Beethoven: Symphony No. 7
LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
Born: December 1770 | Bonn, Germany
Died: March 26, 1827 | Vienna, Austria
SYMPHONY NO. 7 IN A MAJOR, OPUS 92
Composed: 1811-1812
Performance Time: 37 minutes
It is difficult to overstate the influence of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony on the world of Western art music. Often composing works that eschewed the canonical rules of the Classical era, Beethoven’s use of harmony, structure, and development for his Seventh Symphony is unlike that of his previous symphonies, or in fact any prior symphony. Indeed, Beethoven nearly single handedly changed the familiar plot to which we the audience were accustomed in music, creating a storyline with more development, suspense, conflict, and depth. Gone were the days of the stringent and often predictable sonata-allegro form given to us by our musical fathers Haydn and Mozart. Beethoven’s new ideas of music set the stage for future artists such as Brahms, Wagner, Dvorak, Elgar, and Tchaikovsky to explore a new universe of musical sound. It is not entirely hyperbolic to assert that Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony was a necessary ingredient to allow this shift in musical philosophy.
We recognize that Beethoven’s novel conception did not originate in a vacuum. His entire world experience unfolds against the backdrop of the Age of Enlightenment, one of the first truly international efforts of the human mind to initiate reflection on the reality of the world in which we reside. The Enlightenment fostered the creative space for humans to think critically about a number of essential questions: our understanding of reason, of the self, and of the evidence of the senses as primary sources of knowledge. The Enlightenment led to one of the first serious recorded explorations of ideals such as liberty, progress, tolerance, fraternity, constitutional government, and separation of church and state. It encouraged us to not just accept the way the world works as is, but to challenge our whole perception of who we are, what we do, and why things are the way they are. For Beethoven, the musical ideas running around in his brain were simply too complex to be articulated by the traditional structure of the Classical symphony. So he changed the rules. Consequently, he produced works that evolve and mature in unique ways – works that differed substantially from what an early 19th century European ear was accustomed to hearing.
We are all familiar with the primal fear and unease associated in the human consciousness with change, and music is not exempt. This work was so different from traditional symphonic structure that it upset many musicians of the time, leading some to question Beethoven’s mental stability. In fact, Friedrich Wieck, Robert Schumann’s father-in-law, wondered whether Beethoven had composed it while drunk. Composer Carl Maria von Weber suggested that Beethoven was “ripe for the madhouse.” Critics were especially harsh. The music journal The Harmonicon grumbled that “the author has indulged a great deal of disagreeable eccentricity,” the Quarterly Musical Magazine bemoaned, “We shall certainly never become reconciled to either the first or last movements of this, both being full of asperities and almost unbearably whimsical,” and Musical World grumbled that the symphony was, “confused and unintelligible.” I’ve always found it curious that those who can’t understand a new idea regularly feel threatened or uncomfortable, often accusing the idea’s author(s) of flawed thought or understanding, or, worse yet, mental instability. Yet here we are, two centuries later, witnessing a live performance of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony– and not the work of some second-rate copycat jotting down musical phrases in a boilerplate format.
The opening movement of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony commences with a lengthy introduction of chords and scales, setting the stage for our musical journey for the next 40 minutes. Devoid of a clearly articulated melody that, conventionally, would be used as a launching point for the exposition and development of the work, the introduction fluctuates between several keys, stirring with an air of anticipation of almost reckless simplicity. Ever so gradually, with a delicious feeling of suspense, Beethoven draws the “official” exposition of the work from the last flickers of the introduction. We are driven forward with a fierce energy and speed dominated by a single propulsive rhythm. The movement— as is so often the case in the opening movement of a Beethoven symphony— contains a section (the coda) that is virtually another development. Beethoven heaves the music to a tremendous climax by holding a crescendo across a tenfold repetition of an obsessive, harmonically off-balance bass that will only resolve during the finale of the work. Beethoven, like any great storyteller, asks us to follow him down a path that has yet to be explored.
Devoid of a slow movement, the second movement of the symphony serves a few functions. Only slower in comparison to those that precede and follow it, the second movement has a pace that grants us a momentary reprieve from the intensity and energy of the work as a whole. Developing in a wickedly clever way so as to set up a major key change in the following movement, beyond the musical horizon of what we anticipate, Beethoven subtly plants unstable chords in the woodwinds at the beginning and end of the movement. The chord is mostly what we would expect but with an intentionally “wrong” note. This alteration sets up a series of harmonic progressions in the lower strings that appear to conclude the movement in the wrong key. In fact, it prepares us by anticipation for the explosive and slightly eccentric dance-like rhythms of the third movement. If you’re paying attention to the key, you don’t need a course in harmony to recognize that Beethoven has taken us through the looking glass, turning our expectations on their head. An audience favorite, concertgoers at the premiere demanded this movement to be repeated in the performance.
The third movement, the scherzo, consists of two sections: the opening and the trio. Beethoven requests the tempo of the opening as presto (very, very fast) and the trio as “very much less fast.” The ambiguity of the composer’s instructions was certainly intentional. Although sharply defined and superbly controlled, the entire movement mocks the form of the scherzo, which is itself a form of music designed to be a joke (the Italian word scherzo means “joke”). Customarily, the opening section of a scherzo returns after the trio, and that’s it; the movement concludes. For Beethoven, we get a second helping of the trio and the opening section yet again. Unwilling to fade, the trio attempts to make a third appearance, but is summarily swept away as the orchestra closes out the movement.
The work’s finale unleashes musical energy to an extreme level, unimagined before Beethoven’s day and rarely reached since. A truly wild and swirling motion ties together the whole work, creating one central musical idea tightly controlled with supreme rhythmic accuracy. New themes are introduced and propel the music forward, but the movement ends with a recall of the opening theme at the start of the symphony. Our entire symphonic experience concludes with a content feeling of musical satisfaction and resolution that Beethoven serves all too well. My deepest sympathy if you aren’t stirred or moved by the symphony; I hope you feel well again soon.
The Seventh Symphony premiered in Vienna in 1813 with Beethoven as conductor. The concert, a highly political affair, was a charity event for wounded and fallen Bavarian soldiers who had suffered at the hands of Napoleon’s army. Recall that, in 1813, most of Europe feared Napoleon Bonaparte, considering him a mad dog attempting to conquer the world, rather than a revered military or political figure. As part of the concert, Beethoven premiered his work Wellington’s Victory, Op. 91, an ostentatious orchestral piece celebrating the defeat of Napoleon’s army in Spain by the Duke of Wellington and his army of English, Spanish, and Portuguese soldiers. To recap: Beethoven conducts original works for a charity concert in Austria, for German soldiers, commemorating a British military victory comprised of English, Spanish, and Portuguese troops defeating a French army in Spain. Whoever said 19th century European geopolitics was dull?
Unlike the Seventh Symphony, Wellington’s Victory does not possess the intellectual weight or musical craft of a great work. It is a nationalistic piece of self-congratulation– and perhaps a little self-promotion from the composer. Some musicologists rate Wellington’s Victory as possibly the worst orchestral work composed by Beethoven. I’m inclined to agree. Responding to the usual barrage of criticism from the established musical authorities of his day, Beethoven reminded the world that for most of us, “What I scheiße is better than anything you could ever think up!” Touché, maestro Beethoven. Touché.
Lakeview Orchestra will perform Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 on Sunday, October 24, 2021 at the Athenaeum Theatre in Chicago, IL.