Is there a possible photo of Beethoven?

[robert newman]

Hi Rod,

Firstly, congratulations on your work at IBM. (('ve a friend who teaches English at the drama school very close to the Barbican).

The fugue from Handel's great Op.3 set was wonderfully played and I enjoyed it as much as you would have hoped. And, that Handel duet. It's one of those few pieces that come as close as music can come to the impossible task of changing human nature by hearing lovely music alone. It's sublime.

Many thanks

[Agnes Selby]

Originally posted by Cetto von Cronstorff:
So you think that this:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bild:View_from_the_Window_at_Le_Gras%2C _Joseph_Nic%C3%A9phore_Ni%C3%A9pce.jpg

is a 'good quality picture'. Interesting.

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Ha, Ha! I can see something to the right
of the tower? perhaps it is a human form. Perhaps it is "Quasimodo" or a round Italian tenor? Perhaps it is a dark cloud in the sky?!

Agnes.
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[Rod]

Originally posted by robert newman:

Hi Rod,

Firstly, congratulations on your work at IBM. (('ve a friend who teaches English at the drama school very close to the Barbican).

The fugue from Handel's great Op.3 set was wonderfully played and I enjoyed it as much as you would have hoped. And, that Handel duet. It's one of those few pieces that come as close as music can come to the impossible task of changing human nature by hearing lovely music alone. It's sublime.

Many thanks

Thanks Robert. And I knew you'd like the tacks, but then think only the deaf could not appreciate this music. Did you hear Beethoven's fugue as well?


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"If I were but of noble birth..." - Rod Corkin

[Cetto von Cronstorff]

Originally posted by LizR:
Well, it certainly isn't up to your amazing standards, Dr L.

Repeating this won't help, Mrs. Selby.

[robert newman]

The more we examine this image, this 'first photograph', the more extraordinary it becomes and the more extraordinary becomes the business of photography itself.

Firstly, we know the image of 1826 was made with an 8 hour exposure time. But in this case we should expect to see shadows at all angles caused as the sun moved in an arc in the sky during the whole time ths image was being made. But, let us say, the rays of the sun were often blocked by clouds during those 8 hours and were not blocked at other times. This may explain why the final image has recorded certain angles of shadow but not others. But in that case the shadows on this image were made not in 8 hours (which was of course the total exposure time) but in far less and more intense exposure time, though the whole image was made in that 8 hours. And, another thing, what if, for example, a man had stood in this same picture for only a few minutes during those 8 hours ? While no trace of him having stood there can be seen in the existing image it remains possible that, in future, some way of developing this photograph from 1826 may yet be found where his presence may be seen. And, if so, such a refined technique would in reality be a form of film, since it would be a record of events occurring in front of that 1826 camera over that 8 hour period, rather than a single image as we now see it.

In short, the very fact that exposure times for these early photographs were sometimes hours and often minutes long does not (at least theoretically) rule out the possibility that in future these plates may be used to provide moving images of a duration equal to their total exposure time.

(It may be argued that we cannot improve upon an image once it has been made but can only, at best, produce a nearly identical copy of the original image. This is also the argument used to say that a recording of music from, say, 1902 on a disc may not ever sound as if it was recorded yesterday in a modern recording studio). But the copying of an image is not the same thing as fully retrieving the original information on which such an image was made. And so (it seems to me) there must be a chance that information can yet be retrieved from recordings and old photographic plates which, at present, is not accessible for us to see or hear but which may become so by future discoveries.

(Nobel Prize not solicited ! Ha !)

R

[This message has been edited by robert newman (edited 07-28-2006).]

[Megan]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Agnes Selby:
[B] -------------

Perhaps it is a dark cloud in the sky?!

Agnes.
-
Ah, yes, very like a camel !! .

'

[This message has been edited by Megan (edited 07-28-2006).]

[robert newman]

Dear Rod,

I will download the Beethoven fugue and will play it in the next few days. It is sure to be wonderful. It is as close as I dare hope to a Beethoven photograph !

Many thanks

Robert

[Megan]

Here is an early photograph of Johannes Brahms (1872).
I have seen sketches of Brahms as a young boy, and I was wondering if there are any earlier photographs .
http://www.cph.rcm.ac.uk/Tour/Pages/Brahms.htm

'

[Rod]

Originally posted by robert newman:

Dear Rod,

I will download the Beethoven fugue and will play it in the next few days. It is sure to be wonderful. It is as close as I dare hope to a Beethoven photograph !

Many thanks

Robert

You won't be dissappointed. I can understand the quest for the fabled lost Beethoven photo, considering the paintings are so inadequate.

------------------
"If I were but of noble birth..." - Rod Corkin

[Agnes Selby]

Originally posted by Cetto von Cronstorff:
Repeating this won't help, Mrs. Selby.

---------------

Herr Cetto von Cronstorff, Liz is a very nice English lady. You will find she contributes on MozartForum.

I am a very nice Australian lady.
And my name remains,
Agnes Selby.

[robert newman]

Some final notes on the historical background to the science of photography. (These gleaned from 'A History of Photography' by the Royal Photographic Society') -

1. We owe the name "Photography" to Sir John Herschel who first used the term in 1839, the year the photographic process became public. The word is derived from the Greek words for light and writing.

2. There is one amazing, quite uncanny prediction made by a man named de la Roche (1729- 1774) in a work of his called 'Giphantie'. In this imaginary tale, it was possible to capture images from nature on a canvas coated with a sticky substance. This surface, so the tale goes, would not only provide a mirror image on the sticky canvas, but would remain on it. After it had been dried in the dark the image would remain permanent. (The author would not have known how prophetic this tale would be only a few decades after his death).

3. There are two distinct scientific processes that combine to make photography possible. '' It is somewhat surprising that photography was not invented earlier than the 1830s, because these processes had been known for quite some time''. It was not until the two distinct scientific processes had been put together that photography came into being.

4. The Camera Obscura (dark room) had been in existence for at least four hundred years. There is a drawing, dated 1519, of a Camera Obscura by Leonardo da Vinci; about this same period its use as an aid to drawing was being advocated.

5. The second process was chemical. For hundreds of years before photography was invented, people had been aware, for example, that some colours are bleached in the sun, but they had made little distinction between heat, air and light.

6. In the 17th century Robert Boyle, a founder of the Royal Society, had reported that silver chloride turned dark under exposure, but he appeared to believe that it was caused by exposure to the air, rather than to light.

7.Angelo Sala, in the early 17th century noticed that powdered nitrate of silver is blackened by the sun.

8.In 1727 Johann Heinrich Schulze discovered that certain liquids change colour when exposed to light.

9.At the beginning of the 19th century Thomas Wedgwood was conducting experiments and had successfully captured images but his silhouettes could not survive as there was no known method of making the image permanent.

//

It would be interesting to know when the first photographic research was made in Vienna since we must assume there were interested people there too.

R

[Hofrat]

Originally posted by Rod:
You won't be dissappointed. I can understand the quest for the fabled lost Beethoven photo, considering the paintings are so inadequate.

Dear Rod;

I can not imagine Beethoven sitting perfectly still for eight hours while someone took his picture.


Hofrat

[Athea]

Originally posted by Megan:

Here is an early photograph of Johannes Brahms (1872).
I have seen sketches of Brahms as a young boy, and I was wondering if there are any earlier photographs .
http://www.cph.rcm.ac.uk/Tour/Pages/Brahms.htm

'

Here you can find something from 1853
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Brahms

[Casey]

Originally posted by Preston:
I read that the first good quality picture from a camera was in 1826. So it might be possible that there is a photo of Beethoven out there, somewhere.

In my opinion that would amazing, truly astonishing. I couldn't imagine seeing Beethoven in a real picture.

Kind Regards,
Preston

No photos of Beethoven I'm sure. However, if you like other composers, there's always a possibility of recordings of some composers that have not shown up yet...

Example: there is a lead cylinder record from 1878 that can still be listened to today (only someone shouting hours though, it was a talking clock attempt).

Given that, it's (very remotely I'm afraid) possible there's a recording of someone like Franz Liszt out there somewhere...maybe not, but who knows. A cylinder only in recent years turned up that supposedly has Tchaikovsky whistling...(along with other nonsense with Sullivan, attempting to get Rubenstein to record his own playing...sadly, he refused...).

Then for those who like Brahms, there is the 1889 Brahms cylinder for what it's worth...

[This message has been edited by Casey (edited 07-28-2006).]

[This message has been edited by Casey (edited 07-28-2006).]

[Rod]

Originally posted by Hofrat:

Dear Rod;

I can not imagine Beethoven sitting perfectly still for eight hours while someone took his picture.

Hofrat

Not unless he was drugged. I suspect Beethoven had the kind of personality that could not be captured in print or paint.

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"If I were but of noble birth..." - Rod Corkin

[This message has been edited by Rod (edited 07-29-2006).]