by David B. Levy
The CSO Pre-concert Lecture Series and Program Notes are made possible thanks to the Carl and Lee Chaverin Fund.
Symphony No. 1 in C Major, Op. 21
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn on December 15 or 16, 1770 (the date of his baptism was December 17), and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. One of the pivotal figures in the history of Western music, his nine symphonies, 5 piano concertos, Violin Concerto, and several overtures remain at the heart of the symphonic repertory. Beethoven composed the Symphony No. 1 between 1799 and 1800, and premiered it at the Vienna Hofburgtheater on April 2, 1800. It is scored for two each of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons, horns and trumpets; timpani; and strings.
Beethoven’s genius in strategic planning was not limited to his abilities as a composer. Known throughout Vienna as a virtuoso pianist and Haydn’s composition student since arriving in 1792, Beethoven waited before launching his own works in the genres where Haydn was the acknowledged master. It is no accident that Beethoven’s first string quartets (Op. 18) were published only after he knew Haydn was no longer interested in composing quartets. Indeed, Beethoven’s hasty issuance of his official Opus 1, three trios for piano, violin, and cello — another favorite genre of Haydn — led to friction between teacher and pupil.
By 1795, Haydn had premiered his final 12 symphonies for London. This marked the end of an extraordinary career that in nearly 40 years produced 107 symphonies, advancing the genre from a relatively modest piece intended for princely amusement to a sonata writ large intended for a broader paying public. During his first eight years in Vienna, Beethoven most impressed his ever-growing admirers with his earliest piano sonatas (ten of which pre-date the First Symphony), the aforementioned piano trios, assorted chamber music, and above all, his Septet, Op. 20, a work that shared the program with the premiere of his First Symphony along with a symphony (unidentified) by Mozart, excerpts from Haydn’s Creation, an improvisation at the piano, and the first performance of either his C-major Piano Concerto, Op. 15, or the earlier (despite the higher opus number) Piano Concerto in B-flat Major, Op. 19. Much to Beethoven’s annoyance, the Septet proved more popular than the Symphony, although the latter moved one critic for the Leipzig Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung to write:
“[Beethoven] . . . improvised in a masterly way, and at the end a symphony of his composition was performed in which there was very much art, novelty, and a wealth of ideas. However, the wind instruments were used far too much so that there was more music for wind instruments than for a full orchestra.”
The review goes on to sternly criticize the orchestra: “In the second part of the symphony [the players] became so lax that in spite of all efforts, no fire could any longer be brought forth in their playing, particularly not in the wind instruments.” Sadly, Beethoven’s Vienna was poorly equipped for performing symphonies.
Donald Francis Tovey called Beethoven’s First Symphony a “comedy of manners,” which inherited much from the wit of Haydn’s music and Mozart’s comic operas and lighter instrumental music. The notoriously heavy wind scoring, however, reminds us that Beethoven was every bit the ill-mannered “unlicked bear cub,” as Luigi Cherubini once dubbed him. The audacious “off-key” beginning of the Adagio molto, brilliantly scored for winds and pizzicato strings (a trick he used again in his Overture to The Creatures of Prometheus) immediately announces the composer’s humor. The dramatic and thoroughly Beethovenian fury at the climax of the development section reminds us that all great comedy is ultimately about something important.
The fugato exposition of the second movement begs comparison with the Andante scherzoso quasi Allegretto of the String Quartet in C Minor, Op. 18 N\no. 4. That Beethoven calls the third movement a Menuetto is, in itself, a kind of joke (“scherzo” means jest) and may be taken as further evidence of his irreverence for convention. The trio section, with its static harmonic motion, may have been inspired by the analogous passage in Haydn’s Symphony No. 101, “Clock.”
The finale’s introductory Adagio holds the particularly Beethovenian surprise of making a crescendo, only to drop back to a softer dynamic at the end. Tovey appropriately likens this introduction to a cat in a paper bag, insofar as his desire to leave is tentative until it rushes forward suddenly. But Tovey also reminds us that young tigers
are kittens too, and the young Beethoven certainly has an opportunity to roar in the Allegro molto e vivace that brings the First Symphony to its merry conclusion.
