Beethoven’s Final Masterpiece
No doubt that when Beethoven knew his time was coming to end soon, he wanted to go out with a bang. Just before his death, he created his final masterpiece, Beethoven’s 9th Symphony. This piece is beautiful, emotional, powerful and dramatic. I discovered an article this time about Beethoven’s music. Usually I find programs that feature music, but instead I found true gold. The article was titled “Beethoven Night” and was written by William Mann. I believe that Mann was a musical journalist that wrote many articles about concerts that included some history of the festivals, and his own opinion on the shows’ music. The concert contained the 9th symphony and Mann said it was only natural to add the piece because it was one of Beethoven’s most famous masterpieces. The article states that the concert included piano soloist Clifford Curzon along with the Choral Fantasia as the chorus and four vocal soloists. Another piece that was featured was Ode to Joy. Lastly, something I forgot to mention was that the symphony was performed by, none another than, the Royal Philharmonic Society. This orchestra is one of the tops and was considered to be one of the best, which is why he gave such a poor opinion on the performance. He described that the orchestra did not do the symphony justice in that the orchestra messed up a few times too many and that the conductor left the audience short an subsidiary detail that would have changed everything. He final note on the matter was that the performance played another orchestra would have been alright and substantial, but because it was performed by the Royal Philharmonic, it was a little disappointing.
My questions are, were there other festivals like this? Concerts where the program was only celebrating one composer? What other music was included in the performance? The article only says the 9th symphony and Ode To Joy. What were others? Maybe Moonlight Sonata?