Hess-15: the unfinished piano concerto

[chris_evans]

Greetings:

About a decade ago, through the website www.unheardbeethoven.org, I became familiar with Hess 15 - the unfinished piano concerto in D major, which Beethoven started and abandoned in 1815. What he committed to paper - 180 or so bars of a full orchestral score - is in and of itself a significant work, both as music to enjoy, and in its historical context. As one who already knew his published concerti by heart, I found Hess 15 to be a wonderful new discovery.

In the intervening years I've wondered if this work would ever have a future beyond the remarkable midi sequenced version of Nicolas Cook's "performing edition", that is featured on the unheardbeethoven.org site. From an email exchange early on with Professor Cook, there was no reason to be encouraged: he didn't know of any planned efforts to bring the work to wider public attention.

Of course I was fully expecting all this to change last year with the Indentia recording of Hess 15. And yet, even that hasn't seemed to generate any significant new interest or "buzz" that I'm aware of.

My question is this: given that Beethoven is probably the most famous classical composer of all time, and that his piano concerti are among the most studied, most performed and most recorded in the genre, is it reasonable for me to wonder why Hess 15 should not capture the imagination of more people today - beyond a small group of "hard-core" Beethoven or piano concerto afficiandos? Is it destined to remain an obscure work?

Any ideas about this would be most welcome!

[Hofrat]

Dear Chris;

As I understand, Professor Cook has found a publisher for his score of Hess 15. Once a printed score is available, it will be easier to record and/or perform the work. Until now, only the manuscript was available which is not easy to work with.

What we truly need is more recording companies like Inedita who dare to record unknown and unheard Beethoven works. Inedita has recorded 5 CD's in its Beethoven Rarities series, with more to come. Once other recording companies understand that Beethoven wrote much more than 9 symphonies, more unheard Beethoven will be recorded.

With regards to Hess 15 specifically, I believe the music public confuses it with the piano arrangement of the violin concerto, which is in the same key and in many circles refered to as "Beethoven's 6th piano concerto." The music public does not realize that we are talking about 2 different works.

[Peter]

I agree with you Chris though I have only heard the midi version! Is this Indetia version available? I did a search and came up with nothing.

[Hofrat]

Dear Peter;

It is the 4th Beethoven Rarities CD by Inedita, available through their website on the Internet.

[Hofrat]

Dear Peter;

I just checked the website of Inedita:
www.ineditacd.com

The 4th Beethoven Rarities CD with Hess 15 seems available.

[chris_evans]

Hello again.

It's great to hear that a publisher is interested in Prof. Cook's "performing edition" of Hess 15. I agree that this is a critical step toward increased awareness about the work.

I do have the Indentia recording of Hess 15, which is the version prepared by Prof. Cook, and which is performed by Maurizio Paciariello with the Sassari Symphony Orchestra (I'd never heard of either). I'm not a musicologist or even a serious collector, but this performance/recording seems "unusual" to me; I'm not sure whether this has to do with the way the performance was recorded or with how it was actually performed. For one thing, the recording of the movement extends to 16-plus minutes, whereas the midi sequence is around 12-13 minutes. I am eager to hear what others think about the recording!

And let me change the subject briefly from Hess 15 to something that just crossed my radar yesterday that I also did not know about. Is anyone familiar with Beethoven's A major piano concerto!!?? Before you call me crazy, check this out: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=4485919. Apparently, this work was just recently uncovered in the depths of the British Museum! (How do these things stay hidden for so long?)
Does anyone know if there are references to an A major piano concerto in any of the Beethoven studies?

Thanks.

[Hofrat]

Dear Chris;

In the Inedita recording, the tempo was slower than the reproduction on the Unheard Beethoven Website.

As for the A-major concerto you mentioned attributed to Beethoven, I am familiar with a "tempo di concerto" in D-major dating from 1788-1793 once falsely attributed to Beethoven but later proved to be by Johann Joseph Roesler (1771-1813).

[Roehre]

This concerto exists in a quite extended sketch for a middle movement which can be found in the autograph Miscellany from circa 1786 to 1799, the so-called Kafka sketchbook, which is in the British Museum (Add.Manuscript 29801 ff.39-162), a published as facsimile as well as transcription by Joseph Kerman in 2 volumes in 1970.

The facsimile pages (vol.1): 154r and 154v, the transcription (vol.2) pp. 127-128.

(The neighbouring pages btw is a sketch for a 3rd mvt for the Duo for violin and viola "for two eyeglasses")

[Sludlinger]

This concerto movement (the unfinished 1815 concerto) has intrigued me since I first discovered it in The Unknown Beethoven about 1974. I had considered making a completed version myself but felt the work was a really beyond me, so I was very happy to see Professor Cook’s work emerge and listened to the midi version with great delight. While professor Cook did a wonderful job with his reconstruction the recording is a disappointment, very draggy tempo, all the energy is drained out. (The tempo does pick up toward the end, the orchestra appears to be pushing the conductor.) Frustratingly, we have a near miss here, it could have been a great recording. If I can get my hands on a CD or digital file I might be able to speed it up and see what that does, so far I have only listened to it on Youtube.

Of all the Beethoven things I have ever come into contact with this appears as the saddest. Beethoven was going completely deaf and in deep depression. Perhaps he was sadly thinking about his lost youth in this stylistically retrospective piece. Thinking also, perhaps, of the disastrous premiere Emperor concert he may have dropped the concerto when he finally realized that he would never be able to play the solo.

[Hofrat]

Slludlinger;

When you say "the recording," are you referring to the MIDI or the commercial recording by Inedita?

What I found interesting in the Hess 15 is that Beethoven utilizes something that Brahms uses in his 2nd piano concerto and his "Double" concerto." I call it a "misplaced cadenza," for the loss of a better name: After the orchestra states the opening subject once, the soloist plays a cadenza-like passage afterwhich the orchestra resumes the exposition.

It is such a shame that Beethoven did not finish this work.

[Roehre]

Of all the Beethoven things I have ever come into contact with this appears as the saddest. Beethoven was going completely deaf and in deep depression. Perhaps he was sadly thinking about his lost youth in this stylistically retrospective piece. Thinking also, perhaps, of the disastrous premiere Emperor concert he may have dropped the concerto when he finally realized that he would never be able to play the solo.

Welcome on these pages, Sludlinger !

I don't think Beethoven was composing this work with himself in mind as performer. And IMO this concerto's fragment shows perfectly why we haven't got that many completed works of Beethoven between say 1814 (following the premiere of Fidelio) and 1819 (the late sonatas taking shape).

With the cello sonatas more or less as "evidence" we find Beethoven struggling with a new style (as the amount of sketches for numerous works didn't decrease - in my estimation the "productivity" in terms of sketches is hardly less than before 1815, but these sketches didn't come to fruition).

The old "heroic" one, in which framework the concerto Hess 15 still neatly fits, had become old hat following the (political as well as artistic) Restoration which engulfed Europe.

That the struggle regarding the guardianship of his nephew played a role in this is IMO undeniable, but artistic reasons are IMO at the heart of not-completion of many works, including this piano concerto in D.

As far as the Inedita recording is concerned, I am far from happy with it, but at the moment it's the only one available on CD I'm afraid.
A fresh recording of Cook's completion combined with other reconstructed concerto movements, as there are the slow mvt from the oboe concerto and ditto from the early piano concerto in A, could become a sensation I think.

[Sludlinger]

Thank you, Roehre.

We will, of course, never know what was in Beethoven’s mind, but I somehow think that he was rather isolated at that time and may have been deluding himself and simply indulging himself in a retrospective reverie. In the end he puts it aside, defeated, but he does not destroy it - he just sets it aside. I suspect he knew its time had passed and more than anything Beethoven was a forward-looking creator. Despite all his social gaffs, artless puns and crude jokes, his artistic sense is nearly flawless. The thematic material in general of this piece is very reminiscent of the violin concerto, the winds and tympani at the very beginning and the soaring second theme melody – not to mention the key. But I agree, this was the end of the second period Beethoven and the beginning of the third period Beethoven that would end in those edgy pieces that seem to fit into no general category of music except late Beethoven.

The A major concerto movement is really quite lovely, the oboe concerto movement I have yet to hear.

What is it about Beethoven? - we just want more, any way we can get it, even in micro-fragments.

[Bonn1827]

Sludlinger, you are so right in your comment about Beethoven and "any way we can get it"!!! The older I get the more this is so. Who can answer your somewhat rhetorical question, "what is it about Beethoven?" I wish I knew!! If ANYONE on these pages can provide a succinct answer to that question (which is so subjective, after all, and nearly impossible) I would be forever grateful. It is so hard to put into mere words.

[Sludlinger]

I could not help but notice that the soaring theme beginning at measure 54 is the classic ‘yearning theme’ fingerprint as described by Ernest Newman. Some may dismiss this as a real thing but I do see it as a very recognizable Beethoven trademark and very well expressed here. Of course, the big example is the 2nd movement of the Emperor, but there it is right here, yearning like heck and reaching for the sky. Beethoven frequently gets into serious yearning. Mozart never really yearns, he does something else and I won’t dare to characterize it, and it is wonderful in its own way – but it’s not yearning. Perhaps the yearning for the unattainable is the essence of Romantic and not Classical expression. Maybe that’s one of those things that makes Beethoven so attractive, this man with the hideous outward personality (let’s be serious, people, it was pretty hideous) could live and create wonders in a disassociated cerebral world of soaring beauty, obviously nearly completely disconnected from his visible persona and crippling physical defects – like being deaf, which drives him inward all the more; and barely socially trainable, which makes him reject us before we reject him. He really is a perplexing creature.

I’m rambling, but Bonn1827 has gotten me wondering about this strange individual and why we are so fascinated with him – me since I was a teenager. I like a lot of music and know about a lot of composers but no one is treated with such awe and godliness as Beethoven. We really do not understand him – at least I don’t – and so we set him up in a strange category all his own – Beethoven, the crazy man who wrote beautiful and transcendent music – like no one else. And crazy people are believed by many cultures to be the physical embodiment of the otherworldly. I think that’s kind of where we are, and we will never understand it or him. It’s nice to be able to go someplace and be surrounded by something beautiful and amazing that I do not understand.

[Bonn1827]

Sludlinger, I think you've said something really meaningful about Beethoven. After all, you come from Katherine Hepburn territory - Connecticut - so you must be OK!! I do take issue with you, though, about Mozart when you suggest a lack of yearning. Try the second movement of K271 (I think it is) the "Jeunnehomme" piano concerto - a comparatively early but transcendent work. It is full of longing and poignancy with those deep deep chords, same with D Minor Concerto, No. 20. All the same, Mozart wants it both ways and his concerti can be sombre and yearning and affirming and optimistic all in the same movement.

Beethoven? Well, I can't live without him - simple as that. In the last decade I've noticed he has been pushed into first place, transplanting Bach for that position. I've been on holidays for 2 weeks at my coast house and without my CDs. Returning tomorrow and I can't wait to get back to LvB and a tranch of CDs due to arrive from Amazon.