then it comes the trio of clarinets and bassoon, then the string quartet, and finally the whole orchestra. This pattern is designed not only from the same theme they play but also the number of instruments which join the ensemble. As Prof. Whiting mentioned in class, this choral fantasy is a collection and exhibition of all his remarkable contributions before, which includes the 5th symphony, the 6th symphony, the mass, and the G major piano concerto. There are echoes and resemblances of the musical elements from prior works all over the piece. The piano solo part, on the other hand, is full of improvisations, which makes this piece more unpredictable. This kind of composing makes this fantasy in a state of a perfect balance between the collection of old elements and new virtuosic changes, which makes this piece intriguing and also complicated enough to attract the scholars to analyze it.
After studying this piece, I’m now eager to learn about how it connected to the Ode of Joy. Seems like this popular theme has been wandered in Beethoven’s mind for decades before he composed it out. I’m really looking forward to the up-coming sessions on the ninth symphony.
I absolutely loved the way the visiting professor set the scene of the initial Choral Fantasy Academie, emphasizing how even after months upon months of wrangling in order to have access to the theater, the music was still played incorrectly. The musicians were hastily assembled, many other musicians were busy with a different academie, and they needed to rapidly learn a staggering quantity of new and complex music. Not only that, but the musicians, due to a previous quarrel, refused to rehearse with Beethoven in the room and thus he was forced to guide rehearsal from outside. If that wasn't difficult enough, the finale was changed somewhat suddenly without enough time for the musicians to learn the piece. Thus, the audience was forced to spend four hours in an unheated theatre listening to difficult and ultimately deficiently played music.
ReplyDeleteWhat I didn't realize is that the Choral Fantasy is seen by many as just the younger brother to the 9th symphony, obviously a symphony of some considerable acclaim. I think the Choral Fantasy sounded simply beautiful so I'm confused about how some could see it in this light. The most interesting thing I heard in class, so interesting I'm surprised nobody commented on it, is that the German Democratic Republic prepared and performed their own "socialist" version of the Choral Fantasy. Were there other works that were socialized? It's slightly unrelated but I just found out that after the Berlin Wall fell, the Berliner Philharmoniker celebrated with a three-day performance of Beethoven, concluding with Beethoven's Ninth.
I thought that the lecture today from Professor Whiting was super informative and entertaining. Before today, I had never heard the Choral Fantasy and I didn’t really understand its relevance to the class and to Beethoven’s symphonies. Even after listening this morning, I didn’t understand much of a connection beyond the theme resembling the Ode to Joy.
ReplyDeleteThe entire lecture was expertly structured around the Choral Fantasy’s connections to the rest of the program of the academy during which it was premiered along with the 5th and 6th symphonies. The academy included all music composed by Beethoven, and I think that this makes the way he ties it all together even more impactful. I found that the Professor did a wonderful job of showing how aspects of the op. 80 connected with each of the other parts of the program. For example, each level of instrumentation in the first and second halves of the program is represented in the piece. Also, sections like the tumultuous c minor variation and the oboe duo variation harken back to the 5th and 6th symphonies, respectively. These are just examples, of course, that Professor Whiting pointed out. I think that Beethoven marks “Finale” so early on because the Choral Fantasy is a conclusion to the entire program…it needs to be situated in its context in order to be properly understood.
I think that this has given great insight into the mindset that Beethoven was in as he led up to the 9th symphony. It also shows how long he was meditating on this sketch of a melody that would appear in the Finale of the 9th. I think that this symphony will be a great conclusion to the project.
Before today, I hadn’t heard the entire Choral Fantasy– I had only heard snippets of it one time my friend was explaining to me how he thought that the Choral Fantasy was a bad piece. I maybe heard a scattered three minutes of the piece, interrupted by my friend skipping forward and periodically saying “no choir yet.”
ReplyDeleteThe thing I found most surprising from this lecture was the fact that, in the concert on which it was premiered, the Choral Fantasy had to be restarted because the oboes or clarinets messed up a repeat. I don’t know if it’s appalling, reassuring, or devastating that a blunder this big happened to Beethoven, but I think it was interesting that even though we’ve talked before in several classes about this academie, this was the first time it came up.
I found this class very interesting, and enjoyed getting the perspective of this piece in the greater context as a finale to the entire concert. This made me think of last class, how we briefly talked about how some critics say it is not necessary to know the program of a piece to understand it. The Choral Fantasy is not necessarily a programmatic work, but I think it certainly helps to know the circumstances of its origin to understand it. As Professor Whiting said, it exists as a finale and conclusion, and as a sort of younger sibling to Symphony No. 9. After this class, I don’t necessarily think that the Choral Fantasy is one of the best things Beethoven ever wrote, but I certainly have a few ways to admire it now.
Prior to class, I knew nothing about the Choral Fantasy other than its existence. Professor Whiting’s lecture was very informative and fun. I ended up being surprised by a lot of what he taught.
ReplyDeleteI suppose it’s most surprising that Beethoven would compose a piece that served a specific function for a specific concert. The Choral Fantasy ties everything from the Akademie performance together in twenty minutes, but standing on its own, without reference to some metaform, it’s a weird piece. Together with the rest of the concert, it has elements of each work previously played, even accomplishing the darkness to light finale that the fifth was lacking in. This wrapped up the concert nicely perhaps, but it’s still surprising that Beethoven would go on to publish the piece. It seems to be more of an improvisatory piece (the piano part likely being fully improvised by Beethoven), and I wonder if Beethoven wanted to sound fully improvisatory, only with references to other works performed upon its premiere. A Fantasy is supposed to emulate a recitative on the piano, and this Choral Fantasy also feels quasi recitative in the way that it’s serving an extramusical function. I’m surprised Beethoven went on to publish a piece that, in my opinion, relies on metaform to be effective.
I’m very interested in this piece in relation to the ninth symphony. It’s easy to hear the similarities, but historically speaking, how much did Beethoven use the Choral Fantasy in the composition of the ninth? Professor Whiting mentioned that he used the Choral Fantasy to convince publishers that the ninth symphony is good, so I’m curious about just how similar Beethoven thought these two compositions were, and what he thought about the publication of the Choral Fantasy after the ninth symphony premiere.