Had some driving to do (started moving some stuff to the new house), so I listened to Beethoven’s 6th (Pastoral) on the way up, and while I found it pleasant, it was a bit meandering for my tastes. I’ve listened my way through all nine this past week, including multiple different versions, and I really prefer the Karajan performances. On the way home I listened to a 1983 performance of the 9th (Ode to Joy), and I have to say, the Scherzo from Eroica and the 9th really are my two favorites out of all that I have listened to. I’m not sure how you can’t enjoy this:
I’m new to describing this, so bear with me, but at around the nine to ten minute mark, when the cellos and the flutes go back and forth, leading to the cellists and the bass, then building to the violinists, and then the entire symphony comes crashing through, and the hair on your arms is standing up and you find yourself smiling and your eyes are moist and you can feel your chest just about to burst- that is the closest this agnostic/atheist/indifferent has ever come to thinking there is in fact a divine creator.
It is simply other worldly. Freude, schöner Götterfunken, indeed.
jeffreyw
Opening chords to “Layla” used to do that for me.
gogol's wife
Listen to the late quartets and you’ll really be in danger of becoming a believer.
Beethoven and Bach are my proofs of the existence of God. And no, I don’t want to get into a theological flame war. Believe whatever you want to believe. I was just very touched by your description.
fraught
There, in fact, are 3 divine creators: Beethoven, Bach and Handel. 4 if you count Copeland.
Jay C
You’re moving?
How’s that working out with your bum shoulder? Hopefully, you’ve subcontracted out the heavy lifting to
Blackwater Xesome local schleppers?And how are your four-legged dependents going adjust to new surroundings? Lily seems like she will probably get along fine, but are your new digs Tunch-proofed (if that’s even possible?)
BTW, second your rec on Karajan: Beethoven symphonies are so much a “standard” for orchestral recordings, but old Herbert always managed to buff up the performances to make just that little bit better so that it shows.
Presumably you have the whole set?
jeffreyw
Anyone here watch “The Soloist”? A man with a musical gift driven out of Julliard by insanity loves him some Beethoven.
Svensker
Yay, John. Isn’t it wonderful? Listening to certain music — especially Bach, for me, but others as well — is really like getting a first hand glimpse into the majestic mind of the Creator.
So glad you’re discovering this new world. It is vast and glorious.
SiubhanDuinne
@gogol’s wife
And Haydn is my proof that God had a delightful sense of humour.
Yeah, me too. I’m pretty much a nonbeliever (however you want to characterize it) but when I’m in the presence of great music I connect with the Divine Spark, for want of a better term.
With you, too, on the late Beethoven quartets. Well, really though, all of them. I can’t imagine a world without the three Rasumovsky quartets of Opus 59, or even the youthful Opus 18.
John, I am *so glad* you’re discovering Beethoven. The Scherzo from the “Eroica” is the very earliest musical memory I have, from age, maybe, 18 months or so (my parents were musicians). I envy you all that you’re going to get to hear for the first time. What a thrill — but trust me, it all gets even better with maturity and repetition.
Maude
Sasoon, I don’t know how to spell it, has some music that is lovely. I’ve heard them on the radio and missed the names. Anyone know him?
mr. whipple
I think you mean…..
hal
NYT story on how the Teabaggers are avoiding any of those nasty social issues on the way to overturning The Supreme Overlord Hussein Obama before he ruins the world with his lack of tax cuts for the rich, and health care for the poor.
Lots of total bullshit, which seems par for the course when the media covers this fringe movement.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/13/us/politics/13tea.html?hpw
licensed to kill time
__
I absolutely understand and have shared this feeling, but isn’t it ironic/interesting that a human being wrote the music that makes us feel that way?
Modulo Myself
So much to explore with Beethoven: the late quartets, the Diabellis, the Missa Solemnis, the final 3 piano sonatas, the Archduke, the 4th and 5th Piano Concertos…these all should be listened to at length.
Modulo Myself
Also, Brahm’s symphonies have always performed (for me) the same indescribable harmony that a piece like the slow movement of the 9th, or the slow of the 3rd has.
Tony J
Driving around, slamming banks, all whacked out on moody tracks?
You can have that one, in return for the music. Da Da Dum Dum Dum Dum Da Da Da Dum Dum…
colleeniem
@fraught: I count Copeland. The last five minutes of “Appalachain Spring” are my definition of happiness. I know its based on an already written melody, but the coda is so beautiful.
MikeB
As a life long professional musician, (not classical) I’ve always loved
the great classical works. In my opinion, most instrumental music is always
superior to “songs” of any type, because the verbal areas of the brain are
bypassed. I certainly love songs in many forms, rock and roll etc,
but to me, pieces like the 9th are “real” music, along with instrumental
pieces of all types and cultures.
A very interesting book on the subject of sound is
http://www.amazon.com/World-Sound-Brahma-Landscape-Consciousness/dp/0892813180
While it has a strong mystical theme which some might find fanciful,
it is packed with little known scientific facts about music and sound
and it’s perception by humans and has been a favorite among
jazz musicians for many years.
Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle
Damn!! I’m surprised there haven’t been any Rich Lowry related jokes yet.
Mary Jane Leach
If you ever get the chance, listen to the Wilhelm Furtwangler 1951 recording of the Ninth. It was performed at the re-opening of the Bayreuth Festival after WW II, and is just full of emotion. Second the late Beethoven String Quartets. The opening of Bach’s St. John’s Passion always gets me – puts the fear of “god” into you. Then you’ll be ready for Mahler, and if you like brass, Bruckner. For me, Monteverdi, Gesualdo, and Josquin, pre-Baroque music, are in the same categories as Bach and Beethoven. You might also like Verdi’s Requiem if you like the Beethoven 9th – there are parts of it that you will be familiar with, without even having known what they were. Here’s an excerpt.
Martin
@licensed to kill time:
Not to me. My mom always thought it was sad that I didn’t believe in the wonders of an almighty. I’ve always told her I thought it was sad that she was so quick to dismiss the works of man and wonders of nature.
Modulo Myself
Top three musical experiences, no order:
-Phish at the Great Went (with mushrooms, so maybe that’s cheating)
-the Boredoms in San Francisco
-the Guarneri Quartet playing the 15th Quartet on a snowy Sunday in NYC
R. Porrofatto
Not bad for a deaf guy, eh? (I’m not a performance nut — I also like HVK and hate those discussions anyway, and even a high school orchestra that gets most of the notes right will entertain me — but for a different experience of the 9th try Georg Solti and the Chicago,)
Short Bus Bully
How about the “Immortal Beloved” movie with Gary Oldman as Beethoven? One of my all time favorite films, inspires me to the depth of my being. The idea that someone who is deaf and struggling with keeping a grip on reality can have those sounds just bouncing around in their head gives me great pause.
The scene where a completely deaf Beethoven gives the first performance of “Ode to Joy” after years of reclusivity to the amazed audience (he has to be turned around to notice their standing ovation) brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it.
Really. Great. Film.
Martin
I’m more of a domestic purveyor of music and I’ll pick Gershwin over any of the classical favorites. Call me unrefined, but I stand by my preference.
Mike Schilling
Give the last movement of the Sixth another try. One of the most beautiful things ever written, along with the slow movement of his Emperor Piano Concerto.
Brick Oven Bill
Music can rightly be described as the expression of the soul, and is surely the most mysterious of the Seven Liberal Arts and Sciences. Why do we find ratios of harmonics pleasing to our ear? Why do words put to music become so much more powerful to the hearer, than words read alone? Why do we tap our feet to a song?
The answer, in my opinion, is that music provides efficiency in human military maneuver that has been necessary for the DNA strains we have inherited to survive to this day.
Societies that did not produce individuals who were moved to maneuver in unison to the fife and drum, or the equivalent, were removed from the face of the earth by the rock, club, sword, and musket, and replaced by DNA strains who were motivated by rhythm, concord, and discord.
Dogs did not evolve in the presence of music, and thus, do not dance. Neither do rabbits.
mr. whipple
@Martin:
Nothing wrong with Gershwin. No telling what might have happened if he lived longer than 39.
licensed to kill time
@Martin: I was unclear in what I was saying I guess, since I share your sense of awe and wonder and have no belief in a divine creator. It’s just funny to me that it takes a human to inspire that tendency towards belief. It’d be so much simpler to justify that belief if Gawd did the burning bush thing on a regular basis, or parted the Pacific Ocean once in a while.
geg6
I get those feelings from the Clash, or Elvis Costello, or Green Day. There is nothing more beautiful to me than driving along with the windows down (even if just a little bit), blasting “London Calling,” or “My Aim Is True,” or “American Idiot.” I sing along and am transformed. When I’m feeling particularly cheerful, I might put on Ian Hunter and rock out to “You’re Never Alone With a Schizophrenic.”. But classical doesn’t speak to me like that very much. To each their own.
rb
and I really prefer the Karajan performances
Always look for his first. They are peerless IMHO.
Mary Jane Leach
Dies Irae from Requiem, Giuseppe Verdi, Carlo Maria Giulini – conductor. [Let’s see if I can embed this]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdT1Mw4QJT8
Bill E Pilgrim
Kind of uncanny, I was just listening to this before logging in here to check what was happening on Balloon Juice for the first time in a while.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7TTHhkwbcA
It’s the Seventh Symphony, second movement, but by Toscanini. A little lo-fi compared to what’s available of course since it’s from so many years ago, but –my god.
I’ve heard many versions of this piece, but I found this once and heard the way it was supposed to be played for the first time, it seemed to me. It’s that steady pulse, the particular way he does it, it becomes something Zen and meditative in his hands. I felt like I “got” Toscanini all at once hearing it, it must have been something to have been alive back then and heard him.
Here’s my favorite Toscanini story:
Puccini and Toscanini were pals, partners, and then had a bad falling out. For many years. One Christmas Puccini sent Toscanini a pannetone (a fruitcake) by mistake, forgetting that they were on the outs. Aghast, Puccini sent a message to Toscanini saying:
“Pannetone sent my mistake – Puccini”.
Toscanini immediately sent a note back that read:
“Pannetone eaten by mistake -Toscanini”
Martin
@Brick Oven Bill: And yet some species of birds are known to dance to music as well as possibly one species of elephant.
Got any more completely wrong insight for us, BOB?
Tax Analyst
@Martin:
But on the positive side I thought BOB conveyed those incorrect insights rather melodically and with a certain grace.
It’s clear he has music in his soul even though he constantly appears to be a beat off, if you catch my gist.
Cat Lady
Elitist.
ETA: Bach is the shiznit.
Mary Jane Leach
Not to seem too pedantic, but it will be easier to find his music if Aaron Copland’s name is spelled correctly. :-)
Brick Oven Bill
Birds maneuver in unison to flock, operating as a defensive unit. The flapping of the wings would create a rhythm.
Elephants definitely operate in units. Elephants are heavy and make thumping noises with their big feet that could be used to synchronize their movements.
My theory stands, in spite of the fact that I have never seen a bird or elephant dance to music.
My guess is that you do not have any evidence of predators, such as foxes or coyotes, dancing to music.
The Grand Panjandrum
Dan Riehl:
Still a classless chickenhawk piece of shit.
Annie
Keith Jarrett, Kohn Concert, always gives me chills. The fact that it was improvisation makes the concert even more spectacular…
slag
@SiubhanDuinne: You may want to check out Stephen Fry’s discussion of “The Importance of Unbelief”: http://bigthink.com/ideas/17864. He briefly and poignantly addresses Mozart and Beethoven (IIRC) in the discussion.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Annie: That one theme from that concert became a regular jazz standard, worked its way right into the book. Which is pretty remarkable for an improvised piece. (Edit: here it is)
Here’s one of the most beautiful things ever, appropros of nothing in particular except that Beethoven made me think of Van Karajan, and that always makes me think of this.
dr. luba
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra, on of the nation’s finest, will be performing the entire Beethoven symphonic cycle next spring, over three weekends. If you’re in the neighborhood, John, you’re welcome to come with me (season ticket holder).
I’ve recently been rediscovering Beethoven, and it has been a joyful experience. One can love both the Sex Pistols and Bach, the Clash and Arvo Part; music, in its infinite variety, is one of the truly great human accomplishments*.
(*modern country and Celine Dion excepted, of course.)
tim
Just now waking up to transcendent creativity, are you? That explains a lot.
John, I’m pretty sure you have NO idea how utterly self-absorbed you are. The only pain that seems real to you is the pain YOU feel, re your shoulder, then you can’t stop talking about it. Pets don’t matter until you get one, then it’s nonstop rescue posting. Breathtakingly moving classical music, around for centuries, only exists when you finally stumble onto it; now you’re writing music reviews.
I wish you, when making your typical black/white pronouncements on current events, would take into account your profound lack of empathy and inability to appreciate your limited perspective.
I’m guessing that quality in you is what has enable you to go from crazed right wing know it all Bushie to crazed Democratic know it all Obamite, all without blushing or missing a beat.
It’s all black and white to you, no matter where you find yourself, because at the center is always YOU.
Food for thought. Your minions will now proceed to insult and debase me in hopes of gaining your notice in comments.
Violet
I love the Masters – Bach, Beethoven, Handel, Mozart – but I have a soft spot for the Russians: Shostakovich, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Rachmaninoff, and of course Tchaikovsky, who I think is exceptionally brilliant.
Shostakovich is one of my favorites because I had to play some of his works in high school. Very challenging. I can’t say I like his works the best, but he resonates with me because of how hard I had to work on learning the music.
Tchaikovsky was probably my grandmother’s favorite composer and I love his works for that reason. But I also find them very compelling.
peachy
Well, it’s the wrong kind of day for the Sixth. You have to wait until a warm day in spring, you know, the first day that you can open the house windows, so that the breeze makes the curtains flutter. Crank up the sixth. Then every time you listen to it after that it will be a warm spring day.
slag
@tim:
Ha!
Wow. That was some serious ad hominem all the way around. I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t just assume others might feel justified in responding in kind. Maybe it’s your totally un-self-absorbed, nuanced mind that figures you don’t deserve to be treated as obnoxiously as you treat others. Oh well…to each his own, I guess.
licensed to kill time
tim seems a bit …. concerned.
AnneS
@Mike Schilling:
Mike, I’m listening to that now. Incredible music; it’s been in my head for days. The piano in the second movement gives me chills.
And, yes, with maturity comes an even deeper understanding/connection. This was a favorite of my grandfather’s, so I got to hear it a lot growing up.
Wonderful thread!
Roger Moore
@Bill E Pilgrim:
I love Toscanini’s versions of Bethoven. His Ninth is the standard to which all other versions of the Ninth must be compared- and almost always found wanting. He really got the core of Bethoven’s style in a way that the German school von Karajan represented never did.
moe99
John, this series is highly recommended to better understanding Beethoven:
http://www.teach12.com/ttcx/coursedesclong2.aspx?cid=730
Greenberg is a fabulous teacher.
Josie
John Cole – Your description of the music was so on target. I belong to a volunteer chorale that does two concerts per year with the local symphony orchestra, and there have been a few pieces we have done – this symphony, the Carmina Burana and Verdi’s Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves – that gave me that exact feeling. If I hadn’t been singing, I would have been crying from the emotional pull of the music.
colleeniem
@Mary Jane Leach: Sorry about that :). @Violet: I love Rhapsody on a Theme by Paganini, Op. 43 by Rachmaninov. It’s also one of my favorite pieces, but I have to listen to the whole thing, not just the part everyone knows. I love how it contains lot of the virtuoso showing off. I can’t imagine that there a ton of professional pianists that can do the thing justice.
Brick Oven Bill
At my residence, coyotes can be Sensed to be hunting. Coyotes use sound, which is not to be confused with Music.
They hunt in packs, with the coyote emitting sounds seemingly driving the prey, typically rabbits, towards the coyotes that remain silent, awaiting the ambush. It is pretty impressive. They hunt at night so this has to be Heard, and not Seen.
How they learned this, and how they coordinate with each other, I do not know. But there would be no evolutionary basis for coyotes dancing.
New Yorker
This so wonderfully describes exactly how I feel when listening to this piece, but just a bit after when you experience it. For me, it’s when the Ode to Joy theme first appears, very quietly, with just the cellos and bass. Then it crescendos slowly with the violas and cor anglais (I think), then the violins, and then the whole orchestra. This is history’s greatest piece of music, and one of the greatest tragedies of history is that the utter genius who created it was unable to ever hear it performed.
As for the Karajan performance, I have a CD box set of all 9 symphonies, and they’re wonderful. My only issue is with the 2nd movement of the 9th, as the violin triplets seem a bit rushed and washed out, but that’s just a minor complaint.
Two other times for me: when I first walked out of the heavy forest of the Kaibab Plateau and saw the Grand Canyon from its north rim, and when this east-coast boy, whose idea of a big mountain was Mt. Washington in NH, first saw the snow-capped majesty of Mt. Rainier from 40 miles away in Bellevue, WA on a clear August dawn.
PTirebiter
“If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph: THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD WAS MUSIC” — Kurt Vonnegut …
MikeJ
@Josie:
The Pussycats have really branched out from the long tails and ears for hats days.
Violet
@colleeniem:
When I was very young and had just started studying piano, my mother took me to see Vladimir Horowtiz. Just him and a piano. He was absolutely phenomenal. Even though I was very young and had only just been studying piano for a year or so, I knew he was truly amazing.
I’ve got no idea what he played, but his brilliance has stayed with me. Even at a young age I was spellbound by one man playing the piano for hours.
I imagine he could do any piano composition justice. But like you said, there are few who could.
Maude
@mr. whipple: Yup.
When they pronounce his name, it is just like Vidal, the hair guy.
Thanks so much.
West of the Cascades
@R. Porrofatto: Yes. When listening to the recording I have, I have never not wept like a little child when the Chicago Symphony Orchestra brass section come in at the point that John refers to as the “entire symphony comes crashing through.” When I want an emotional catharsis I listen to the Solti/CSO recording with at least a +4 (usually red wine).
Fern
@Violet: I had an experience like that at a Vladimir Ashkenazi concert.
Also a performance of a Shostokovich string quartet – can’t remember now which one, but it may have been his last.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Roger Moore: Totally agree.
By the way, thinking of the “title piece” of this blog post as it were, who can hear that without thinking of “It’s made of people! People, I tells ya!”
Not me, anyway. That was the first time I ever heard that music, and it was actually incredibly effective, with the screen showing scenes of old Earth before the fall, and ol Edward G Robinson lying there watching, in tears.
And what do you know, found that too.
EcoRI
That was beautiful, John.
If you were a man, I’d marry you.
Lurker
@John Cole – Thank you for sharing this video.
If time permits, listen to David Oistrakh’s take on Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, Movement 3.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0RgjrBu5uE
I’m a fan of this specific piece, especially where the violin breaks away from the crowd and speaks its mind (around 3:05).
My dad’s a huge fan of violinist David Oistrakh in general. :-)
Cat Lady
@tim:
Jeebus gawd man, calm the fuck down. Someone is moved by beauty and wants to share, and you come and shit all over him, it and us. You also seem to have lost the plot – if you want to scold about lack of empathy, go bother Michelle Malkin or any of the other reichtards one click away. If they ever post classical music, my guess it’s Wagner.
Tax Analyst
@tim:
Aren’t blogs pretty much for stating one’s POV?? Cole is stating his opinions and his commenters are free to agree or disagree as it suits them.
Whatever you might think of John he is pretty consistent in letting people have their say. Unlike many other sites I’ve noticed that he has very rarely 86 ‘d anyone from commenting and those bans have rarely been more than a few days or so and almost always for stuff like gratuitous racial slurs as opposed to banning someone for slamming his POV.
The top banner somewhat facetiously says “Consistently wrong since 2002”. What it does not say is “Fair and Balanced”.
But whatever. You had your say. Fine & dandy.
Restrung
Yeah, John Cole! Thank you for getting me interested again. I’m loving it.
Which brings up another issue: why is my websurfing life so B-Juicy? I needed mr. consistently wrong to bring me back to classical? I have much to ponder. :b
OK, I pondered. This is the best website ever.
vtr
As someone who has made his living in public radio, as my wife also has, let me say how warmed my heart cockles are by these expressions of love for music in general and classical music in particular. We have the Karajan nine, but please listen to the ninth played by Roger Norrington’s London Classical Players. His research led him to speed up the tempos a bit, and, more importantly, use a smaller orchestra and chorus. They really have to scream to get through it. I take that as Beethoven’s way of telling us that if we want to get any joy out of life, we have to try really, really, really hard.
Listen to everything. The more you like, the fun you have.
My musical moment – hearing Louis Armstrong at Dartmouth in 1960. He lost his chops just a few years later, so I was very lucky.
geg6
To be clear, I like and enjoy classical music and listen to it often on the local public radio station. It just doesn’t speak to me the way punk rock does. I have found myself experiencing similar sensations and emotions with punk as John describes here. I can create the same feelings with the blues, too. Well, not the same exactly. I find the blues to be very sexy. Very sexy.
daniel thomas macinnes
My favorite Beethoven album in my record collection is a 1978 LP by the Orford String Quartet, performing Beethoven’s Op. 130. I bought it at one of the local record shops for a dollar. One dollar!
Also, if you’re a fan of Beethoven, I highly recommend the 1982 Isao Takahata film Gauche the Cellist (Sero Hiki no Goshu). Every fan of classical music should see this movie, in fact. It’s wonderfully sublime, a true labor of love, and I think it may change your mind if you’re not a fan of Beethoven’s 6th.
If you visit The Ghibli Blog (cough, shameless plug, cough), you can find links to download Gauche. I posted some screenshots of the film a few days ago, in fact.
John Cole
@tim: Always the ray of sunshine.
Anyone care to tell me how to run a personal blog that ISN’T centered on me?
FreeAtLast
@Josie: My husband sings with a similar group and has done so for many, many years. I think I’ve heard just about every major choral piece over this time. The one that comes closest to moving me to tears is Faure’s Requiem, especially the Libera Me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YO7obfP6MJI&feature=related
Restrung
“unchurched”
MattT
Thanks for posting the Beethoven/Toscanini link. Very fine. The 7th has always been my favorite of the Beethoven symphonies.
daniel thomas macinnes
Here’s the trailer for Takahata’s Gauche the Cellist. Enjoy!
Yutsano
@John Cole: Benevolent benefaction?
I’m amazed I’m acknowledging the petulant child at all.
FreeAtLast
Does the word “esp eci ally” now get one into moderation? Can’t think of anything else.
Svensker
@John Cole:
Welp, you could run a blog called “John Cole on Why Svensker is FABULOUS”, but I don’t think it would get the same # of page views as you’re gettin’ now.
The next step for your Beethoven appreciation, Cole, is going to hear a live symphony. The 9th particularly is fantastic. You can FEEL the sound waves. It’s really overwhelming. I dare you not to weep.
fraught
@Mary Jane Leach:
Not pedantic at all. I’m astounded. I’ve listened to tons of Copland, (In the forties the radio was full of him.) I have his CD’s, I had his cassette tapes, I had is LP’s, he in on my iPod. I’ve seen the movies he scored and have seen his work performed in concert. The “e” was a pure creation of my imagination. I gnuinly nvr noticd thr was no “e” thr. (sic) Thanks for that information which comes so late to me. I guess I never wrote his name before in public.
PhilK
I want to recommend the version of the Ninth conducted by Georg Solti, with Yvonne Minton, Pilar Lorengar, Stuart Burrows, and Martti Talvela (1991).
I’ve listened to so many Ninths where some of the soloists are great and others are not so great. The soloists in this version are uniformly excellent.
FreeAtLast
I now have 2 comments in moderation! One more try:
@Josie:
My husband sings with a similar group and has done so for many, many years. I think I’ve heard just about every major choral piece over this time. The one that comes closest to moving me to tears is Faure’s Requiem, particularly the Libera Me.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…..re=related
Jim Once
@Restrung:
Yeah. (Sigh.) Thank you so much, John, for reminding me of the absolute glory of No. 9. And, yes, Immortal Belovedwas one of the most affecting movies I’ve ever watched . . . and I could go on and on about Bach, Monteverdi, Mozart, Barber, et al., but will not. My life has been blessed in so many ways, not least of which is the fact that both my sons are gifted musicians and composers. When my youngest began his study of cello and orchestral music, he took it upon himself to share what he was learning with me. Later, I never missed any opportunity to listen to him perform with the Kansas City Civic Orchestra. What gifts I have been given.
Bitter Scribe
Piano is my favorite instrument (to listen to–alas, I don’t play), and to me, nothing can surpass Beethoven’s Fifth Piano Concerto (the Emperor). I have a long drive just ahead of me, and I’m going to listen to it again.
FreeAtLast
Help! Three comments in moderation and I don’t know why.
New Yorker
@Svensker:
I visited Vienna 2 years ago and searched madly for a performance of the 9th in the city in which it premiered. No dice. Instead I had a very enjoyable experience watching a chamber orchestra perform a selection of Mozart and Strauss pieces. Of course, I loved Vienna so much that I am determined to return some day, so maybe I’ll catch it then.
I did see the Cornell symphony orchestra with the glee club perform it my senior year in a nice concert hall on campus, so I’ve at least got that.
Yutsano
@fraught: It’s one of the (many) beauties of this blog that I will learn something every time I come here. What I learn may or may not be desirable information, but it still happens.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@John Cole:
If you had the least bit of class, you’d rename this blog, this
jrosen
I’m a musician (Boston Symphony retired) a recovering alcoholic and a life-long atheist, with some training in math and physics. (There’s a combo for you!). Whatever music is (I’ve been doing it all my life and still don’t know how it really works) it points to something beyond (above, beneath?) words and equations (although I think the Maxwell equations, once you understand the language, do something of the same), the everyday, and may be the thing about us that transcends our commonality with other animals. The 2nd movement of the Mozart Clarinet Concerto is the closest to heaven I’m ever going to get.
At least, I know it is there, unlike the version peddled by the God-machine.
SiubhanDuinne
@Brick Oven Bill: I’m here to tell you, rabbits *do too* dance. I’ve seen them, dancing in the moonlight. No lie.
jrosen
Now I’m going back to practicing Beethoven op. 111. I’m a very lucky man.
Svensker
@New Yorker:
Sounds like a pretty good Plan B. We had a similar thing happen in Paris — went to St. Sulpice to hear their amazing organist play Bach on the amazing organ there, not realizing that daylight savings time in Paris had happened the night before, so we missed the performance. Plan B was a men’s choir from the Ukraine singing Rachmaninoff’s Vespers. It was a transcendent bit of serendipity.
Mary Jane Leach
@fraught:
Not to worry, it took me years to remember the correct spelling (that, and Aaron). I’m a composer, and we try to stand up for each other.
Gregory
…and then, after Beethoven has just kicked huge amounts of musical ass, he has the soloist lead off with, “Oh friends! Not these tones! Rather, let us raise our voices in more pleasing and more joyful sounds!” And then they go into the Ode to Joy.
Wonderful. I can see why Alex from A Clockwork Orange loved it so.
Svensker
@jrosen:
In MY version of the God-machine, the 2 versions are pretty much indistinguishable.
Gregory
As for God, if church ever made me feel the way being at a Springsteen concert does, I might still be a believer.
elaine
I’d second listening to the Norrington version. You may not be converted, but it gives an idea of the richness of interpretations Beethoven’s music offers. One of my favorite memories ever was hearing the 9th while driving through Navajo country. My heart beats a little faster even thinking of that thrill.
Also try the Takacs version of the late quartets. Shivers down the spine, weird, but oh so awesome (as in awe inspiring)
SteveinSC
Beethoven: slovenly, filthy habits, possibly gay, very liberal= First DFH.
John Cole: Get back in that car, load a CD and blow the windows out with Rachmaininoff.
nancydarling
BOB and Tim—just go away.
Interesting fact from the companion book to the PBS series “The Mind” from several years back: you can train a dog to make a certain response to middle C and he will also respond to the octave. This probably works with coyotes also. It tells me that the mammalian brain is wired for music.
Brian Greene had a chapter titled “Nothing but Music” in his book “The Elegant Universe”. I gave up trying to understand string theory as I can barely get my head around 4 dimensions, let alone 11 or more. What I took away from the book is that we are all (BOB and Tim included) a song in the heart of whatever created us.
John,you can be an atheist, agnostic, indifferent, or whatever and still live in a state of grace. Music like this lifts us into hyper-awareness of that state, but it is always there at some level. Sometimes I look at Mijo and Max (my dog and cat) with envy as they seem always to be in that state of grace because they never experienced that metaphorical fall from Eden. They are always one with what Tillich would call their “ground of being”. Alas, we humans only catch glimpses of it now and again.
John Cole
@Gregory: You know- if that taught music like that, using that verbiage, kids would love the class.
Instead, my memories of music class are standing around doing stupid shit with a recorder.
Mary Jane Leach
@SteveinSC:
And then there’s Carlo Gesualdo (basically a contemporary of Shakespeare), an Italian prince who murdered his wife and her lover, and then went on to write exquisitely expressive music.
And John, I do try to teach music the way you want, trying to get students to really hear the music, instead of worrying about what they think they should be hearing, and putting it in context.
Brick Oven Bill
You go away nancydarling. Music is primarily military in nature. Band is military training for those not athletically inclined towards football.
Music’s secondary importance is to benefit those engaging in the art by drawing fertile young women to its practitioners (musicians), populating the society with future generations of warrior-musicians.
And rabbits don’t dance. Perhaps there was some fermented grain that this particular rabbit had consumed and it was trying to stay standing up.
Jim Once
@FreeAtLast:
God, yes. How could I forget that one.
Jim Once
@Brick Oven Bill:
Oh, Bob, I feel bad that you felt you had to respond this way. Because what you were saying earlier about music is exactly what someone else was saying – it had a certain grace, and certainly revealed your love for music.
PurpleGirl
John, thanks for this post. It’s been too long since I played any of my classical albums.
The only thing better than hearing the music is singing along with it. When I sang with the choir at my church, it was marvelous. I’m not a good singer on my own; I’m really a soprano but the choir director had me sing backup for the alto. The most incredible works to do were Bach and Handel, especially when we did them as concerts.
Yutsano
@nancydarling: You got under BoB’s skin. I must give you mad props for that.
slag
@PurpleGirl:
Same here. I really appreciate the passion and sincerity of these kinds of posts. They make me take a step back and look more broadly at the world, which is a nice change of pace.
Annie
@General Egali Tarian Stuck:
LOL. As always, your comments are priceless. ;)
Just been channel surfing. Came upon an evangelical channel. Apparently this ministry is having a fundraiser — lots of music and blah, blah. The main guy told me that “my inability to get off the couch and give is evidence of my disobedience to God.” He told me “to grab my credit card and do as God commands. Delayed obedience is disobedience.”
So I guess I will remain disobedient and accept the consequences.
WereBear
The seventh is a personal favorite, but if you don’t get goosebumps during the Ode to Joy, I would wonder a bit….
Jason Bylinowski
Yeah, that’s nice, Beethoven could really write some ditties. However I am living proof that you can wear anything out, as I can no longer get through the ninth. I wore it slap out back in high school and am anticipating the day when it becomes cool for me again. Same with most of Steve Reich. Used to think he was simply the greatest living composer. Now though, I appreciate it for what it was to me in college but I figure my tastes just changed at some point without meaning or them to change. Now I don’t really do orchestral at all. Things change.
Totally disagree on Eroica though. Just never liked it much. No accounting for taste and I know it, as Handel’s Water Music in F Maj is my favorite Old Masters piece of all time. I may not be the only person in modern history to ever say that, but it’s a fairly small club.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
Adagio for Strings. Trinity Choir
jrosen
BoB: I never respond to you but your latest BS is just too much. Have you ever heard of 3/4 time? (You don’t march to that, you waltz). Music does draw people together (Martin Luther wrote simple hymns so the congregation could participate actively, and we know how much that contributed to J S Bach), for all sorts of purposes, battle being only one (weddings, funerals, thanskgiving, etc., etc.), and sometimes just the contemplation of being in the deepest possible way.
Because some behavior evolved for one purpose says nothing about what use it may be now. After all, when Cro-Magnon men were throwing rocks at mastodons they weren’t thinking about pitching fast-balls.
Your purpose in coming to this board seems to be only to sour whatever is going on. There is an apt German expression for that” “to spit in the soup” or as we would say in English, put a turd in the punch-bowl. What sort of perverse pleasure does that give you? Go listen to Mozart and STFU.
To Dr. Luba: DSO was my band for 4 years (1968-1972) and included I am sorry to say one of the worst 9th’s of my life. It was a sorry bunch in those days (Sixten Ehrling, known to us as Sixpack or Mr. Coffee Nerves or Count Dracula) and I was glad to escape, although some of my old friends are still playing there. Your new conductor is a pro, if a bit stodgy for my taste.
tatertot
In the fraught days after 9/11, there was one day when Blair and Bush stood together at a memorial service (in Westminster Abbey, or was it in the US?) but it was so contrived/manipulative that I started to weep from frustration and horror at how we were all being manipulated that I put on Beethoven’s 9th at full blast – opened up all the windows of my semi-rural home – and just sang along with the last movement as loud as I could – and thought G.W. Bush’s idea of ‘freedom’ is as far away from Beethoven’s as the planet Mercury is from Pluto.
And any of you who say I’m denigrating the 9/11 dead, piss off – I lost cousins and neighbours, kids I used to babysit – so piss off.
Josie
FreeAtLast – That was lovely. Thanks for posting.
Cat Lady
The lyrics are as beautiful as the music.
You millions, I embrace you. This kiss is for all the world!
debbie
Being much more of a fan of Baroque music, Beethoven would probably be at the bottom end of my Top Twenty list (to borrow a phrase from the Emporer in Amadeus, “Too many notes!”), but as someone posted above, that second movement of the 7th is one of the most moving pieces in all of music (and right up there with anything by Mozart).
I certainly haven’t heard all the proper recordings of Beethoven’s Symphonies, but I remember really liking a boxed set of records, commemorating the NY Philarmonic’s 50th anniversary and conducted by Leonard Bernstein. I don’t know if that’s classless or not, but it really opened me up to classical music in general.
Martin
@jrosen: BOB marches to everything. He puts a pizza on the oven, cranks up the music, grabs his trusty plunger, strips naked and marches up and down his driveway to whatever is on the radio.
And he’s correct – dogs and rabbits don’t do that.
Linda Featheringill
To John Cole:
Congratulations on finding music you can get off to!
I would like for my tombstone to read:
Life is hard, but music is cool.
Linda Featheringill
To tatertot:
I am sorry for your loss. Your grief honors those who have gone on before you.
Joe Lisboa
Thanks for the Beefoven fix, JC. On the kitchen-tip, I’m baking roughy for the first time tonight: ginger and soy marinade. Wish me luck.
Joe Lisboa
… oh, and finally getting around to watching The Wire. I know, for shame. I’m halfway through Season Two and loving life.
GeeYourHairSmellsTerrific
Ritchie Blackmore’s Difficult to Cure.
It’s his Re-interpretation I suppose of Ode to Joy. Complete with full orchestra.
It’s in two parts.
gbear
@fraught:
But Handel was gay!!
gbear
@John Cole:
Talk about Tim.
General Egali Tarian Stuck
For Joni Mitchell fans. Something old that is new again.
Annie
Pavarotti with Nessum Dorma….
A tiny slice of heaven….
Brick Oven Bill
Music has many nice esoteric things about it in our ‘modern’ world jrosen, and it is great at Thanksgiving, but these are all subsets of the reason we exist in our current form on earth to appreciate it, which is maneuvering and coordination.
The Left gets so touchy on the subject of evolution.
Batocchio
Beethoven’s 9th is one of my all-time favorites, too. Annie mentioned “Nessun Dorma,” and if you hear it from a good tenor, especially live, it will give you chills.
Performing a great piece of music can also be transcendent, and even just rehearsing with some friends can be a real joy. (Performance-wise for me it was singing Josquin de Prez’ “Ave Maria” in college – it’s a gorgeous piece – and some old rock ‘n’ roll/soul.) But whatever does it for ya!
General Egali Tarian Stuck
@Brick Oven Bill: What is your branch on the tree of evolution BoB? Lizard fork?
SiubhanDuinne
@gbear #119: “But Handel was gay!!”
So was Copland, sometimes known as the Dean of gay American composers.
Sibelius
All this classical jibber jabber and NO one mentions Mozart’s operas?
I know, opera, blech. That’s what I thought until I listened. Now I can’t stop. The Mozart Da Ponte operas (Le Nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni and Cosi Fan Tutte) are amazing. Just listen.
jrosen
BoB: How are you so sure that I am a “lefty”? Because I’m here and don’t like you? What is so touchy about my response? I’m just objecting to your smug reductiveness, as if the question “what is music?” is closed and you have the answer. I think that evolutionary psychology is a very interesting approach to understanding our lives, and I certainly doubt that Steven Pinker’s dismissal of it as an epiphenomenon of our nervous systems and has no evolutionary significance is right. (Not that it matters to doing music, which I expect to be doing until I am terminally horizontal).
That said, I’ll sum, up several dozen previously suppressed responses to your two or three-note honking as this: when I read your shticks, I feel as if I have just played a badly out of tune piano. LIke I need a bath very badly. Npw gp back to Mozart…if may mellow your clearly damaged soul.
jrosen
BoB: How are you so sure that I am a “lefty”? Because I’m here and don’t like you? What is so touchy about my response? I’m just objecting to your smug reductiveness, as if the question “what is music?” is closed and you have the answer. I think that evolutionary psychology is a very interesting approach to understanding our lives, and I certainly doubt that Steven Pinker’s dismissal of it as an epiphenomenon of our nervous systems and has no evolutionary significance is right. (Not that it matters to doing music, which I expect to be doing until I am terminally horizontal).
That said, I’ll sum, up several dozen previously suppressed responses to your two or three-note honking as this: when I read your shticks, I feel as if I have just played a badly out of tune piano. LIie I need a bath very badly. Now go back to Mozart…it may mellow your clearly damaged soul.
SiubhanDuinne
BoB has apparently never heard, or even heard of, a back-beat.
jrosen
Sibelius: Can’t mention every great thing in one post! But you are right on about Mozart/ And the piano concertos.
Annie
@Batocchio:
Nessum Dorma does give me chills. Was listening to Pavarotti, and then remembered the Paul Potts version — the little telephone salesman that sang it in a competition. Just youtubed that version, and it, again, almost made me cry…it is too sweet…
@Brick Oven Bill:
LOL. If you want to be provocative you have to make a point…being stupid is not being provocative…it is just being stupid….try again!
JAHILL10
@JC
I can’t argue the heavenly qualities of Beethoven, but when you get to Mahler (the 2nd and the 4th) you will truly know the divine.
gogol's wife
@Annie:
Try Jussi Bjorling. And while we’re on the subject of opera (yes, Mozart is the best!), my “pep aria,” which I listen to when I’m mad at the world, is “La mamma morta” from “Andrea Chenier.” I first heard it narrated by Tom Hanks in the movie “Philadelphia.” I love the whole opera now (Domingo-Scotto).
Hawes
Sadly, for many people, Ludwig’s 9th is just the theme to Die Hard
And, for that matter, Raising Arizona
JK
Two thumbs up for Beethoven’s 9th Symphony
And for these as well
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lN_8qFinDBM&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAtpHXkit0Q
Cat Lady
@jrosen:
I’m not familiar with the names of well regarded symphonic musicians, but I’m fascinated by this little girl. Obviously she’s a prodigy, but is she considered to be amongst the elite?
ChrisNBama
The ninth symphony is wonderful.
If you get a chance, John, explore the late Beethoven string quartets. (OP 127-133). They contain, in my opinion, the greatest music Beethoven ever wrote.
A good primer is the Gross Fugue (OP 133). It was originally written as the finale to the OP 130 quartet, but it was so estoteric and complex, that it was stripped off that work and made to be a standalone piece. It is incredibly dense, but very rewarding. Here’s a good recording of it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=uCQ0MP96T0Y&feature=related
Annie
@gogol’s wife:
OMG. Best ever. I am crying. Thank you ever so much…
MaximusNYC
@John Cole:
If you want a really mind-altering experience of the 9th Symphony, check this out:
http://www.park.nl/park_cms/public/index.php?thisarticle=118
It’s called “9 Beet Stretch”. A Norwegian sound artist used software to stretch the symphony out to 24 hours long, with no pitch distortions. It sounds like a gimmick, but the result turned out to be stunningly powerful.
I can’t describe the experience to you — but maybe “ambient music from heaven” comes close. Give it a shot. I suspect that after about 10 minutes, you’ll be hooked.
The link above is to a page where you can stream “9 Beet Stretch” 24 hours a day.
MaximusNYC
P.S. Further info on the “9 Beet Stretch” project is at
http://www.expandedfield.net/
techno
Another vote for Beethoven’s 6th. Last fall, I went out to photograph some of the harvest here in Minnesota. When I went to assemble it into a short movie, the only music I could find that was appropriate was the final movement of the 6th which is supposed to be about the joy of the harvest. The resulting YouTube clip is much more popular than I would have expected and I owe much of the popularity to Ludwig van.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44ujv4HHz4A
gogol's wife
@Annie:
You’re welcome!
Svensker
@Jim Once:
Yes. What a beautiful Requiem. So French, so sad, so terrified, so full of grief, and then so utterly released and full of peace.
fraught
@gbear: And so was Copland. I purposely gave equal opportunity. I find Bach and Handel an interesting story since they were born 50 miles from one another in the same year. To me Bach and Handel are a fable. One stayed home and went to church and the other expatriated to a foreign city and went to the opera. In Italy Handel wrote 24 operas which are just being re-discovered and performed. Bach wrote for his church and was noticed favorably but he stayed were he was, presumable in order not to uproot his growing family. Handel had no such concern. he went to London because the king needed some work done. Handle was a major figure in the cultural scene in London. Unmarried, he was imperious and impertinent at events and was wildly sought after.
And yet, his music was every thing that Bach’s could not be. It was flashy and occasionally profane. It was sensual and sometimes distraught. Handel wrote the saddest music ever written. Bach showed his passion but never his own angst, if he had it.
They are two sides of the same coin. I would not choose one over the other but the constant proclamations of Bach’s preeminence in music’s canon certainly gives me an opportunity to cry out in Handel’s behalf as a reminder of his equal status at the very least.
John Casey
I have actually performed the Ninth, as a bass in the chorus. This was as a college sophomore in 1969 — interesting times.
It was the best musical experience I have ever had or will have.
Restrung
SiubhanDuinne is one frack’n great f’n word! I have no idea what it means, but I like it.
Jim in Chicago
John,
You might want to check out George Szell’s Beethoven recordings with the Cleveland Orchestra, Nos. 3 and 7 in particular.
Another piece you might love is Sibelius’s 2nd Symphony. Try Szell with the Amsterdam Concertgebouw for that one.
It’s nice to see that so many political bloggers are also music geeks! (I’m a record producer.)
HeartlandLiberal
Then, John, I recommend for your listening tingle Brahms double concerto for violin and cello.
Here is a taste on YouTube:
Brahm’s Double Concerto, 3rd Movement
Hard to beat, I have been listening to it again and again for over 60 years, and it NEVER grow stale, and never ceases to amaze.
bob h
Heard the Leipzig Philharmonic do a blazing hot Seventh Symphony recently. It was lost on the porcine Governor of NJ, Christie, who was sprawled asleep in the front row start to finish.
Svensker
@fraught:
Bach seemed to have more acceptance, perhaps because of his strong religious beliefs. Despair he did not seem to have. But his Ich Habe Genug is one of the most sorrowful, yet accepting, things ever.
I think Bach is my favorite, by a nose, but I would not want to give up Handel.
fiona
While I agree with your choice of blissful music, Karajan however would not my choice, he was a Nazi and a close friend of Hitler.
Ab_Normal
@General Egali Tarian Stuck: Great, you’ve broken the lurker. Bastard.
mike
Instead of “proof of God,” I’d say “argument for Western Civ’s worthiness.”
My selection: the one-two punch of Ode to Joy and the Brandenburg Concerto #3 in G.
Soprano2
I’m glad you’ve found the joy that is classical music. If you think it’s divine to listen to the 9th, you should try singing it – that’s a transformative experience! The only bad thing for sopranos (like me) and tenors is that Beethoven liked to use that high “A” a lot…..LOL He does it in the Missa Solemnis, too. I have the Bernstein “Ode to Freedom” recording that was done by the Brandenburg Gate in December 1989. It may not be the best technical performance, but with Germans singing in German right after the Wall came down, it’s full of emotion.
I love the Faure Requiem, too – it’s a beautiful piece to listen to and to sing. The In Paradisum always makes me cry. The Verdi Requiem is full of bombast and thunder, with quiet moments interspersed – the Lux Aterna will give you chills. I always hold my breath for the soprano soloist on that high B-flat at the end, because if it’s done just right it brings tears to your eyes.
For pure joy in singing, though, nothing can beat Carmina Burana. Most people only know the beginning and ending choruses, but the whole thing is wonderful. Singing that work is, for me, like singing joy and happiness.
There’s a whole wide world of classical music out there for you to find and enjoy.