LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
THE FIRST RECORDING BASED ON THE NEW CRITICAL EDITION
Symphony No. 3 in E-flat Major, Op. 55, "Eroica"
[1] Allegro con brio
[2] Marcia funebre
[3] Scherzo
[4] Allegro molto )
[5] Coriolan Overture, Op. 62
Dennis Russell Davies
Conductor
ORCHESTER DER BEETHOVENHALLE BONN
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) is not only one of the greatest of all composers, but a veritable icon of Western culture. Born in Bonn, a center of Enlightenment thought, Beethoven started composing at an early age and became a great pianist and improviser. He moved to Vienna in November 1792, where he resided until his death. Deeply influenced by Haydn and Mozart, Beethoven fused aspects of their style with his own, becoming the great mediator between the Classic and Romantic styles. Beethoven's growing deafness, starting in the late 1790s, was the cause of tremendous anxiety, suffering, and even suicidal thoughts.
Though primarily an instrumental composer, Beethoven left great works in all the major genres. Calling himself a "tone poet," Beethoven endowed his music with a Shakespearean range of mood, extending from the most intimate and lyrical to the stormy and heroic. He deeply sympathized with the Enlightenment ideals of freedom and brotherhood, which he immortalized in his opera Fidelio and his setting of Schiller's Ode to Joy in the Ninth Symphony. In Beethoven we find embodied the artist as explorer, as conscious innovator, an attitude that profoundly influenced later composers into the twentieth century. His music was a major influence on the Romantics in terms of its structural innovations, expansion of tonality,
and power of feeling. In Beethoven's music the intensity of expression combines with unsurpassed control and variety of form; the intellectual and expressive aspects are in perfect balance.
SYMPHONY NO. 3 IN E-FLAT MAJOR, "EROICA", OP. 55 (1803)
"He will sell the symphony to you for 100 Gulden. It is in his estimation the greatest work he has written until now. Beethoven played it for me recently, and I believe that heaven and earth must have trembled at this performance. He wants very much to dedicate it to Bonaparte; if not, since Lobkowitz wants it for half a year and is willing to give 400 Gulden for it, he will title it Bonaparte .... "
These words, from a letter written by Beethoven's pupil Ferdinand Ries to the music publisher Simrock on October 22, 1803, give the first detailed reference to one of the greatest of all symphonies. Early rehearsals took place in the Lobkowitz palace in Vienna in late May or early June 1804. The first public performance occurred in Vienna on April 7, 1805. According to Ries, the news that Napoleon had declared himself emperor so enraged Beethoven that he tore up the title page with Napoleon's name. In the end, the symphony was published with the title Sinfonia Eroica and bore the inscription, "Composed to celebrate the memory of a
The large dimensions of the symphony were unprecedented. In fact, the first edition included a statement suggesting that the symphony be placed near the beginning of a concert because of its unusual length. The orchestral scoring, however, was standard except for the addition of a third horn, though Wagner and others reorchestrated certain passages for greater power (as in the coda of movement I, where the final presentation of the heroic theme is given to the trumpets in the high register, which occurs in this performance). The symphony represents Beethoven's middle period in its expanded size, highly varied instrumentation, continuity, and intensity of development and expression, as well as many unique structural features. A remarkably detailed marking of dynamics and other performance indications profoundly influences the structure and performance of the music.
Movement I: Allegro con brio
After two monumental tonic chords, Beethoven fills the huge frame of the first movement in sonata form (691 measures) with fifteen units which provide intensified contrast and activity throughout. The most significant elements of this movement are the opening triadic phrase, the first secondary theme in dialogue, the furious dactylic rhythm in the third secondary
theme, the meditative episode before the closing group, the chordal hammer strokes in syncopation and hemiola, and the lyrical new theme of the development. Intensified harmonic and rhythmic dissonance and frequent climaxes contribute to the high temperature of the music. An enormous development section, nearly twice the length of the exposition (which must therefore be repeated), is balanced by a long culminating coda, almost as long as the exposition. The coda features the metamorphosis of the opening triadic idea into a triumphant, symmetrical theme.
Movement II: ,Marcia funebre; Adagio assai
The Funeral March in C minor can be related to the popularity of such marches in France and operas of the period. Earlier, Beethoven had written two for piano. This greatest and longest of all such marches is organized as a large-scale rondo. Beethoven incorporates such march features as duple meter, dotted rhythm, a four-note drum figure (three short notes to a long), and extensive wind solos, suggesting a marching band. The funereal atmosphere is further conveyed by use of the low orchestral register and lamenting sound of the oboe solos. The first section is in rounded binary form (a/ba 1), with varied repeats and coda, while the following section, in C major, has a two-part layout like a small sonata form, each part ending with a military salute to the
dead. The C section contains a grand climax area, featuring a fugue derived from a theme in the first part, the contrapuntal style being associated with the sacred style. The coda recalls the consoling melody from the opening of the second section, but in the distant key of D-flat, and ends with a remarkable rhythmic transformation of the opening theme of the movement, broken, as if by grief, into short, hesitating fragments.
Movement III: Scherzo; Allegro vivace
Beethoven is famous for inventing the modern scherzo, found here in its quintessential style. Life returns with extraordinary intensity through the nearly steady quarternote motion that dominates most of the Scherzo. There are several jokes in this section, the main one being that the folk-like melody presented by the oboe as the primary theme occurs in the wrong key -- the dominant, not the tonic -and is not heard in the tonic until its climactic return in canon. The Trio, also in rounded binary form, features the three horns in the style of a hunting fanfare. The fanfare returns after contrast only to melt away in a chromatic cadence which connects to the Scherzo in the second ending. The entire Scherzo then returns without repeating the second part but with another joke -- a change from triple to duple meter in the repeat of the concluding triadic theme. The movement closes with a coda that recalls the chromatic Trio cadence.
Movement IV: Finale; Molto
Allegro Faced by the challenge of a finale that would balance the grand opening movement, Beethoven turned to the variation form on two themes invented by Haydn to produce sufficient variety and contrast. Here, however, the two themes are not two melodies but a melody and its bassline, treated as an independent theme. The same melody (dated 1800-1801), and use of melody and bass occur in Beethoven's "Prometheus" piano variations, Op. 35 (1802), a model for the symphonic finale.
The variations of the Finale are unprecedented in their continuity, changes of key in variations 3-5 and sharp changes of character, all of which create a unique structure. Both the presentation and three variations of the themes are given varied repeats. After the themes enter, they alternate in rondo-like fashion, the bass theme always treated contrapuntally and fugally in two ''free" variations while the melody dominates the closing section of the movement.
THE OVERTURE TO CORIOLAN OP. 62
The Coriolan overture in C minor was composed in early 1807 (the autograph is so dated) and first performed in a remarkable series of all-Beethoven concerts in March 1807 held at the palace of Prince Lobkowitz in Vienna. Shortly thereafter, on April 24, the
overture was played for a revival of the play of the same name by the Viennese playwright Heinrich von Collin (1772-1811). Beethoven dedicated the overture to Collin, a dramatist he hoped would supply a viable libretto for an opera. This tragic overture was well received from the start, being described by the composer-critic J. F. Reichardt in December 1808 as "gigantic and overpowering."
Though the overture is in sonata form, it is impossible to understand its style in purely musical terms. The powerful and stable opening theme seems to depict the proud Roman (the exaggerated long notes and dramatic pauses make this sound like a slow introduction). Coriolan's indecision and inner torment' are symbolized by the theme that follows, with its syncopation and unstable harmony, both features dominating and unifying this intensely continuous movement. The warmly lyrical secondary theme, which provides the main thematic contrast, clearly represents the pleading of Coriolan's mother and wife. This theme's basic phrase appears fifteen times in rising, modulating sequences and majorminor contrasts, and the theme also starts the coda after a sudden pause. The long coda, so typical of middle-period Beethoven, ends with the disintegration of the two Coriolan themes, depicting the death of the hero.
THE CRITICAL EDITIONS
The performances on this recording are based on the new critical editions made for the series of Beethoven's complete works published by the Beethoven-Haus, Bonn (G. Henle Verlag, Munchen). A critical edition is one that draws on the authentic sources of a work for the establishment of the musical text-sources that stem directly or indirectly from the composer. Furthermore, all editorial additions are indicated as such, so that the original text can be essentially reconstructed at a glance.
The new edition of the Eroica by this writer is mainly based on the copyist's score (no autograph has survived) located in the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna. This score contains extensive corrections by Beethoven as well as some revisions. Only a few details stem from the first edition, published by the Kunst- und Industrie Comptoir in Vienna, an edition riddled with errors, as are the 11 surviving manuscript parts with insufficient corrections by Beethoven and Ries. The first edition also contains a repetition of two measures near the end of the exposition of the first movement (mm. 150-51 ), which was later removed, undoubtedly at Beethoven's request.
Hundreds of details in the new edition differ from the old complete edition of the symphony (1862), which was the source of all later editions. These details include slurs, staccati, dynamics, and some notes. The changes influence the accents, nuances, and flow of the music. The main problem is the placement and length of slurs. In the old complete edition, many longer slurs were broken up into shorter ones, and irregular and contrapuntal slurs regularized. Thus, in the first movement, the slurs of the new theme's first phrase, which vary in each of the first four presentations, were made the same length. At the end of the Funeral March, the fragmented opening theme has been given the slurs found in the copyist's score, rather than the standard conflation of markings not found in any source. In the third movement, the recurrence of the Scherzo includes the fuller writing for horns in the climactic return of the primary theme, a scoring omitted in the sources and modern editions though surely intended since it occurred in the opening appearance. Among the changes in the Finale is the slurring of the first phrase of the contredanse melody in the coda's Presto section, the slur starting from the first rather than the second note. Many dynamic marks are placed earlier or later as the sources indicate; staccati have been added or removed; and the notation of the grouping of notes follows the copyist's score, which
reflects the phrasing more precisely.
For the new edition of the Coriolan Overture (1974), the editor, Hans-Werner Kuthen, made use of the autograph score in the BeethovenHaus and the two earliest editions of the music published by Simrock in Bonn (1807) and the Kunst- und lndustrie Comptoir in Vienna (1808). Unlike the Eroica, this edition diverges only slightly in slurs and dynamics from the text of the old collected works of Beethoven.
- © 1993 Bathia Churgin
The author is professor of musicology at Barlian University, Israel and editor of the Eroica Symphony for the New Beethoven Edition published by the Beethoven-Haus, Bonn.
Widely acknowledged as one of classical music's most innovative conductors, DENNIS RUSSELL DAVIES is also one of the most active, currently holding three music directorships and performing as guest conductor on both sides of the Atlantic. In his seventh year as General Music Director since 1987 of the City of Bonn, Germany, he is also Principal Conductor and co-founder of the highlyregarded American Composers Orchestra, Music Director of the Brooklyn Academy of Music and Principal Conductor of the Brooklyn Philharmonic.
As Music Director of Bonn, Mr. Davies serves as Artistic Director/Chief Conductor of the Orchester der Beethovenhalle Bonn and Music Director of the Bonn Opera House. As pianist, he performs regularly with violinists Oscar Shumsky and Romuald Tecco, cellist Janos Starker, and the Stuttgart Wind Quintet. Mr. Davies served as General Music Director of the Stuttgart Opera from 1980- 1987. From 1972-1980 he was Music Director of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, leading the ensemble to international recognition through increased touring activities and recording projects. In addition, he was Music Director of the Cabrillo Music Festival in Santa Cruz from 1974 -1991. His operatic engagements in the United States have included the Lyric Opera of Chicago, Houston Grand Opera and the Santa Fe Opera. In Europe apart from his Bonn Opera he conducts regularly at the Bavarian State Opera. He has also conducted at the Wagner Festival in Bayreuth, the second American ever invited to do so.
Mr. Davies' ongoing projects with MusicMasters include cycles of works by Beethoven and Mendelssohn with his Orchester der Beethovenhalle as well as a cycle of works by Aaron Copland.
THE ORCHESTER DER BEETHOVENHALLE
BONN began its career in 1897 as the Koblenz Philharmonic and was adopted by the city of Bonn in 1907 as its own. Since 1963 the orchestra has carried the name of the concert hall which is its home.
The Orchester der Beethovenhalle Bonn is indebted to the great tradition which, above all, Beethoven and Schumann have bequeathed the city. The orchestra plays a major role in the International Beethoven Festival, which has taken place regularly in Bonn since 1927. The orchestra has appeared in Salzburg at the Vienna Festival and has toured extensively in Europe and Japan. In March 1990 the orchestra undertook its first North American tour under Dennis Russell Davies, who, as General Music Director of the city of Bonn, has led the orchestra since 1987.
With 122 members the Orchester der Beethovenhalle Bonn is one of the most important and active German orchestras, playing yearly around 30 concert programs and 150 evenings in the Bonn Opera House. With its recent music directors, Volker Wangenheim, Jan Krenz and Gustav Kuhn and now Mr. Davies, the orchestra has played a major role in the cultural life of Beethoven's birthplace.
