Beethoven's shift from Classical to Romantic

[dolefulorange]

I was having a discussion with my father about Beethoven. We were trying to argue whether he was primarily Classical or Romantic. Of course, it is always said that he was classical in his early works and became more Romantic in his later works. I wonder though, what time of his life would you classify his shift from one movement to the next. This might be difficult to pinpoint seeing how the definitions of both movements are vague and the change is probably pretty gradual. But, do you think there was any piece or set of pieces that could be the turning point?

[Gurn Blanston]

Orange,
Well, I disagree with your basic premise. I would rather think that he was more Romantic in his earlier works, and more Classical in his later works. This is mainly based on structural things. In his younger days B was considered very progressive, as much so as those of his contemporaries who went on to become the Early Romantics. But later he was considered to be very conservative relative to his generation, because he preserved classical form and structure right up to the end. And look at his late works, so progressive in their content and forward-looking in their influence, but they relied mainly on forms that were "ancient" even then, like fugue, variation, country dance, suite-like organization, even the Lydian Mode in one instance.
This is my theory, which will be argued for and against, but no matter; the Romantics needed Beethoven far more than he needed them (he was dead, after all ) and they simply hijacked him by applying all sorts of bizarre programmatic lists to his works, wherein they could justify any number of excesses by saying "Beethoven started it". But when it comes down to the actual structure, there was very little Beethoven in the Romantics because it was too much for them, they were not able to take a lot of stylistic things because they just didn't fit - i.e. - they were not Romantic!


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Regards,
Gurn
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That's my opinion, I may be wrong.
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[Peter]

Whilst we can agree that the terms classical and Romantic are vague, in purely musical terms Beethoven was never a Romantic, nor was he the forerunner of that movement. The later works actually reveal a stricter classical approach than some of the early works such as the song Adelaide. Nowhere in Beethoven will you find a weakening of the tonic-dominant (or substitute dominant) relationship - all Beethoven's secondary tonalities imply a classical increase in tension, as compared to a relaxation in early Romantic music.

Beethoven was not favourable to the first generation of Romantics, composers such as Spohr he considered too chromatic and dissonant, by which he meant it was not sufficiently integrated within the diatonic framework - just the sort of music that was being written in the 1830s by Chopin etc.
It is no coincidence that his preferred living composer was Cherubini - the most conservative composer of the time.

No, the Romantic movement arose from Italian opera, Weber, Spohr, Hummel, Field, Schubert's lieder and the recently rediscovered Bach.

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'Man know thyself'

[v russo]

"the Romantics needed Beethoven far more than he needed them (he was dead, after all ) and they simply hijacked him by applying all sorts of bizarre programmatic lists to his works, wherein they could justify any number of excesses by saying "Beethoven started it".

Brillant stuff Gurn, I totally agree...well said!

The break it seems to me though, well- It has to be the "Eroica" symphony. His work before this piece was much more conservative and "classical" in nature and structure. This is the piece that ushered in his 2nd phase or "middle period". This is also the period that the future "Romantics" pillaged his discoveries.

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v russo

[Gurn Blanston]

v.
Well, there is no doubt that the Eroica marks a watershed point in B's works, but I'm just not sure what point it does mark. If it can be thought of in this way, I think that in some aspects it is as you say, a point from where his works become more daring and even outre. In other ways, it is also the point where he becomes more conservative, rigidly adhering to sonata form while all around him abandoned it. There is a very curious dichotomy in Beethoven, and I think that the reason that people such as us still speculate about it is because even the professionals haven't explained it satisfactorily to each other yet, let alone to us. As Peter mentions, he condemns the chromaticism of his contemporaries (while using a spot of it himself, of course) and many of the devices they are developing, and yet he is also developing his own devices that are beginning to be pretty far removed from standard Classicsm too. I really believe that he remained a Classical composer to the end, he just stretched a redefined what "Classical" meant. His was a road not taken subsequently, thus my assertion (roundly condemned I might add!) that he was not influential, at least in structure. He was, however, tremendously so in spirit. Perhaps that is his one, unintentional contribution to Romanticism, they co-opted his attitude.


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Regards,
Gurn
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That's my opinion, I may be wrong.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[Chaszz]

Originally posted by dolefulorange:
I was having a discussion with my father about Beethoven. We were trying to argue whether he was primarily Classical or Romantic. Of course, it is always said that he was classical in his early works and became more Romantic in his later works. I wonder though, what time of his life would you classify his shift from one movement to the next. This might be difficult to pinpoint seeing how the definitions of both movements are vague and the change is probably pretty gradual. But, do you think there was any piece or set of pieces that could be the turning point?

Dolefulorange, I have been posting here about two years now, and during my time we have had at least two separate long cycles of discussion on this topic. When I came here I was of your mind, and Peter certainly taught me a good deal about the technical, sonata-form and harmonic aspects of Beethoven's classicism as compared to the Romantics' methods. So I have come more in some ways around to that view now, that Beethoven was a classicist. But, agreeing with Gurn's last sentences, I still think he influenced the Romantics by his heroic stance, by the overwhelming emotion he put into his music, and also by the large scale of it. So to me the answer is somewhere in between yes and no.

I don't think there is too much doubt possible that music would have changed and become Romantic with or without Beethoven, because this was the dominant spirit of the arts and the age, and music was a little late expressing it, so it would have happened in any case. But I think the scale of it might not have been so heroic and gigantic without Beethoven. Painting changed also when it became Romantic, but not to so great an extent in scale... As a matter of fact, this aspect, scale, didn't occur to me on the last go-round, and I'd like to ask Peter what he thinks of this: isn't this a fairly unequivocal instance of the influence of B. on the Romantics? Without him, can't we suppose that symphonies might have not got much bigger than Mozart's 41st, and that 9 or 10 would not become the number of symphonies beyond which almost all subsequent composers could not go? And likewise, that the concerto might not also have expanded to such length as is it did?

Also, another thing which just occurred to me, didn't B. in more or less invent the leider, and in this way influence many Romantics, as the leider is more personal than anything in the classical style. So here is another issue not covered last time as I remember. Maybe there is life in this old dispute yet. Peter?...



[This message has been edited by Chaszz (edited April 05, 2004).]

[Rutradelusasa]

Lieder .

And I guess he didn't invent it for Mozart already used it in his Singspiels, the lieder was a mandatory item on them, and Mozart didn't forget them. In Die Enthfürung (it this spelled right?) he used them, and I guess Beethoven was still learning music by then.

[dolefulorange]

Thanks guys. I really wasn't thinking abut the movements around Beethoven. I just tried to get as much as I could from the Encyclopedia. It was always Beethoven's "heroic" themes and varied dynamics that proved he was a Romantic. Also, they cite the fact that he was an emotional, musician at his time quoting Czerny every other sentence. But, it always seemed to me that he was improving the musical forms of his time rather than inventing new ones.

Anyway, thanks again for the feedback.

[Peter]

Originally posted by Chaszz:
Dolefulorange, I have been posting here about two years now, and during my time we have had at least two separate long cycles of discussion on this topic. When I came here I was of your mind, and Peter certainly taught me a good deal about the technical, sonata-form and harmonic aspects of Beethoven's classicism as compared to the Romantics' methods. So I have come more in some ways around to that view now, that Beethoven was a classicist. But, agreeing with Gurn's last sentences, I still think he influenced the Romantics by his heroic stance, by the overwhelming emotion he put into his music, and also by the large scale of it. So to me the answer is somewhere in between yes and no.

I don't think there is too much doubt possible that music would have changed and become Romantic with or without Beethoven, because this was the dominant spirit of the arts and the age, and music was a little late expressing it, so it would have happened in any case. But I think the scale of it might not have been so heroic and gigantic without Beethoven. Painting changed also when it became Romantic, but not to so great an extent in scale... As a matter of fact, this aspect, scale, didn't occur to me on the last go-round, and I'd like to ask Peter what he thinks of this: isn't this a fairly unequivocal instance of the influence of B. on the Romantics? Without him, can't we suppose that symphonies might have not got much bigger than Mozart's 41st, and that 9 or 10 would not become the number of symphonies beyond which almost all subsequent composers could not go? And likewise, that the concerto might not also have expanded to such length as is it did?

Also, another thing which just occurred to me, didn't B. in more or less invent the leider, and in this way influence many Romantics, as the leider is more personal than anything in the classical style. So here is another issue not covered last time as I remember. Maybe there is life in this old dispute yet. Peter?...

[This message has been edited by Chaszz (edited April 05, 2004).]

Firstly Beethoven no more invented the Lieder than Haydn did the symphony. However Haydn's influence was greater in that form than Beethoven's was in Lieder - it was Schubert's lieder that had the real impact on the Romantics.

Mozart in his last 3 symphonies had already opened new doors - they are far removed from the courtly 'classical' symphony and they also contain that personal element (as does much of his last music) that people credit solely first to Beethoven.

I have never denied Beethoven's influence on the later Romantic composers such as Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler, but this is coming primarily from the 9th symphony which is hardly a typical Beethoven work;
Beethoven was influenced by Palestrina but it doesn't make Palestrina a classical composer.

The expansion of the concerto and the symphony also go hand in hand with the development of musical instruments - the more the capablities, the more composers would experiment and none more so than Berlioz whose Symphonie Fantastique did most to influence composers such as Liszt and Wagner.

I don't think 9 symphonies being the limit was Beethoven's fault! Havergal Brian in the 20th century wrote around 32 symphonies on a vast scale (outdoing Mahler) - most unperformed!

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'Man know thyself'

[urtextmeister]

I don't want to get too embroiled in this perennial argument, but I would like to briefly comment on a couple points.

Peter's remark about the harmonic structure of Beethoven's late works is very important. Yes, he strayed to some odd tonal centers, but he always retained the classical tradition of tonic-dominant-tonic. It isn't the chords that are as important as the FUNCTION of those chords. The tension, the conflict of sonata form was always a driving force until the bitter end.

Yes, larger works are often associated with romantic composers, but the romantic era also produced many short, lyrical works. Think of Schumann's character pieces for piano--Davidsbunldertanze, Carnaval, etc., Chopin's preludes, various composers' lieder.

[Joy]

Originally posted by Peter:


I don't think 9 symphonies being the limit was Beethoven's fault! Havergal Brian in the 20th century wrote around 32 symphonies on a vast scale (outdoing Mahler) - most unperformed!

Thanks for all that information Peter, very interesting! Regarding 9 Symphonies and other composers here's what I read from “The Music and the Life Beethoven” by Lewis Lockwood:
“No major composer of symphonies after Beethoven down to the early 20th century (as you pointed out) wrote more than 9, (about 80 years) as if this work has set up a virtually permanent standard.”


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'Truth and beauty joined'

[Rutradelusasa]

Originally posted by urtextmeister:
I don't want to get too embroiled in this perennial argument, but I would like to briefly comment on a couple points.

Peter's remark about the harmonic structure of Beethoven's late works is very important. Yes, he strayed to some odd tonal centers, but he always retained the classical tradition of tonic-dominant-tonic. It isn't the chords that are as important as the FUNCTION of those chords. The tension, the conflict of sonata form was always a driving force until the bitter end.

Yes, larger works are often associated with romantic composers, but the romantic era also produced many short, lyrical works. Think of Schumann's character pieces for piano--Davidsbunldertanze, Carnaval, etc., Chopin's preludes, various composers' lieder.

When it comes to the function of chords and keys, Weber was a greater influence on Romantics than Beethoven for Weber was the one to really enphasize on the "mood" or "colour" of keys and chords, using the diminished seventh a lot because of this. Indeed Beethoven was one of the first to treat keys as a part of the music, in spite of what others did that could be transposed according to a singer, etc.
In fact I've seen quite an interesting essay on a german opera book (Brazilian book, I'm not sure it's sold out of here) where the author states the main difference between Leonore and Fidelio as the keys they turn to. Leonore starts with C (Beethoven's freedom key) and ends with C, so Leonore already arrives in the prison knowing who and what she must work her way through to get Florestan out of there (Pizzaro is the obstacle). In Fidelio she doesn't, therefore it starts in E, not in C, as in all Leonores, and also, the first aria in Leonore is Marzelline's one (in C) in Fidelio, it's the duet, in A, to match the E from the Ouverture. Interesting, huh?

[Chaszz]

Originally posted by Peter:
Firstly Beethoven no more invented the Lieder than Haydn did the symphony. However Haydn's influence was greater in that form than Beethoven's was in Lieder - it was Schubert's lieder that had the real impact on the Romantics.

Mozart in his last 3 symphonies had already opened new doors - they are far removed from the courtly 'classical' symphony and they also contain that personal element (as does much of his last music) that people credit solely first to Beethoven.

I have never denied Beethoven's influence on the later Romantic composers such as Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler, but this is coming primarily from the 9th symphony which is hardly a typical Beethoven work;
Beethoven was influenced by Palestrina but it doesn't make Palestrina a classical composer.

The expansion of the concerto and the symphony also go hand in hand with the development of musical instruments - the more the capablities, the more composers would experiment and none more so than Berlioz whose Symphonie Fantastique did most to influence composers such as Liszt and Wagner.

I don't think 9 symphonies being the limit was Beethoven's fault! Havergal Brian in the 20th century wrote around 32 symphonies on a vast scale (outdoing Mahler) - most unperformed!

In order to cite a composer who was not limited to nine or ten symphonies after Beethoven you had to name someone I've never even heard of, and I suspect many other members of the board haven't heard of him either. He may be very good, for all I know, but why is it that of the composers post-Beethoven that we are all familiar with,
none could compose more than this magic number?

This shows that Beethoven made the symphony over into a very large form dealing with the nature of fate, humanity, life or what have you, and this wasn't just the Ninth, but began with the Third, as we all know. And composers (excepting Mr. Brian) were just not able to put that amount of philosphical muscle out that often. And no Mozart symphony approached this scale. And Beethoven at 54 died a decade or so younger than Bach and Handel. Had he lived we might expect to have seen perhaps a tame tenth and then an eleventh to raise the heavens, so by no means is the Ninth necessarily out of character for him.

I think I've put a wedge in a crack in the edifice here, because none of the other arts besides music shows this very big leap in scale in one of its major forms, between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Music had had this kind of scale for religious works utilizing choruses, but Beethoven brought it to secular, and to orchestral, works really for the first time.

(And these odd-numbered symphonies are certainly not one would call classical with a small 'c' - in the general or generic meaning of the term (leaving out for a moment the specific meaning of 'Classical' in 18th-19th C. music). Pick any other artwork generally described as 'classical' - Mozart, Haydn, the Parthenon (both building and sculpture), Raphael, Bramante, Racine, Poussin, even the Odyssey and the Iliad, and the difference is clear. Much of Beethoven's greatest work is clearly more akin to that of Michelangelo, the Altar of Zeus at Pergamon, the Laocoon, Dostoyesvsky, and other non-classical art. I put this last part in parentheses because it is less important than the first part; if anyone answers I wish they'd take up that issue there of Scale, which I think really does put a wedge in a crack in this argument).


[This message has been edited by Chaszz (edited April 06, 2004).]

[Peter]

Originally posted by Chaszz:
In order to cite a composer who was not limited to nine or ten symphonies after Beethoven you had to name someone I've never even heard of, and I suspect many other members of the board haven't heard of him either. He may be very good, for all I know, but why is it that of the composers post-Beethoven that we are all familiar with,
none could compose more than this magic number?

This shows that Beethoven made the symphony over into a very large form dealing with the nature of fate, humanity, life or what have you, and this wasn't just the Ninth, but began with the Third, as we all know. And composers (excepting Mr. Brian) were just not able to put that amount of philosphical muscle out that often. And no Mozart symphony approached this scale. And Beethoven at 54 died a decade or so younger than Bach and Handel. Had he lived we might expect to have seen perhaps a tame tenth and then an eleventh to raise the heavens, so by no means is the Ninth necessarily out of character for him.

I think I've put a wedge in a crack in the edifice here, because none of the other arts besides music shows this very big leap in scale in one of its major forms, between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Music had had this kind of scale for religious works utilizing choruses, but Beethoven brought it to secular, and to orchestral, works really for the first time.

(And these odd-numbered symphonies are certainly not one would call classical with a small 'c' - in the general or generic meaning of the term (leaving out for a moment the specific meaning of 'Classical' in 18th-19th C. music). Pick any other artwork generally described as 'classical' - Mozart, Haydn, the Parthenon (both building and sculpture), Raphael, Bramante, Racine, Poussin, even the Odyssey and the Iliad, and the difference is clear. Much of Beethoven's greatest work is clearly more akin to that of Michelangelo, the Altar of Zeus at Pergamon, the Laocoon, Dostoyesvsky, and other non-classical art. I put this last part in parentheses because it is less important than the first part; if anyone answers I wish they'd take up that issue there of Scale, which I think really does put a wedge in a crack in this argument).


[This message has been edited by Chaszz (edited April 06, 2004).]

I really think too much is being read into this 9 number in an almost superstitious 19th century melodramatic manner, after all Beethoven was working on a 10th and even projected an 11th at the time of his premature death. OK you haven't heard of Havergal Brian and I admit he is pretty obscure - but what about Shostakovich's 15? Mahler nearly completed 11 massive symphonies (Das Lied von der erde really is a symphony in Mahlerian terms) and would have written more had he not been compelled to compose in his spare time and had he also not died prematurely. The same goes for Schubert who most certainly would have clocked up many more symphonies had he lived as long as Beethoven. The dominant form of the 19th century was opera - just look at the number of Wagner or Verdi operas (all on a much grander scale than any symphony) to see that this argument is meaningless.

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'Man know thyself'

[This message has been edited by Peter (edited April 07, 2004).]

[Sorrano]

Originally posted by Peter:
I really think too much is being read into this 9 number in an almost superstitious 19th century melodramatic manner, after all Beethoven was working on a 10th and even projected an 11th at the time of his premature death. OK you haven't heard of Havergal Brian and I admit he is pretty obscure - but what about Shostakovich's 15? Mahler nearly completed 11 massive symphonies (Das Lied von der erde really is a symphony in Mahlerian terms) and would have written more had he not been compelled to compose in his spare time and had he also not died prematurely. The same goes for Schubert who most certainly would have clocked up many more symphonies had he lived as long as Beethoven. The dominant form of the 19th century was opera - just look at the number of Wagner or Verdi operas (all on a much grander scale than any symphony) to see that this argument is meaningless.

And if you count Bruckner's Symphony #0 in d minor and the student symphony in F there are 11 of his own.