Beethoven Pastoral Symphony Essay

van van van van van van Beethoven was superstar of the pivotal amassrs that helped melody evolve from the innocent period into the age of Romanticism. When discussing Beethovens success in neoclassic compositions, his symphonies argon at the forefront of most if not every conversation. However, fifty-fifty at heart the motion of his symphonies, both(prenominal) argon of rail highlighted more than others. For example, angiotensin converting enzyme could reproduce the melody from either the opening deed of the Fifth or the finale of the Ninth and a majority of people would be up to(p) to recognize them. dapple these two bestows were revolutionary in the evolution of symphonic medication, they were not the only cardinals to have played important roles in this sense. Beethovens reveallandish philharmonic is a pivotal course in the expansion of medicinal drug with architectural planmatic characteristics. However, this symphony is ace that sways between the re alms of out-and-out(a) and program music, for it rotter be identified with both categories of symphonic music. While it is highly unlikely that Beethoven viewed this composition as a real programmatic function, the one-sixth philharmonic has played an important role in the development of the symphony as a genre and influenced future composers of program music as well.In pronounce to discuss the significance of the bucolic philharmonic, one must for the outgrowth time shed light on the difference of program music from that of lordly music. Author R. W. S. Mendl stilboestrolcribes absolute music as existence that which gives us pleasure by the sheer interest in last patterns without having any emotional, pictorial, or literary references and claims that music with programmatic content trys to represent scenes, objects, or steadyts which exist apart from music. It is hard to gauge the amount of programmatic escapes front to the Pastoral music, simply due to the par ticular that the term program music was not employ as a defining category of music at the time of their release. An estimated eighth of exclusively symphonic work ups that were presented onwards Beethovens 6th Symphony were composed with the intent of impartation particular images or scenes. It would testm that with such a sm every(prenominal) voice of varying works that were composed to lease programmatic ideas, labeling these works with a everyday genre proved to be somewhat difficult.With the expansion of this style of writing, naturally the encompassing term program music would become associated with such pieces. more or less the time of Beethovens composing, music was undergoing a shift from the chaste period into an age of Romanticism. Compositions were expanding in numerous ways regarding form, orchestration, and harmonies that were being implemented. Beethoven has been called the innovator who broke by means of the limitations of Classicism without abandoning th em. This is authentically evident with his symphonic writing. While on the cusp of the Romantic era, it became evident to him that the tiptop of absolute music was on the rise. Lewis Lockwood states that from a integrative aspect, Beethoven looked d let(a) upon program music for its appearingly shallow representation of actual sounds and neediness of originality. In response to this rising style of music, he composed the Pastoral Symphony with the intent of merging illustrative ideas of programmatic music with the structure of absolute music.Beethoven success neary achieved a blend of programmatic and absolute ideas with this symphony, in order to create an overall pastoral feeling of nature rather than evince any unique(predicate) image. While the symphony and its five movements are denominate with titles that were created by Beethoven himself, he believed that the overall pastoral idea of this work could be perceived by the audience without a description that would usua lly be necessary with a complete program piece. It is this idea that helped Beethoven create the title as it can be viewed on wee sketches, Pastoral Symphony or Memories of Country Life More the materialisation of Feeling than Tone-Painting. It would appear that Beethoven intended to create a ordinary mood that expresses the idea of nature rather than rely on specific images or one precise story to achieve this. Despite Beethovens general feelings towards program music and his conscious efforts to claim that the Sixth Symphony was more a collection of overall feelings rather than an attempt at creating one specific image, this piece is neither absolute or programmatic music but a blend of the two styles.The prototypical localise in this argument would be the fact that Beethoven prone titles to each(prenominal) of the five movements within this symphony that depict certain scenes associated with pastoral ideas. The headings for the movements are as follow Pleasant feelings whi ch are awakened in human being on arrival in the landed estate, blastoff by the leap out, Joyful fellowship of country folk, Thunder and Storm, and benefic feeling afterwards the beset joined with thanks to the deity. The mere fact that this symphony is the only one of his niner to contain subtitles attached to each movement that describe a scene of nature favors the public opinion of the symphony being more programmatic than absolute. However, if one were to look past the movement headings and take into consideration the content of the music, one would observe that the offset printing two movements contain very little defined imagery. From an analytical perspective of the form, the first half of the symphony is rather conventional and resembles the absolute approach to music.These movements sustenance true to the subheading for the symphony in regards to creating overall feelings rather than one precise painting or story. While there are compositional devices used to hel p convey the pastoral feeling within the first half of the symphony, it is not until the end of the second movement that Beethoven truly utilizes extra melodic associations to convey imagery. This andante movement entitled Scene by the brook ends with the flute, oboe, and clarinet engaged in a coda bandage imitating birdcalls. The composer himself labelled these three woodwind voices as a nightingale, a quail, and a cuckoo, respectively. These birdcalls have led to several debates, discussions, and even complete articles that attempt to break down the true meaning of their existence in the piece. No matter how they are interpreted, one fact remains still.The birdcalls act as segues from the symphonic first half to the more programmatic portion of the piece. The second half of the Sixth Symphony ventures away from conventional symphonic composing techniques found in the first two movements and includes more programmatic material. A strong indication of programmatic material resid es within the later half of the symphony, where Beethoven includes several pastoral elements to enhance the musical comedy imagery. The third movement consists of excited melodies in a compound-meter stylized scherzo representing country-dances. there are several points within this movement that have a slug in the bass that has been viewed as a depiction of bagpipes, an instrument that was a great deal associated with the representation of pastoral ideas.This jovial dance-like movement transitions into the fourth movement, which resembles a act. The draw is clearly an example of tone-painting with its explosive minor chords that represent thunder and lightning and the invariant patter of rain in the strings lines. Another significant trace added to the symphony that aids the pastoral image is the use of a ranz des vaches in the final movement. The ranz des vaches was an alpine thrust call that herdsmen used to summon cattle. Author, David Wyn Jones notes in his book that co mmon features of ranz des vaches melodies are triadic motion, continue 6/8 meterfrequent use of grace notes, all harmonized mainly by the tonic triad. While looking at the horn call that Beethoven uses within his symphony, one would notice that it meets all of the criteria that Jones listed.The imagery associated with the Pastoral Symphony depicts scenes from nature, which was a subject close to Beethovens heart. Through diary entries and letters, one can deduce Beethovens love for nature. The following is a letter to Austrian thespian and friend, Therese Malfatti in 1810 that depicts his feelings about the outdoors How fortunate you are to have been adequate to(p) to go to the country so early in the year not before the 8th shall I be able to enjoy this delight I look forward to it with childish anticipation. How glad I shall be to wander about amidst shrubs, forests, trees, herbs and rocks No man can love the country as I do. For it is forests, trees and rocks that provide men with the resonance they desire.Through this letter and several other firsthand records, one can clearly see Beethovens infatuation for the outdoors and the justifiable reason to compose a piece that commemorates this love. It makes sense that the first large-scale work that includes colossal amounts of imagery would reflect the thing that he admired most. Along with the bare(a) beauty of nature, there were other factors that influenced Beethoven while writing his Sixth Symphony. The inclusion of nature and rustic ideas within music was not comical to composers prior to Beethoven. Pastoral subjects could be found in several theatrical performance presentations, operas, and intermezzo from the sixteenth by dint of the eighteenth centuries. One notable work that inspired the development of the Pastoral Symphony was an oratorio written by Franz Joseph Haydn, his teacher and mentor early on in his composing career. Haydns oratorio, The Seasons, had an impact on Beethoven while he wrote his Sixth Symphony.Haydn incorporates arpeggiated horn calls in the aria Der muntre Hirt that begin a sequence of summer scenes that will eventually lead to the storm later in the oratorio. Similarly, Beethoven opens the fifth and final movement of his symphony with an arpeggiated melody in the French horns that subsequently signify the end of the storm that took tail end in the previous movement. Another example of musical course credit that Beethoven purposely incorporated is an oboe melody that has long been understood as a quotation from Bachs chorale strap an, o Schnes Morgenlicht, from the second part of the Christmas Oratorio It is worth mentioning that prior to Beethovens Pastoral Symphony, there had been other symphonic works to contain sections that resemble thunderstorms. Several commentaries on the Pastoral and its development discuss the eighteenth century German composer, Justin Heinrich Knecht and his piece entitled La Portrait musical de la nature.This work seems to contain standardized programmatic ideas as that of Beethovens symphony, including a thunderstorm that interrupts the overall peaceful feeling of nature that resumes after the storm. In addition to preceding compositions that influenced Beethovens writings, there has been the wind for the possible influence from the literary writings of Scottish poet James Thomson, in general that of his well kip downn meters collectively titled The Seasons. While there is no concrete evidence that Beethoven took dream from this rime, some scholars feel that the poem possibly had an underlying effect on the outcome of the Pastoral Symphony. The text edition of the poem discusses nature, progressing through the four seasons starting with spring and ending with winter.The poem was translated to German in 1745 and served as a basis for Haydns oratorio that shares the same name. As discussed earlier, Beethoven drew inspiration from Haydns oratorio, so it would seem that he was indirectly influenced from the poetry of James Thomson for this reason even if he had no connection to the actual literature itself. So far there have been factors that support both sides of the argument in onerous to define the Pastoral Symphony as either a work of absolute music, or one depicting tone painting. The mere fact that the piece contains an appropriate amount of material that justifies both categories, one should acquiesce that this work could be viewed as the perfect synthesis of the two sides of the symphonic spectrum.The next step in understanding the influence that the Pastoral Symphony had on future composers of both absolute and programmatic works would naturally be to look at the general reception of the premiere of this piece. The Sixth Symphony received its first public performance on December 22nd, 1808 on with Beethovens Fifth Symphony. Beethoven worked on these two symphonies simultaneously in the years leading up to this concert. At this time however, the symphoni es were labeled opposite of what they are viewed as today, which means that the Pastoral was written and performed as Beethovens fifth symphony, while the C-minor was viewed as his sixth. Over the course of time it would seem as though the Fifth Symphony has overpowered the Pastoral in the minds of audience members.While this whitethorn be true to some extent today, at the time, critics were singing praises to this wonderful portrayal of nature through melody and harmony. A review of the score in the musical journal of the time, Allgemeine musikalishce Zeitung, was typical in saying such things as this work of Beethoven, wonderful, original, and full of life, which can be placed without hesitation besides his other masterworks When canvass it to other compositions that focused on imagery of programmatic material, one critic claimed that none of the musical paintings known until now can withstand comparison Overall, the piece was welcomed positively and viewed as a representation fo r composers who desired to use programmatic features. whatsoever of the compositional styles that would soon develop through the Romantic period can trace influence from Beethovens Sixth Symphony. When discussing compositions that drew inspiration from the Pastoral Symphony, one should mention Hector Berliozs programmatic work, Symphonie Fantastique. As a composer, Berlioz was an advocate for music with more programmatic tendencies and was viewed as a radical composer during his time. At one point in his career, Berlioz wrote critical reviews of Beethovens nine symphonies. When discussing the Sixth, he used descriptions such as, delightful phrases that greet you, like the fresh morning breeze as well as swarms of chattering birds in flight With such joyous descriptions that Berlioz gave, it comes as no surprise that he would find inspiration from this piece for his own writing. Author, Owen Jander views the second movement in Beethovens symphony entitled Scene by the lose as an ob vious point of departure for the Scene in the Meadows in Berliozs Symphonie Fantastique.As mentioned earlier, Beethovens second movement has been the topic of several discussions concerning the Sixth Symphony, specifically, the imitation of birdcalls that can be found at the close of the movement. Jander believes the calls to symbolize Beethovens acceptance of his growing hearing loss and his own fate. If one is to agree with this interpretation, then the connection to Berliozs Symphonie Fantastique becomes one that is easy to accept. Berliozs third movement, entitled Scene in the Meadows opens with the English horn and the oboe representing two shepherds that are calling to one another. At the end of the movement, one of the shepherds return once more but is not joined by the other, but is instead replaced by the distant order of thunder heard in the timpani. Those familiar with the piece and its program know that the concluding two movements that follow represent a personal en docarp and damnation for the protagonist. The connection between both that of Beethovens and Berliozs works would be the idea that both composers are aware of their own fate and accept it through the illustration of music.Another composer that was potentially influenced by the Pastoral Symphony was that of the German opera composer, Richard Wagner. As just discussed, it would seem that the second movement of Beethovens work is to represent the identification of ones chance through nature. In Wagners opera, Siegfried, there are scenes within the second act that take place in the forest. In which, the main character, Siegfried learns of his destiny from the big businessman to understand a forest bird. This situation is the exact opposite from that of Beethovens, where the composer realizes his destiny through the discovery that he can no longer hear. Two compositions that were marooned by nearly one hundred years, both contain similar imagery that represents a persons realization and acceptance of their destiny through nature. The chances of this being a coincidence seem rather unlikely. To say that that Beethovens Pastoral inspired Wagners use of nature within this opera would be a fair conclusion.When discussing Beethoven, the Sixth Symphony may not be a piece that comes to mind set away one might rather recall themes from other symphonies by him. However, the importance of this piece in the evolution of the symphony as a genre is too important to go overlooked. The mere fact that out of the nine symphonies that Beethoven wrote, the Sixth was the only one to receive a programmatic title and descriptive scenes attached to the movements is an indication at the significance of this work. It may not have directly influenced several composers in the years that followed as far as content is concerned, but Beethovens ability to combine aspects of program music with the absoluteness of a symphony undecided the door to possibilities for future composers on both s ides of the spectrum.