Rare Beethoven works revisited - excerpts from Egmont
Klarchen's arias "Die Trommel Geruhret" and "Freudvoll und leidvoll".
Larghetto - "Klarchens Tod bezeichnend".
Beethoven wrote the music to Goethe's tragedy Egmont, published in 1788, to a commission from the Burgtheater in Vienna. This work, on the Netherlanders' struggle for freedom, was particularly topical in Vienna when Austria found itself facing Napoleon's onslaught. Beethoven was fascinated by this "republican" subject which, as he wrote to Bettina von Arnim, he set "from love of his [Goethe's] poems, which give me happiness". The score of the incidental music was written in the winter of 1809/10 and, besides the overture, comprises four entractes, Klarchen's two songs, a Larghetto ("Klarchen's death"), a melodrama and the concluding triumphal symphony. The role of Beethoven's music already became precarious in the 19th century, with changed traditions of performance; there was no longer any room for it in the play, and attempts were made to rescue the music for the concert hall. Already in 1821 Friedrich Mosengeil, consistorial councillor in Meiningen and a "respected poet and close friend of the art of music" (Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung), wrote connecting texts to be recited. Goethe seems to have known this version; at any rate, he welcomed it as permitting Beethoven's music now also to be performed as an "oratorio". The literary quality of Mosengeil's text remained disputed, however; in 1831 Franz Grillparzer revised it, and in the second half of the 19th century the Hamburg literary figure Michael Bernays wrote a text of his own. All these versions, however, suffer from the same defect: they presuppose a listener with a thorough knowledge of Goethe's drama. Gerd Albrecht has now constructed - with recourse to Goethe and Grillparzer -for performance and for this recording his own version of the text, which attempts to present, concisely and understandably, the dramatic and emotional continuity; he does not relate the story as such, but selects portions of the text that directly illuminate the respective mood; no more than the music does the text narrate the action. Beethoven's Egmont overture is in three parts: a terse, slow F minor introduction with a subject for strings in sarabande rhythm is followed by the Allegro main section, which is driven forward by short, mounting motives. The recapitulation ends on a general pause (in Beethoven's sketch-book is found the remark "Egmont's death could be implied by a pause"). It is followed by a whirling coda which, with its fanfares, anticipates the concluding victory symphony. Thus this overture, without being illustrative, already reflects the course of the drama's action. Beethoven conceives Klarchen's song in the first act in march style and with the sound of drums and fifes; the first entracte music at the end of the act links a peacefully yearning Larghetto with a wildly whirling Allegro; quite different is the second entracte, an expressive disjoint Larghetto extremely rich in contrasts, that dies away quietly after several dynamic eruptions. The rejoicing to heaven, grieving to death of Klarchen's second song is expressed in the tempo contrasts of Andante and Allegro assai vivace, just as in the closely concentrated character antitheses.The third entracte is in three parts: a quick, lyrically swinging Allegro is followed by a march whose sound approaches from afar and which leads to a quiet, halting ending. The last entracte finally concentrates entirely on Klarchen: an agitated, turbulent Larghetto is followed by an animated, breathless Andante agitato with a resigned, imploring ending. Beethoven intended three pieces for the fifth act of the tragedy: a D minor Larghetto in throbbing 9/8 time, "representing Klarchen's death", a melodrama with Egmont's vision of the liberation of the Netherlands - as in Fidelio a trumpet-call indicates "freedom won for the native land" - and finally the "Symphony of victory", which refers back to the theme of the overture's coda and so establishes a musical continuity.
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjN2tRfw9eQ[/YOUTUBE]
Larghetto - "Klarchens Tod bezeichnend".
Beethoven wrote the music to Goethe's tragedy Egmont, published in 1788, to a commission from the Burgtheater in Vienna. This work, on the Netherlanders' struggle for freedom, was particularly topical in Vienna when Austria found itself facing Napoleon's onslaught. Beethoven was fascinated by this "republican" subject which, as he wrote to Bettina von Arnim, he set "from love of his [Goethe's] poems, which give me happiness". The score of the incidental music was written in the winter of 1809/10 and, besides the overture, comprises four entractes, Klarchen's two songs, a Larghetto ("Klarchen's death"), a melodrama and the concluding triumphal symphony. The role of Beethoven's music already became precarious in the 19th century, with changed traditions of performance; there was no longer any room for it in the play, and attempts were made to rescue the music for the concert hall. Already in 1821 Friedrich Mosengeil, consistorial councillor in Meiningen and a "respected poet and close friend of the art of music" (Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung), wrote connecting texts to be recited. Goethe seems to have known this version; at any rate, he welcomed it as permitting Beethoven's music now also to be performed as an "oratorio". The literary quality of Mosengeil's text remained disputed, however; in 1831 Franz Grillparzer revised it, and in the second half of the 19th century the Hamburg literary figure Michael Bernays wrote a text of his own. All these versions, however, suffer from the same defect: they presuppose a listener with a thorough knowledge of Goethe's drama. Gerd Albrecht has now constructed - with recourse to Goethe and Grillparzer -for performance and for this recording his own version of the text, which attempts to present, concisely and understandably, the dramatic and emotional continuity; he does not relate the story as such, but selects portions of the text that directly illuminate the respective mood; no more than the music does the text narrate the action. Beethoven's Egmont overture is in three parts: a terse, slow F minor introduction with a subject for strings in sarabande rhythm is followed by the Allegro main section, which is driven forward by short, mounting motives. The recapitulation ends on a general pause (in Beethoven's sketch-book is found the remark "Egmont's death could be implied by a pause"). It is followed by a whirling coda which, with its fanfares, anticipates the concluding victory symphony. Thus this overture, without being illustrative, already reflects the course of the drama's action. Beethoven conceives Klarchen's song in the first act in march style and with the sound of drums and fifes; the first entracte music at the end of the act links a peacefully yearning Larghetto with a wildly whirling Allegro; quite different is the second entracte, an expressive disjoint Larghetto extremely rich in contrasts, that dies away quietly after several dynamic eruptions. The rejoicing to heaven, grieving to death of Klarchen's second song is expressed in the tempo contrasts of Andante and Allegro assai vivace, just as in the closely concentrated character antitheses.The third entracte is in three parts: a quick, lyrically swinging Allegro is followed by a march whose sound approaches from afar and which leads to a quiet, halting ending. The last entracte finally concentrates entirely on Klarchen: an agitated, turbulent Larghetto is followed by an animated, breathless Andante agitato with a resigned, imploring ending. Beethoven intended three pieces for the fifth act of the tragedy: a D minor Larghetto in throbbing 9/8 time, "representing Klarchen's death", a melodrama with Egmont's vision of the liberation of the Netherlands - as in Fidelio a trumpet-call indicates "freedom won for the native land" - and finally the "Symphony of victory", which refers back to the theme of the overture's coda and so establishes a musical continuity.
[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjN2tRfw9eQ[/YOUTUBE]
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