Beethoven's Orchestra

[spaceray]

Symphony orchestras are bigger today than they were in Beethoven's day,how many instruments would LvB have typically written for?

[ann hathaway]

The Grand Musical Concert which took place in the Royal Imperial Court Theatre beside the Karntnertor, 7th May 1824, which includes the 9th
symphony, The Grand Overture, and Three Grand Hymns with choruses.

An enlarged orchestra was needed, consisting of twelve of each of first and second violins, ten violas and twelve cellos and double basses, with doubled wind instruments and a large chorus. Some extra singers and instrumentalists required were supplies from the leading amateurs of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde.

The theatre was packed for the oaccasion, and despite the small number of rehearsals and difficulty of the music, the reception was wildly enthusiastic.
Despite the great musical and popular success of the event, it was financially a near-disaster. Beetoven had been led to expect handsome profits such as he had gained from similar events in earlier years, but the enormous copying costs and various other charges left only a small surplus.
Although he had received the promised £50,
from the Philharmonic Soceity of London for a manuscript copy of the 9th Symphony, finances were still precarious; suspicious as ever of those around him, he became convinced that he had been cheated at the box-office. Schindler bore the brunt of the blame.

[Rod]

Originally posted by spaceray:
Symphony orchestras are bigger today than they were in Beethoven's day,how many instruments would LvB have typically written for?

I've read accounts where there orchestras could be pretty vast even in those days or even earlier. It is influenced by the size of the venue and the size of the promoters purse, but for me circa 60 would be the absolute maximum for a B symphony, ideally rather less than this, certainly for syms 1-8.

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

[Peter]

Originally posted by Rod:
I've read accounts where there orchestras could be pretty vast even in those days or even earlier. It is influenced by the size of the venue and the size of the promoters purse, but for me circa 60 would be the absolute maximum for a B symphony, ideally rather less than this, certainly for syms 1-8.

"I never wrote noisy music. For my instrumental works I need an orchestra of about sixty good musicians. I am convinced that only such a number can bring out the quickly changing graduations in performance."

(Reported by Schindler.)



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'Man know thyself'

[Rod]

Originally posted by Peter:

"I never wrote noisy music. For my instrumental works I need an orchestra of about sixty good musicians. I am convinced that only such a number can bring out the quickly changing graduations in performance."

(Reported by Schindler.)

Well, if he agrees with me Schindler is probably not making it up! Though I could make do with 50 easily. I probably have got this quote myself in Schindler's biography but can't remember it. It makes complete sence regardless. You loose the balance between the strings and woodwind section especially with big orchestras - these latter instruments are very important to the Beethoven sound.

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

[This message has been edited by Rod (edited February 11, 2003).]

[John Rasmussen]

Much different than the 80 to 100 players in today's major orchestras!

Rod, what you say about the woodwinds is right on target. I also noted that the winds were doubled for the legendary Ninth premiere. I assume that means four flutes, four oboes, etc.? Probably with only one piccolo and one contrabassoon, and maybe one brass instrument for each part as they're stronger. Most modern orchestras would never even consider doubling the woodwinds, and so they're lost in LvB's climaxes. But with primitive proportions the woodwinds would be an active presence even in the big fortissimos. It is said that Gustav Mahler and many of his contemporaries doubled the woodwinds when conducting Beethoven.

[This message has been edited by John Rasmussen (edited February 11, 2003).]

[spaceray]

At the Handel festival Crystal Palace 1859
the choir had 2765 singers and 460 musicans.
Bigger must be better?

[Rutradelusasa]

Once I sung the 9th with a choir here and the local orchestra, the lousy conductor doubled (despite of everyone being against, even because we have 12 1st violins, 10 seconds, 8 violas, 8 cellos and 6 basses.
The sound of it was totally diferent, and it was very worse...

I think the good string section for Beethoven in general would be
12-14;10-12;8-10;8-10;6-8
but that only for the 3rd symphonie onwards...

[Rod]

Originally posted by spaceray:
At the Handel festival Crystal Palace 1859
the choir had 2765 singers and 460 musicans.
Bigger must be better?

There were colossal Handel performances long berfore this, as Haydn witnessed on his trip to London. But Handel himself never used anything like these forces. I recall he had in total circa 25 string players for the oratorios. With an ideal venue I would use at the very most 8 to 10 first violins and a corresponding amount of other instruments and vocalists. The same as for Beethoven really. Larger venues would however require more performers, this cannot be avoided. Of course with period instruments the effect will be all the better regardless of the size. With Handel I have more an issue with the orchestra being too small, certainly on CD - sometimes you have an opera accompanied by what sounds like a string quartet.


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



[This message has been edited by Rod (edited February 13, 2003).]

[John Rasmussen]

Originally posted by spaceray:
At the Handel festival Crystal Palace 1859
the choir had 2765 singers and 460 musicans.
Bigger must be better?

How could they even stay together? The more musicians take part, the harder it is to get a coherent performance and the slower the tempos have to be to accomodate the time lag between the conductor and the last rank of choristers or the last violin desk. Perhaps there were sub-conductors?

But they did things differently in those days. "My Favorite Intermissions" by Victor Borge describes the Boston Peace Jubilee, assembled by mega-showman Patrick Gilmore; there were 1100 orchestra players, a couple dozen brass bands, several thousand singers, a hundred fireman pounding anvils, a row of cannons, and a hundred assistant conductors equipped with binoculars. Johann Strauss Jr. led this mob in his Blue Danube waltz and apparently never forgot the "unholy row" that resulted. Now this must really have been "Muddle Instead of Music," to quote an infamous musical headline.

[OboeKing]

I read that for the premiere of the Ninth, the orchestra in full was:

1 piccolo
2 flutes
2 oboes
2 clarinets
1 contrabassoon

4 horns
2 trumpets
3 trombones (2 tenor, 1 bass)

timpani
triangle, cymbals and bass drum

12 first violins
12 second violins
10 violas
8 cellos
6 double basses