Beethoven Allegri connection

[Peter]

In a letter of Nov 1862, Liszt wrote to the grand duke of Weimar how the main themes of Beethoven's Funeral March from the Eroica, the Adagio of the Moonlight sonata and the Andante from the 7th symphony had all been anticipated in Allegri's Miserere. Has anyone else noticed this? I shall have to listen carefully again because it never occurred to me!

[Michael]

There isn't a huge amount of thematic material in the "Miserere" - in fact it's almost 80 per cent monotonal (if there is such a word) and young Mozart got too much praise for his memory feat. Beethoven had a fondness for this type of simplistic theme and the slow movement of the Seventh symphony is certainly in this category and also the main tune of the opening of the Moonlight Sonata.

I can't fit the Eroica funeral march into this, but I suspect that Liszt (as a pianist) might have been thinking of its precursor: the slow movement of the A flat piano sonata which is also a funeral march, and its main theme is practically on one note.
These are the only resemblances I can think of.




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[Joy]

Very good deduction there and, no, I hadn't noticed any of that either but the three musical pieces you mention area amongst my favourites.

[Peter]

Very good deduction there and, no, I hadn't noticed any of that either but the three musical pieces you mention area amongst my favourites.

Liszt also suggested similarities with Mozart's Ave verum Corpus.

[Michael]

Liszt also suggested similarities with Mozart's Ave verum Corpus.

I'm sure one could make a whole liszt of similarities between any pieces of music if one were so inclined.

[hal9000]

I'm sure one could make a whole liszt of similarities between any pieces of music if one were so inclined.

Please get your coat :P

I had never heard Allegri's Miserere, but I'm in the same boat as Michael.

Check out Francois-Joseph Gossec's march. More interestingly this passage with this passage in Beethoven. The funeral march was already an established genre at the time, which Beethoven almost certainly studied. The links to Allegri could be there (Liszt is far more qualified than I am), but musical langauge at the time was a chain, it doesn't necessarily imply Beethoven derived the theme from Allegri.

[Michael]

The "Miserere" is now being played on Classic FMs Hall of Fame where it is placed at No. 6 - just one above Mozart's Clarinet Concerto.