Turkish March in 4th Mvmt of 9th Symphony - What was Beethoven Thinking?

[Peter]

Yes, that's true. Audiences were used to long performances in those days, and it was hardly Beethoven's fault that it was such a cold night. But he did specify that the Fifth Symphony should open the concert as it was the most difficult work for a new audience.

Yes Michael and I think you have a point in drawing attention to the main weight in the classical forms generally being placed on the first movement -however I think the 9th symphony is a marked departure from that.

[Michael]

What about that mammoth Dec 22nd 1808 concert? Audience consideration didn't play a large part there!

Yes, that's true. Audiences were used to long performances in those days, and it was hardly Beethoven's fault that it was such a cold night. But he did specify that the Fifth Symphony should open the concert as it was the most difficult work for a new audience.

[Peter]

Perhaps he was, even at that late stage of his compositional life, still thinking of his audience?
However, in dealing with Beethoven, you cannot come to easy conclusions. Opus 130 originally ended with the “Grosse Fuge”, audience fatigue or not. But he did replace it ………….

What about that mammoth Dec 22nd 1808 concert? Audience consideration didn't play a large part there!

[Michael]

This may have been dealt with elsewhere, so apologies if I appear to be rehashing.
I think the prevailing view in the eighteenth century was that the first movement of a symphonic work should be the most complex because the audience would be more alert and receptive at the beginning of a piece. Beethoven even suggested that the “Eroica” be played as near as possible to the start of a concert because of its huge opening movements, etc.
The vast majority of Beethoven’s works are first-movement oriented. The piano sonatas and other chamber works usually end up with a rondo which is lighter in character than the rest of the work, while the more complex sonata-form is reserved for the opening movement. This is only a generalisation and there are numerous exceptions in later works such as the “Hammerklavier”.
I believe the composer is always conscious of the fact that his music is listened to in real time (or should be!) and cannot be left down and resumed like a novel. His/her audience is sitting and listening, often for a considerable length. Even a painting or a sculpture is not constrained by time and can be examined at the viewer’s own discretion. So, to optimise his work, the clever composer will give the opening movements the full intellectual weight of his art without compromising the remainder. How could anyone regard Beethoven’s scherzos as inferior works but, in a sense, they are less complicated than the opening movements.
I would say that Mozart was one of the first composers to place the emphasis on the last movement of a symphony. The opening of the “Jupiter” is as great as any of his last six symphonies, but the themes appear to me to be a bit simpler than usual, as if he were easing off on his audience in order to have them more alert for that fantastic fugal finale.
So, to get back to Beethoven’s Ninth, the first movement is, in a sense, more complex than the last – and why not? In spite of its merging of sonata-form, rondo, and even concerto, the last movement is based on a simple tune which is always recognisable through its variations. Perhaps he was, even at that late stage of his compositional life, still thinking of his audience?
However, in dealing with Beethoven, you cannot come to easy conclusions. Opus 130 originally ended with the “Grosse Fuge”, audience fatigue or not. But he did replace it ………….

[Peter]

we should forget the military element and imagine instead the steady 'march' of the millions that represent the brotherhood of man, walking (marching?) toward a Utopian (dare I say 'socialist'?) state.

The ode was originally conceived by Schiller in 1785 to freedom, not joy (as Bernstein performed it in 1989) and was coming very much from enlightenment and masonic ideals. I suggest socialist 'utopia' had nothing to do with it, freedom from political oppression everything.

[Quijote]

IMHO the entire 9th rests entirely on the massively solid foundation of its first movement. the rest of the music is no match in contrast to the surging dynamics of the first movement.

Does anyone have anything solid to say about those opening crashing chords... and that thunderous musical explosion in the middle of the first movement?

Can anyone possibly fathom the imagery described in that music?

Hello LvBfanatic : as I have said elsewhere on this forum before, reponses to such issues as you raise will be (necessarily) grossly inadequate, given that internet forums by their nature will lend themselves only to 'soundbite' answers. That said, let me try to address your points :

In your honest opinion the entire IXth rests on the [...] first movement. In as much that most symphonies are 'defined' by their opening first movements this is certainly true, but is only half the picture. The point you are perhaps unintentionally raising is one of 'structural weighting' (other writers refer to 'centres of gravty' in a given work), and it is this that - in part - distinguishes LvB from his contemporaries (and why I have decided not to be drawn into the 'Classical v. Romantic' argument on another thread on this forum). Whereas your comments would normally apply quite validly to many if not most of Haydn's (and Mozart's) symphonies, sonatas and quartets, this is decidedly not the case with our dear belovèd LvB, who, in contrast to accepted classical procedures (which were, incidently, not at all formalised in B's day), chose to play with this 'structural' aspect.

The point then, about the IXth in particular, is that the 'centre of gravity' is not only in the 1st movement, momentous though this movement is. The question for me is whether or not the 4th movement matches up to the 1st movement from this point of view, and as I said above, I do feel a certain 'disappointment' in that regard. This is a point that would be the subject of many a musicological convention, so I can hardly hope to do justice to it here, but perhaps it will set in motion an interesting debate.

As to your last comment above about 'fathoming the imagery' : let yourself be guided by your own imagination, as B himself would not have wanted to 'spell it out' for you!

[Quijote]

I think everyone's about half right with this. The march is a devastating puncturing device, breaking up the emotional overload before we are subconsciously primed for even more intensity.

Perhaps I am half wrong, but I feel you may have hit the proverbial nail on the head, PDG. I am not sure to what extent B was aware of 'puncturing devices' as 'structural tools', but surely as you say, there is a clear feeling of our emotions being controlled and guided. Thus it ever was, with B.

[Quijote]

Nice idea Sorrano, but I don't buy it - after all there was nothing much familiar about having a Turkish march in a symphony! I don't think for one moment Beethoven was thinking along anything other than artistic lines - the march (which is simply a variation of the theme) provides an almost operatic interlude before the double fugue and a dramatic contrast to the preceding episode.

We are also perhaps overlooking something here, in the Alla Marcia (or so-called 'Turkish' march) : we should forget the military element and imagine instead the steady 'march' of the millions that represent the brotherhood of man, walking (marching?) toward a Utopian (dare I say 'socialist'?) state.

[Quijote]

The musicologist where I studied music taught that one of the reasons for using the Turkish March was to give the audience something familiar to hear with all the newness of a choral symphony. The very nature of the work was so vastly different than anything that had come before; even the first three movements are unlike anything else that Beethoven had composed. The Turkish March, then would represent something that would enable the audience to get a hold of that was somewhat familiar.

I do not think for one moment that LvB wrote to 'accommodate' the common listener, Sorrano. The speculation of your musicologist (why not just say 'music teacher'?) is interesting, but does not finally hold water.

[Quijote]

I think the march is highly inspired with a wonderful counter melody in the tenor - nobody criticised Haydn for using cymbals, triangles and tambourines in his symphony no.100.

I agree with the first part of your posting Peter : yes, an inspired 'Alla marcia' with a wonderful counter melody. The fact that nobody (really?) has criticised Haydn for using cymbals, triangles and so on misses the point somewhat. I would tentatively suggest that Haydn uses percussion as 'decoration'. Beethoven, on the other hand, uses it as a motor force, as we know well in the Scherzo of the Ninth : surely, never before had the timpani been used in such a manner and for such structural purposes.

[Quijote]

[...] the march section of the finale was described as Beethoven taking the music "outdoors". The beginning of the march does seem to suggest an army of musicians in the distance and gradually coming closer.

Michael raises an interesting point : 'taking the music outdoors'. According to the literature Beethoven advised against using / imagining too overt a 'programme' in his music. We must consider this statement in light of the Pastoral symphony, but why not too in the IXth? In certain ways the concept ("taking music outdoors") raises issues concerning 'absolute' music (as a symphony would have been perceived at that time) and 'extra-musical' constructs; certainly, this 'Turkish March' may be construed as 'relocating the live', but its modernist approach is staggering for someone writing in the early part of the 19th century.

[Quijote]

Yes it is the last movement that has always come in for the greatest criticism yet paradoxically it is the movement best known and loved! Honestly I think the march is splendid and highly original in its context.

Rather like the 'Eroica', where we can read many scholarly 'amounts of ink' expounding on the the first movement alone. I am not entirely convinced that the 4th movement (IXth) is the best known and loved. Personally (please forgive me if I am breaking some taboos in saying so) I have always felt a slight 'disappointment' with the choral finale, and take some succour from the reported 'fact' that LvB even considered he may have made a mistake. That said, even if it were an aesthetic 'miscalculation' on B's part, it remains one hell of a glorioius mistake.

[Quijote]

There is just so much self-depracation in Beethoven. I think the Turkish fashion had gone out with Mozart, but Beethoven's humour got the better of him, and the "carnival" aspect of which you speak is about spot on and in keeping with his general feeling of artistic freedom and cocking a snook. The 9th is the greatest symphony of all time, but what spurred Beethoven on to finish it (its gestation period was unusually long) was not "his art" but the promise of £25 from the Royal London Society...

A few points, if I may, PDG. You speak about 'self-deprecation' (note spelling, old boy!), but I wonder if you rather mean 'irony' in this context. I also ask in all honesty, to whom is LvB cocking a snook (I admit unfamiliarity with this expression)?

As to your proclamation that LvB's Ninth is 'the greatest symphony of all time', whilst I share your enthusiasm for this momentous work I hesitate to make such categoric statements; further, we know from the literature that LvB wrote what he wanted when he wanted, and in the latter part of his career did not write solely for pecuniary motives, so I feel obliged to question a mere £25 as providing the stimulus to its completion.

[Peter]

How in touch was Beethoven with the current styles of the time? I doubt that he had much capacity to attend concerts at the current deficiency of aural abilities.

Yes but he was fully aware of what was going on through various other means - music journals, publishers, friends and of course bill boards with Rossini written all over them!

[Sorrano]

I don't think so - Italian opera was the rage.

How in touch was Beethoven with the current styles of the time? I doubt that he had much capacity to attend concerts at the current deficiency of aural abilities.