Ludwig van Beethoven was baptized in Bonn, Germany, on December 17, 1770, and died in Vienna, Austria, on March 26, 1827. Approximate performance time is thirty-four minutes.
During the summer of 1806, Ludwig van Beethoven visited his friend and patron, Prince Karl Lichnowsky, who owned a Silesian country estate. During that visit, Lichnowsky introduced Beethoven to Count Franz von Oppersdorf, whose castle was located nearby. Oppersdorf, an avid music-lover, greeted Beethoven with a performance of the composer’s Symphony No. 2, played by the Count’s own court orchestra.
It was on that occasion that Count Oppersdorf commissioned Beethoven to write a new symphony. Beethoven had already begun work on what would become the Fifth Symphony. However, Beethoven temporarily put that work aside, in order to compose the B-flat Major Symphony for Prince Oppersdorf. Beethoven composed his Fourth Symphony during the months of September and October 1806, while residing at Prince Lichnowsky’s estate. The Symphony probably received its premiere in March of the following year, at the Vienna Palais Lobkowitz.
It was Robert Schumann who characterized Beethoven’s Fourth Symphony as “a slender Greek maiden between two huge Nordic giants.” It is true that the Fourth does not manifest the epic struggles found in the “Eroica” and Fifth Symphonies. Nevertheless, there is plenty of drama in the Beethoven Fourth, as well as humor. The latter is a characteristic not often associated with a man who, through genius and force of will, overcame the greatest obstacles, including deafness.
Still, we know from contemporary accounts that Beethoven did indeed possess a robust sense of humor. We should also bear in mind that in his early years, Beethoven was a student of the greatest of all symphonic humorists, Franz Joseph Haydn. In listening to the Fourth, it is appropriate to recall what Haydn wrote of his young pupil in 1793: “Beethoven will in time become one of the greatest musical artists in Europe, and I shall be proud to call myself his teacher.”
The Symphony is in four movements. The first opens with an extended and mysterious slow-tempo introduction (Adagio). A crescendo leads to a whiplash motif in the strings, the springboard to the skipping principal motif of the Allegro vivace. The slow-tempo second movement (Adagio) begins with a repeated figure in the second violins. This serves as accompaniment to the lovely cantabile opening theme, played by the first violins, and later repeated by the winds. The third movement (Allegro vivace) is a buoyant scherzo. The principal scherzo portion alternates with a pastoral Trio section. A brief horn call precedes a concluding fortissimo chord. The finale (Allegro ma non troppo) opens with a perpetuum mobile figure in the strings, establishing the playful mood that predominates throughout. The coda seems to proceed toward a quiet resolution, but, suddenly, a raucous exclamation brings the Symphony No. 4 to a fortissimo close.
Program notes by Ken Meltzer