Hess-15: the unfinished piano concerto

[Sorrano]

That second movement from Mozart's concerto, Bonn1827, is my favorite passage from him. I find it very magical and deeply moving.

[Bonn1827]

Yes, Sorrano, it's absolutely sublime isn't it? Also, that "yearning" quality is nevermore in abundance than in the Clarinet Concerto - in fact, that quality of yearning is probably best represented in his works through the clarinet, especially the Serenade for Winds ("Gran Partita") - possibly even more so than with the piano!!!!???

[Sludlinger]

I know, yearning everywhere. Okay, even Salieri yearns. But it is a special thing with Beethoven and his three note upward reaching figure. Ernest Newman has been criticized for his Beethoven finger prints for years. One can easily take this thing too far but B uses it like no one else, and it’s in abundance here.

[Bonn1827]

Didn't mean to have a go at you, Sludlinger!! Yes, Beethoven is THE MAN!! Today I've listened again to K271 and think now that the 3rd movement is actually the better one - how tastes can change!! What about the Trio from "Cosi"? Is that not the most remarkable thing Mozart ever wrote?

Today I've received 8 CDs in the mail which represents a range of works - Schubert, Schumann, Mozart, Beethoven (9th and 6th), Bach (arr. Busoni) and Samuel Barber. Apart from the symphonies by Beethoven and Mozart, most are works for the piano. In some cases these duplicate works I already have, but one thing is already clear. I have to get back to "Missa Solemnis" and "Diabelli Variations" asap!!! As you say, "what IS IT about Beethoven?" The more I listen to the music of others the more I actually want Beethoven. Go figure. (My husband thinks I've finally gone made, BTW!)

[Joy]

Didn't mean to have a go at you, Sludlinger!! Yes, Beethoven is THE MAN!! Today I've listened again to K271 and think now that the 3rd movement is actually the better one - how tastes can change!! What about the Trio from "Cosi"? Is that not the most remarkable thing Mozart ever wrote?

Today I've received 8 CDs in the mail which represents a range of works - Schubert, Schumann, Mozart, Beethoven (9th and 6th), Bach (arr. Busoni) and Samuel Barber. Apart from the symphonies by Beethoven and Mozart, most are works for the piano. In some cases these duplicate works I already have, but one thing is already clear. I have to get back to "Missa Solemnis" and "Diabelli Variations" asap!!! As you say, "what IS IT about Beethoven?" The more I listen to the music of others the more I actually want Beethoven. Go figure. (My husband thinks I've finally gone made, BTW!)

Well then I suppose I am 'mad' too as I feel the same way when I hear other's works I always go back to Beethoven! What was it that one conductor said (and I can't remember who), and he said you listen to Beethoven because you have too.' Or something like that anyway.

[Bonn1827]

Joy, that is so true. That conductor may have been Lenny Bernstein. But, yes, choice doesn't come into it; the older I get the more I MUST hear his music, and regularly. Stephen Kovacevich recently wrote in the notes accompanying his recent "Diabelli Variations";

'Beethoven's is the music I most need to hear and play these days'. That'll do me for an endorsement.

[Sludlinger]

I have been giving this subject of why we find Beethoven so good when compared with other composers and exactly what makes him superior, more interesting. I went back and listened to things I had not heard in many years by composers that I do not find interesting or deficient in some ways. I suppose this will cause some outrage but here goes. Schubert is one. He is beguiling but in the end his works cloy; white on white, material that in the end seems bland and uninteresting. Not the lieder, by the way, but the piano works and orchestral works, the extended works. This is difficult to explain exactly but his ideas are often bland, not arresting, and what is most destructive is that his orchestration does not vary. Beethoven’s orchestration constantly varies. Almost every two measures, by my rough count. Of course this is not uniform and varies widely but the point is that Bs orchestration is highly imaginative and changes frequently, more frequently than anyone else. Brahms has the same problem. Schubert sits on something for a long time. I think of the Great C Major symphony. To me, this highly touted work is not interesting over the long haul. Beginnings of movements are interesting and then I get bored. The 5th Bb symphony starts out with one of the most engaging openings, clever orchestration, I’m all ears, this is great! - and then, after about two minutes, I’m thinking – I’m bored, nothing is really happening. Some of his piano sonatas just go on forever – white on white, nothing memorable, nice tunes – I’m bored. Yes, you can trot out examples to the contrary but by and large Schubert is just not as interesting as Beethoven and it’s the staticness of his ideas and orchestration.

And the Hess 15 piano concerto has the same problems as well. After listening to it many times I get the feeling that it does not have that ‘certain something’ that the other mature concertos have. It is a little static. The orchestration is varied, to be sure, but the ideas are very limited. One could say that the piece is highly integrated, and that's good and a sign of the mature Beethoven, but it just does not reach the level of the 3rd, 4th and 5th concertos. But we must remember in this mad age of finishing unfinished works (I know someone who wants to put the andante favori back into the Waldstein) – Beethoven rejected this piece!! HE did not see fit to bring it forward. In the end he found it wanting. So, there is a kind of continuity here. It has characteristics of works of other (to me) less interesting composers and he did not finish it.

[Hofrat]

Beethoven had a keen sense of balance when he composed. He did not reject the "Adante Favori." The first movement and the finale of the "Waldstein" were huge. To keep the "Andante Favori" as a second movement would make the sonata very cumbersome. So, he put in the smaller and better-balanced "introduction" in its stead. He puts the sketch aside, as he had done countless times before, to be continued later or to be integrated into another piece.

[Roehre]

Beethoven had a keen sense of balance when he composed. He did not reject the "Adante Favori." The first movement and the finale of the "Waldstein" were huge. To keep the "Andante Favori" as a second movement would make the sonata very cumbersome. So, he put in the smaller and better-balanced "introduction" in its stead. He puts the sketch aside, as he had done countless times before, to be continued later or to be integrated into another piece.

The Andante favori was completed before it was rejected by Beethoven as 2nd mvt for the Waldstein. It was published only some 4 months after the Waldstein. The sketches for the present 2nd mvt are the last ones Beethoven made before completing this sonate in the way as we know it now.

[Sludlinger]

I'm sorry for not being clear. I meant that he rejected the D major piano concerto Hess 15. I know why he took out the andante favori. And, yes, his sense was correct, an intermezzo was more appropriate.

[Bonn1827]

Sludlinger, I've read your very interesting comments about Schubert, in particular, a couple of times over to digest these. You did make some earlier remarks about yearning, as I recall.

I can't agree with you about Schubert, but I think what you are describing is the process of change that tastes undergo as we "mature". White on white? When I started to listen to the Impromptus again recently (I'd just bought a Brendel recording) the first thing that struck me was that very cloying quality you describe and I did relate this back to LvB and his late piano masterworks, I must say, unfavourably. After listening for a while I grew tired of a couple of them, but this then lead to Sonata D664, which is quite lovely. The Impromptus are more "occasional" pieces, if you will and not meant to be drained for every musical drop as, say, late Beethoven piano works. Think of many of LvB's Bagatelles - nice, but not the solid meal one is often after!! Entree perhaps?

Having said that, I don't think we can compare per se. You rightly point out the wonderful lieder - I think of "An die Musik" as special and encapsulating my feelings about music - but I think the piano sonatas are very good and in some ways the product of a much more mature composer. I enjoy these immensely, their playing with plangent dissonances and key changes and interesting harmonic ideas. I've tried playing them and this is what I learned from them! Repetitive sometimes, sure, but also going places!

Don't say anything negative overall about Brahms, except that perhaps some of his solo piano writing can sometimes be weak - those 4 symphonies are desert island stuff!! His intermezzos and smaller pieces for piano are full of invention at times, but at others repetitive and bland. But I don't like "Fidelio" (heresy) and find this leaden. Critics have also slammed it in the past. For me, the late works are never surpassed by anyone at any time (which the exception of JSB at his most introspective and profound). I think of Shakespeare (as I'm a retired English teacher) compared to Keats: well, that could be LvB versus Schubert couldn't it? But both very wonderful, always.

[Quijote]

Entrée. I do think the food references most apt. Really, I do. But this is a diversion. The "meat" of my responses will be served later. Hope you all like hot 'n spicy.

[Bonn1827]

Oliver Twist was accused of being wanton; as Mr. Bumble says, "it's the meat ma'am"!!

[Hofrat]

The Andante favori was completed before it was rejected by Beethoven as 2nd mvt for the Waldstein. It was published only some 4 months after the Waldstein. The sketches for the present 2nd mvt are the last ones Beethoven made before completing this sonate in the way as we know it now.

Roehre;

That just emphasizes my point. Regardless of the order in which he wrote the "Andante Favori" and the outer movements of the "Waldstein" sonata, Beethoven's keen sense of balance and wholeness compelled him to remove the "Andante Favori" for something else. He did it again with the finale of the "Kreutzer" sonata, which was originally intended for his 6th piano and violin sonata opus 30/1. But the free-reeling tarantella was so contrary to the gentle nature of the other movements of the 6th sonata. Beethoven saves the tarantella for another day and writes a more serene movement for opus 30/1. Again, it is his keen sense of balance.