Beethoven

George Alexander Fischer

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• Publié par: noshor
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 35
• Langue: English

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Beethoven, by George Alexander
Fischer
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Title: Beethoven
Author: George Alexander Fischer
Release Date: February 22, 2005 [eBook #15141]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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Transcriber's Notes
1. Corrected spelling of Maelzel's invention in one place from
'Panharmonican' to 'Panharmonicon'.
2. In the index, corrected 'Krumpholtz' to 'Krumpholz', 'Origen of the dance'
to 'Origin of the dance', and 'Neafe' to 'Neefe'.
BEETHOVEN
BEETHOVEN
A CHARACTER STUDY
TOGETHER WITH
WAGNER'S INDEBTEDNESS TO BEETHOVEN
BYGEORGE ALEXANDER FISCHER
Es kann die Spur von meinen Erdentagen Nicht in Aeonen
untergehn.
GOETHE.
NEW YORK
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY
1905
THE TROW PRESS, NEW YORK
TO THE MEMORY OF
My father
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Early Promise 1
II. The Morning of Life 19
III. The New Path 30
IV. Heroic Symphony 40
V. Fidelio 46
VI. The Eternal Feminine 58
VII. Victory from Defeat 73
VIII. Meeting with Goethe 80
IX. Optimistic Trend 93
X. At the Zenith of His Fame 102
XI. Methods of Composition 119
XII. Sense of Humor 132
XIII. Missa Solemnis 143
XIV. Ninth Symphony 162
XV. Capacity for Friendship 174
XVI. The Day's Trials 184XVII. Last Quartets 191
XVIII. In the Shadows 203
XIX. Life's Purport 216
WAGNER'S INDEBTEDNESS TO BEETHOVEN 224
INDEX 237
BEETHOVEN
CHAPTER I
EARLY PROMISE
God acts upon earth only by means of superior chosen men.
—HERDER: Ideas Toward a History of Mankind .
s life broadens with advancing culture, and people are able to
appropriate to themselves more of the various forms of art, the
artist himself attains to greater power, his abilities increase in
direct ratio with the progress in culture made by the people and
their ability to comprehend him. When one side or phase of an
art comes to be received, new and more difficult problems are
invariably presented, the elucidation of which can only be effected by a higher
development of the faculties. There is never an approach to equilibrium
between the artist and his public. As it advances in knowledge of his art, he
maintains the want of balance, the disproportion that always exists between the
genius and the ordinary man, by rising ever to greater heights.
If Bach is the mathematician of music, as has been asserted, Beethoven is its
philosopher. In his work the philosophic spirit comes to the fore. To the genius
of the musician is added in Beethoven a wide mental grasp, an altruistic spirit,
that seeks to help humanity on the upward path. He addresses the intellect of
mankind.
Up to Beethoven's time musicians in general (Bach is always an exception)
performed their work without the aid of an intellect for the most part; they
worked by intuition. In everything outside their art they were like children.
Beethoven was the first one having the independence to think for himself—the
first to have ideas on subjects unconnected with his art. He it was who
established the dignity of the artist over that of the simply well-born. His entire
life was a protest against the pretensions of birth over mind. His predecessors,
to a great extent subjugated by their social superiors, sought only to please.
Nothing further was expected of them. This mental attitude is apparent in their
work. The language of the courtier is usually polished, but will never have the
virility that characterizes the speech of the free man.As with all valuable things, however, Beethoven's music is not to be enjoyed
for nothing. We must on our side contribute something to the enterprise,
something more than simply buying a ticket to the performance. We must study
his work in the right spirit, and place ourselves in a receptive attitude when
listening to it to understand his message. Often metaphysical, particularly in the
work of his later years, his meaning will be revealed only when we devote to it
earnest and sympathetic study. No other composer demands so much of one;
no other rewards the student so richly for the effort required. The making a fact
the subject of thought vitalizes it. It is as if the master had said to the aspirant: "I
will admit you into the ranks of my disciples, but you must first prove yourself
worthy." An initiation is necessary; somewhat of the intense mental activity
which characterized Beethoven in the composition of his works is required of
the student also. There is a tax imposed for the enjoyment of them.
Like Thoreau, Beethoven came on the world's stage "just in the nick of time,"
and almost immediately had to begin hewing out a path for himself. He was
born in the workshop, as was Mozart, and learned music simultaneously with
speaking. Stirring times they were in which he first saw the light, and so indeed
continued with ever-increasing intensity, like a good drama, until nearly his
end. The American Revolution became an accomplished fact during his
boyhood. Nearer home, events were fast coming to a focus, which culminated
in the French Revolution. The magic words, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, and
the ideas for which they stood, were everywhere in the minds of the people.
The age called for enlightenment, spiritual growth.
On reaching manhood, he found a world in transition; he realized that he was
on the threshold of a new order of things, and with ready prescience took
advantage of such as could be utilized in his art. Through Beethoven the
resources of the orchestra were increased, an added range was given the
keyboard of the piano, the human voice was given tasks that at the time
seemed impossible of achievement. He established the precedent, which
Wagner acted on later, of employing the human voice as a tool, an instrument,
to be used in the exigencies of his art, as if it were a part of the orchestra.
Beethoven's birthplace, Bonn, no doubt proved a favorable soil for the
propagation of the new ideas. The unrest pervading all classes, an outcome of
the Revolution, showed itself among the more serious-minded in increased
intellectuality, and a reaching after higher things. This Zeitgeist is clearly
reflected in his compositions, in particular the symphonies and sonatas. "Under
the lead of Italian vocalism," said Wagner, speaking of the period just
preceding the time of which we write, "music had become an art of sheer
agreeableness." The beautiful in music had been sufficiently exploited by
Mozart and Haydn. Beethoven demonstrated that music has a higher function
than that of mere beauty, or the simple act of giving pleasure. The beautiful in
literature is not its best part. To the earnest thinker, the seeker after truth, the
student who looks for illumination on life's problem, beauty in itself is
insufficient. It is the best office of art, of Beethoven's art in particular, that it leads
ever onward and upward; that it acts not only on the esthetic and moral sense,
but develops the mental faculties as well, enabling the individual to find a
purpose and meaning in life.Ludwig van Beethoven was born at Bonn, December 16, 1770. He came of a
musical family. His father and grandfather were both musicians at Bonn, at the
Court of the Elector of Cologne. The family originally came from Louvain, and
settled in Antwerp in 1650, from which place they moved to Bonn.
This old city on the Rhine, frequently mentioned by Tacitus, older than
Christianity, the scene of innumerable battles from Roman times up to the
beginning of the nineteenth century, has much that is interesting about it, but is
distinguished chiefly on account of having been Beethoven's birthplace. It was
for five centuries (from 1268 to 1794) in the possession of the Electors of
Cologne. The last one of all, Max Franz, who succeeded to the Electorate when
Beethoven was fourteen years of age, and who befriended him in various ways
was, in common with the entire Imperial family, a highly cultivated person,
especially in music. He was the youngest son of Maria Therese, Empress of
Austria, herself a fine singer and well versed in the music of the time. The
Elector played the viola and his chief interest in life seems to have been music.
In Beethoven's time and long before, the aristocracy led lives of easy,
complacent enjoyment, dabbling in art, patronizing music and the composers,
seemingly with no prevision that the musicians whom they attached to their
train, and who in the cases of Mozart and Haydn were at times treated but little
better than lackeys, were destined by the irony of fate to occupy places in the
temple of fame, which would be denied themselves.
Ludwig van Beethoven, the grandfather of the composer, received his
appointment as Kapellmeister at Bonn in March of 1733, then tw