piano concertos

[Serge]

Here I am talking about Piano Concerto # 5 again! This time, it is to ask why he didn't write any others after that one, esp. when he would continue to write other piano music for many years after. Do you think he tired of it, or thought the piano concerto form was exhausted the way Schumann did? Did he even contemplate or sketch a sixth one at any point? As far as I know, he did not.

[Peter]

Well, of course the main reason for Beethoven losing interest in the piano concerto was his increasing deafness - most composers of the day wrote piano concertos to perform themselves - B performed the first 4 of his, but never the 5th. He did actually write substantial sketches for a 6th concerto (Hess 15) in 1815 - 70 pages. This movement has been reconstructed and can be heard in midi format at the 'unheard Beethoven' site , a link to which can be found on the home-page of this site (bottom right) - Beethoven evidently abandoned work on this concerto as he considered the material to be too symphonic, and not suitable for a concerto - also at this time his brother died and his nephew Karl came into his life.

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'Man know thyself'

[Luis]

Originally posted by Peter:

(...)He did actually write substantial sketches for a 6th concerto (Hess 15) in 1815 - 70 pages. This movement has been reconstructed and can be heard in midi format at the 'unheard Beethoven' site , a link to which can be found on the home-page of this site (bottom right) - Beethoven evidently abandoned work on this concerto as he considered the material to be too symphonic, and not suitable for a concerto - also at this time his brother died and his nephew Karl came into his life.

It would be very nice to find this kind of pieces like CD bonus traks don't you think? Few record labels seem to do so. Naxos sometimes does. I have some very enyoyable variations WoO. 79 Rule Britannia and WoO. 78 God save the king in my version of the Diabelli variations (By Konstantin Scherbakov). Have you heard this Cd? I think my opinion could be not very accurate because this is only Diabelli version I've heard, but seems ok and the sound quality is absolutely amazing.

Well, may be for now we have to resign to listen most of this less known music on midi...
PS:
Don't you think this movement of the piano concerto N°6 souds a bit like Mozart? I also noticed a mozartian flavor on a Symphony movement in C minor, Hess 298, wich is also on the 'unheard Beethoven' site. Here's the link: http://www.unheardbeethoven.org/sear...ce=hess298.mid

(remind's me Mozart's 25th Symphony but much better!)

Tell me if you know more of this hidden pearls both on midi or CD.

C ya.

[Luis]

I almost forgot...
You can also find on Naxos (no, I'm not part of Naxos marketing crew as Rod seams to be from Nimbus ) the variations from Handel Judas Maccabaeus WoO. 45 (I think somebody was asking for it sometime ago) wich comes with some others variations for cello and piano from Mozart's Magic flute.

[Peter]

Originally posted by Luis:

Don't you think this movement of the piano concerto N°6 souds a bit like Mozart? I also noticed a mozartian flavor on a Symphony movement in C minor, Hess 298, wich is also on the 'unheard Beethoven' site.
(remind's me Mozart's 25th Symphony but much better!)

Tell me if you know more of this hidden pearls both on midi or CD.

C ya.

There are some rhythmic similarities with Mozart - the dotted quaver/semi-quaver was common in Mozart. Beethoven probably knew Mozart's Symphony no.25 when writing the Hess 298 sketch as both works have the same agitated synchopation - I don't agree that Beethoven's sketch is superior to the Mozart work - Personally I thought the Beethoven too hectic and confused (although it isn't really possible to judge properly from a midi format - Beethoven himself was obviously not satisfied with it).
I know that the piano concerto no.6 has been performed, but I'm not aware of any recordings - anyone else know ?


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'Man know thyself'

[Luis]

The Unheard Beethoven site has been updated (10/22/00) http://www.unheardbeethoven.org/new.html

[Rod]

Originally posted by Luis:
I almost forgot...
You can also find on Naxos (no, I'm not part of Naxos marketing crew as Rod seams to be from Nimbus ) the variations from Handel Judas Maccabaeus WoO. 45 (I think somebody was asking for it sometime ago) wich comes with some others variations for cello and piano from Mozart's Magic flute.

It is pure coincidence that a few of my recommendations have been with Nimbus. However this label is to be commended for its value for money, as is Naxos. Whereas the big labels (especially Phillips and EMI from my experience) will charge you an arm and a leg for a performance that is often third rate and poorly recorded! I don't care about nice packaging is the music stinks.

Rod

[Stephen F Vasta]

<<It is pure coincidence that a few of my recommendations have been with Nimbus. However this label is to be commended for its value for money, as is Naxos. Whereas the big labels (especially Phillips and EMI from my experience) will charge you an arm and a leg for a performance that is often third rate and poorly recorded! >>

Interesting, Rod. Do you find the Nimbus recordings good? I admit I have not heard any of their solo piano recordings, but in general I find their orchestral (and concertante) recordings overreverberant and "washy" - long hall ambience (as in an empty hall, which may well be the case at the sessions), but unclear detail and textures. Performances I've heard in most concert halls sound clearer and less confused than that.

Steve

[Rod]

Originally posted by Stephen F Vasta:

Interesting, Rod. Do you find the Nimbus recordings good? I admit I have not heard any of their solo piano recordings, but in general I find their orchestral (and concertante) recordings overreverberant and "washy" - long hall ambience (as in an empty hall, which may well be the case at the sessions), but unclear detail and textures. Performances I've heard in most concert halls sound clearer and less confused than that.

Steve

I had (but have given away) the complete B sonatas by Bernard Robert on Nimbus. At that time is was probably the best attempt of the complete works available on cd. This critics liked them too generally. My aquisition of the complete set by Paul Badura-Skoda on period instruments rendered Robert's set somewhat obsolete.

Such ambience in recordings is fine by me. If there is too much I can live with it. It is better than the current trend to record extremely close to the instrument, with little ambience at all. I don't like to hear the piano being played from inside the piano! There must be a sence of distance. A good sound engineer can produce an ambient yet still focused sound, but all in all, despite the improvements in technology, for me there has not been a corresponding increase in recording standards.

Rod


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

[Tim]

Originally posted by Serge:
Here I am talking about Piano Concerto # 5 again! This time, it is to ask why he didn't write any others after that one, esp. when he would continue to write other piano music for many years after. Do you think he tired of it, or thought the piano concerto form was exhausted the way Schumann did? Did he even contemplate or sketch a sixth one at any point? As far as I know, he did not.

The sixth piano concerto is an absolutely fascinating piece of music. It was sketched in the last period of Beethoven's life (the one following the 'heroic' period), but sounds a lot like the earlier ones. Only part of the first movement is sketched (the ritornello in quite a lot of detail) and is very similar to the op 37. The piano enters briefly at the beginning but has no real impact in the same way as 4 and 5 though. (It is more like the Mozart piano concerto no 9 in E flat; on of the first examples of this).

After that, much of the piano writing (ie. scalic passages) is very like the 3rd pc. It is impossible to know whether B would have improved it a lot after having worked on it, but it is no wonder he left it in my opinion.

Check out 'Unheard Beethoven' for a completion of the 1st mvt and some of the original sketches.

Peter - I don't think that a reason for stopping this composition was his deafness. I think that Beethoven wrote what he felt could express his emotions the best. If a piano concerto could have looked forward to the afterlife as the last quartets do, he would have probably composed a pc instead. Remember, he didn't actually perform the 5th ever (even though he does on that terrible rendition of his life Immortal Beloved), and that was because of his deafness. It didn't stop him finishing it though.


Tim.

[Peter]

Originally posted by Tim:

Peter - I don't think that a reason for stopping this composition was his deafness. I think that Beethoven wrote what he felt could express his emotions the best. If a piano concerto could have looked forward to the afterlife as the last quartets do, he would have probably composed a pc instead. Remember, he didn't actually perform the 5th ever (even though he does on that terrible rendition of his life Immortal Beloved), and that was because of his deafness. It didn't stop him finishing it though.


Tim.

The Emperor dates from 1809 at a time when Beethoven was still occasionaly performing in public - wasn't his last performance as a pianist in 1814 playing the Archduke trio ?

I wonder why he didn't perform the Emperor - he must have had serious doubts about his playing with an orchestra.

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'Man know thyself'

[Tim]

Originally posted by Peter:
The Emperor dates from 1809 at a time when Beethoven was still occasionaly performing in public - wasn't his last performance as a pianist in 1814 playing the Archduke trio ?

I wonder why he didn't perform the Emperor - he must have had serious doubts about his playing with an orchestra.

When he performed the Archduke Trio, it was a bit of a shambles. The piano was a bad one anyway, and it wasn't helped by the fact that Beethoven was nearly completely deaf at this point. Perhaps the occasion on which he performed the emperor was a lot bigger and he didn't want to be embarassed in front of all those people. I think that the Archduke concert was a smaller scale one.

[Peter]

Well I think it was that Archduke concert that must have persuaded B not to perform in public again.

Czerny gave the first Vienna performance of the Emperor on Feb 11 1812, yet B performed in Karlsbad at a charity concert in aid of Baden on 6 Aug 1812.

[Luis]

As far as I know Beethoven performed this trio one more time after that shameful 1st (4/11/14 at the inn zum Römischen). In this occasion the problem was that the piano was badly out of tune and of course B´s own deafness didn’t help the performance at all. Louis Spohr, who was present in that occasion, reported that B played the soft passages so quietly that the piano part was almost inaudible while the piano strings were jangled out on the loud ones. The second performance was taken a few days later in the Prater (I have no idea what’s that) with the same violinist: Schuppanzigh, but on my CD notes doesn’t says this was B’s last public performance, but instead: “his days as a pianist were coming to an end”. Does anyone know what was, then, B’s last pp?

[This message has been edited by Luis (edited 11-22-2000).]

[Peter]

Originally posted by Luis:
The second performance was taken a few days later in the Prater (I have no idea what’s that) with the same violinist:
[This message has been edited by Luis (edited 11-22-2000).]

The Prater is a large public park in Vienna opened in 1766 by Joseph II - It was highly fashionable with restaurants, taverns, puppet theatres, swings, bowling alleys, circus gymnastics, impressive firework displays, coffee houses. The famous ferris wheel is there (remember the film 'The 3rd man' ?)