Beethoven & Tempo

[jman]

In classical History class I'm required to right a critical review of Rudolf Kolisch' essay "Tempo and Character in Beethoven's Music". Basically, it's an essay arguing that musicians must follow the metronome markings that Beethoven left for his music after receiving one of Malzel's (inventor of) metronomes.

I was wondering if anyone knows the essay or if they basically have an opinion on this issue. I'm just looking for some ideas and it might make for interesting discussion

My inclination is to say we don't have to, but for ease of writing my review I'm going to argue with the essay and say we do. Mainly because later in his career, Beethoven did go through the trouble of creating markings for many earlier works (all symphonies, etc.), tended to not use ambiguous Italian terms later in his career, and stuff like that.

Any comments would be cool!

[Peter]

I think metronome marks are useful if taken as a guide, rather than something to adhere to rigidly - it is well documented that Beethoven was fairly flexible in his playing. Certainly I think the view that Beethoven's markings were way out and therefore to be ignored is now no longer the case.

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'Man know thyself'