Beethoven 'Pastoral' Symphony - Berlioz Comments
'This astonishing landscape could have been designed by Poussin and drawn by Michelangelo. The author of 'Fidelio' and of the 'Eroica' symphony sets out to depict the tranquillity of the countryside and the shepherds’ gentle way of life. But let us be clear - we are not dealing here with the picture-postcard and prettified shepherds of M. de Florian, still less those of M. Lebrun, who wrote the Rossignol [The Nightingale], or those of J.-J. Rousseau, the composer of the 'Devin du Village' [The Village Soothsayer]. We are dealing here with REAL nature. The title given by the composer to his first movement is 'Gentle feelings stirred by the sight of a beautiful landscape'. The shepherds begin to move about nonchalantly in the fields; their pipes can be heard from a distance and close-by. Exquisite sounds caress you like the scented morning breeze. A flight or rather swarms of twittering birds pass overhead, and the atmosphere occasionally feels laden with mists. Heavy clouds come to hide the sun, then suddenly they scatter and let floods of dazzling light fall straight down on the fields and the woods. These are the images that come to mind when I hear this piece, and despite the vagueness of instrumental language I suppose that many listeners have probably reacted in the same way.
Further on there is a 'Scene by the Brook'. Contemplation… The composer probably created this wonderful Adagio lying on his back in the grass, his eyes turned to heaven, his ear listening to the wind, fascinated by countless reflections of sound and light, observing and listening at once to the white ripples of the river as they break gently on the stones of the bank. This is delightful. There are some who vehemently criticise Beethoven for wanting to reproduce at the end of it the song of three birds, at first in succession and then together. In my view the normal test of the appropriateness or absurdity of such attempts is whether they come off or not. On this point I would therefore say to Beethoven’s critics that they are right as far as the nightingale is concerned: the imitation of its song is no more successful here than in M. Lebrun’s well-known flute solo, for the very simple reason that since the nightingale only emits indistinct sounds of indeterminate pitch it cannot be imitated by instruments with a fixed and precise pitch. But it seems to me that the case is different with the quail and the cuckoo, whose cry involves either one or two real notes of fixed pitch, and can therefore be fully imitated in a realistic way.
Now if the composer is criticised for introducing a childishly literal imitation of bird-song in a scene where all the quiet voices of heaven, earth and water must naturally find their place, I would say in reply that the same objection could be made when in the storm he also imitates faithfully the gusts of wind, the flashes of lightning and the bellowing of animals. And heaven knows that no one has ever dreamed of criticising the Storm of this Pastoral symphony! But let us proceed. The poet now brings us in the midst of a Joyful gathering of peasants. The dancing and laughter are restrained at first; the oboe plays a cheerful refrain accompanied by a bassoon that can only manage to produce two notes. Beethoven’s intention was probably to suggest in this way an old German peasant, sitting on a cask with a decrepit old instrument, from which all he can draw are the two principal notes of the key of F, the dominant and the tonic. Every time the oboe plays its naïve and jolly tune like a girl in her Sunday clothes, the old bassoon blows his two notes. When the melody modulates to a different key the bassoon falls silent and quietly counts his rests, until the original key returns and he is able to interject again unruffled his F, C and F. This burlesque effect is wonderfully apt but the public seems to miss it almost completely. The dance gets more animated and becomes wild and noisy. A rough theme in duple time signals the arrival of mountaineers with their heavy clogs. The first section in triple time is repeated, but even more animated. The dancers mingle excitedly, the women’s hair flies loose over their shoulders, the mountaineers add their noise and intoxication, there is clapping, shouting and running, and the scene goes wild and furious… Then suddenly a distant clap of thunder strikes terror in the midst of this rustic ball and scatters the dancers.
Storm, lightning. I despair of being able to convey an idea of this prodigious piece. It has to be heard to understand how realistic and sublime imitative music can become in the hands of someone like Beethoven. Listen to the gusts of wind gorged with rain, the dull growl of the basses, the shrill hissing of piccolos announcing the fearful storm that is about the break out. The hurricane approaches and increases in intensity. A huge chromatic scale, starting in the upper instruments, plunges to the depths of the orchestra, picks up the basses on the way, drags them upwards, like a surging whirlwind that sweeps everything in its way. The trombones then burst out, the thunder of the timpani intensifies in violence; this is no longer rain and wind but a terrifying cataclysm, a universal deluge and the end of the world. In truth the piece induces dizziness, and there are many who on hearing this storm are not sure whether the emotion they experience is one of pleasure or of pain. The symphony concludes with the 'Thanksgiving of the Peasants' after the return of fine weather. Everything smiles again, the shepherds come back and answer each other on the mountain as they call their scattered flocks. The sky is clear, the torrents gradually dry out, calm returns and with it the rustic songs with their gentle tones. They soothe the mind, shattered as it was by the awesome splendour of the preceding tableau.
Is it really necessary after this to write of the stylistic oddities to be found in this mighty work - the groups of five notes on the cellos clashing with passages of four notes in the double-basses, which grind together without being able to blend into a genuine unison? Must one mention the horn call which plays an arpeggio on the chord of C while the strings hold that of F?… In truth I cannot. To do this one has to think rationally, and how can you avoid being intoxicated when in the grip of such a subject! Far from it - if only one could sleep and go on sleeping for months on end, and inhabit in one’s dreams the unknown sphere which for a moment genius has allowed us to glimpse. After such a concert should one have the misfortune to have to see some comic opera, attend a soirée of fashionable songs and a flute concerto, one would have a look of stupefaction. Should someone ask you:
- How do you find this Italian duet?
You would reply in all seriousness
- Quite beautiful.
- And these variations for clarinet?
- Superb.
- And the finale of the new opera?
- Admirable.
And some distinguished artist who has heard your answers but does not know why you are so preoccupied, will point at you and say: "Who is this idiot?"
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How the ancient poems, for all their beauty and the admiration they evoke, pale before this marvel of modern music! Theocritus and Virgil were great landscape artists; lines like the following are music to the ears:
«Te quoque, magna Pales, et te, memorande, canemus
Pastor ab Amphryso; vos Sylvae amnesque Lycaei.»
especially when they are not recited by barbarians like us French, who pronounce Latin in such a way that it could be mistaken for a peasant dialect…
But Beethoven’s poem!… these long periods so full of colour!… these speaking images!… these scents!… this light!… this eloquent silence!… these vast horizons!… these magic hideouts in the woods!… these golden harvests!… these pink clouds like wandering specks in the sky!… this vast plain dozing under the midday sun!… Man is absent!… nature alone reveals herself glorying in her splendour… And the deep rest of everything that lives! And the wonderful life of everything that rests!… The little stream that pursues its murmuring course towards the river!… the river, the source of all water, which descends towards the ocean in majestic silence!… Then man appears, the man from the countryside, robust and full of religious feeling… his joyful play interrupted by the storm… his fears… his hymn of thanksgiving…
Hide your faces, poor great poets of antiquity, poor immortals. Your conventional language, so pure and harmonious, cannot compete with the art of sound. You are vanquished, no doubt with glory, but vanquished all the same! You have not experienced what nowadays we call melody, harmony, the combination of different timbres, instrumental colour, modulations, the skilful clashes of conflicting sounds which fight and then embrace, the sounds that surprise the ear, the strange tones which stir the innermost recesses of the soul. The stammering of the childish art which you referred to as music could not give you any idea of this. For cultured minds you alone were the great melodists, the masters of harmony, rhythm, and expression. But these words had a very different meaning in your vocabulary from what we give them now. The art of sound in its true meaning, independent of anything else, was only born yesterday. It has scarcely reached manhood, and is barely twenty years old. It is beautiful and all-powerful: it is the Pythian Apollo of modern times. We owe to it a world of emotion and feeling which was closed to you. Yes, great venerated poets, you are vanquished - Inclyti sed victi. ''
Hector Berlioz
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