On Monday evening I returned to David Geffen Hall to hear the second concert given by the Budapest Festival Orchestra with its music director Iván Fischer once again conducting. As had been the case on Sunday, the performance was devoted entirely to the music of Beethoven and on this occasion featured the composer's final two symphonies.
The program began with the Symphony No. 8 in F major, Op. 93 (1812). This is the least often performed of Beethoven's symphonies and the most misunderstood. One can sympathize with the perplexity of the audience at its 1814 premiere at which the Symphony No. 7 was also performed. By this point, the Viennese had come to expect the outrageous in the composer's symphonic works and were prepared to be alternately thrilled and horrified when attending a Beethoven premiere. What they must never have expected, however, was to be confronted with a work that was, on its surface at least, a return to the four movement Classical symphony invented by Haydn in the previous century. The third movement is even marked as an archaic menuetto rather than as a scherzo. As one listens, though, one begins to realize that something is slightly off. Much in the manner of Prokofiev's First Symphony, the piece seems, if not quite a parody, still something of a reinterpretation of the earlier style. It is filled with oddities - the lack of a slow movement, the clock-like syncopation of the second movement, and finally the unusual shifts of key in the fourth movement. The result of all this was to leave the audience at its premiere puzzled and not quite sure of what they'd just heard nor of the proper way to respond to it.
After intermission, the concert concluded with a performance of the Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125 (1824). Beethoven's Ninth is more than just a musical work, of course - it is one of the touchstones of Western culture and one of the greatest expressions of universal brotherhood ever devised. Jan Swafford, in his monumental biography of the composer, has linked the sentiments contained within it to Beethoven's youthful exposure to the Enlightenment principles then prevalent in Bonn. Certainly, it is the culmination of all the composer had learned over the years regarding both life and art. There's a magnificent irony in the fact that this obstreperous morose man who was often so difficult in his private life should choose to celebrate the common thread that binds all men together and to give voice to Schiller's An die Freude when his own life had predominantly been one of loneliness and suffering.
The Ninth has always offered a message of hope and has been criticized by some for its naivete in sounding so simplistic a call to brotherhood. Nevertheless, at a time when the news is daily filled with accounts of political turmoil and the most basic values of Americans have been called into question, the symphony has more than ever something to offer those of us who are at times brought close to despair by current events. If nothing else, we are given hope simply by the fact that such a transcendental masterpiece should exist in the first place. It demonstrates the heights that can be reached by one man, cursed with deafness and nearing death, acting on behalf of us all. We have to feel that if Beethoven could overcome the obstacles fate had placed in his path then so too can we triumph in the face of horrible adversity.
The soloists for the final movement were Laura Aikin, soprano, Kelley O’Connor, mezzo-soprano, Robert Dean Smith, tenor, and Matthew Rose, bass; James Bagwell led the Concert Chorale of New York. In an unusual tactic, the chorus was scattered among members of the audience in the hall's orchestra and first tier sections. No one knew they were there - at least I didn't - until the time came for them to give voice to Schiller's words in the final movement. At that point, they rose from their seats, sang their lyrics and then sat back down again. While this was probably extremely distracting to those audience members seated immediately behind the singers, it did have the effect of bringing the audience more directly into the spirit of the piece and its plea for universal brotherhood.
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