Hmmm…after two listens, I’m aware of several allusions to the start of the 9th Symphony’s 1st movement, and what sound like a couple to the first subject of the corresponding movement in the 5th; perhaps there are more to be uncovered during further listens…
…but, aw heck! I wasn’t going to ask, but find myself unable to resist a second opportunity: could you summarise in one sentence your chief objection(s) to Beethoven 9 itself? (I’m too ambivalent myself about those other two pet hates of yours, Carmina and Gorecki 3, to mind what you have to say about them.)
It’s impossible to know, of course, but i really do wonder whether you’d have heard (/projected) those ‘allusions’ if Lindberg hadn’t made his claims beforehand about a Beethovenian connection? i’m somewhat tired of composers doing this—the Proms in particular seems to compel many new commissions in this direction: “write a new piece related to x”, which begs the question of whether this is how they see new music as being ‘relevant’—and often find myself questioning the veracity of these purported connections/allusions. So i guess i’m saying if you hear something Beethovenian in there, good for you, but i’m sceptical; as someone who grew up steeped in LvB’s symphonies (my father was a Beethoven nut), i thought i’d detect at least something of Beethoven in there somewhere, but no: to my ear, Lindberg has either made the connection(s) so tenuous it may as well be non-existent or else it’s all, as i suggested, just a red herring.
Beethoven’s Ninth: i can sum up my chief objections in just two words, both of which i use implying their various meanings: “unbalanced” and “hysterical”.
True, suggestion (auto- or otherwise) may play a part; this is, after all, the same listener who once convinced himself he could hear an allusion to Perotin’s Viderunt Omnes about two minutes into Knussen 3…
Yup, I can see how one might apply those two adjectives to the Beethoven; the difference is (perhaps it’s the Elgar-lover in me? ;-)) that I’d consider said traits to be a good thing! After all, there’s unbalanced and hysterical and then there’s a certain Frenchman’s Op.14, completed just six years later (which, incidentally, I love a fair bit more than I do the Choral)…
Just listened to the Ninth again (Barenboim’s performance from his complete Beethoven Proms series in 2012): UGH.
thune
8 years ago
Lindberg showing a popular side seems to be causing some upset. But I like this one. It reads as a pan-homage love-letter to the Beethovenian/Romantic music tradition, which as never gone away. ‘Two episodes’ seems perfectly drawn for a festival/pickup/pops orchestra playing for a casual audience on a lovely summer evening.
I feel like this performance/interpretation misses dozens of opportunities in the first half to shape the drama and play above the time changes. The through-line gets lost more than once. The second half runs on rails and works well.
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Hmmm…after two listens, I’m aware of several allusions to the start of the 9th Symphony’s 1st movement, and what sound like a couple to the first subject of the corresponding movement in the 5th; perhaps there are more to be uncovered during further listens…
…but, aw heck! I wasn’t going to ask, but find myself unable to resist a second opportunity: could you summarise in one sentence your chief objection(s) to Beethoven 9 itself? (I’m too ambivalent myself about those other two pet hates of yours, Carmina and Gorecki 3, to mind what you have to say about them.)
It’s impossible to know, of course, but i really do wonder whether you’d have heard (/projected) those ‘allusions’ if Lindberg hadn’t made his claims beforehand about a Beethovenian connection? i’m somewhat tired of composers doing this—the Proms in particular seems to compel many new commissions in this direction: “write a new piece related to x”, which begs the question of whether this is how they see new music as being ‘relevant’—and often find myself questioning the veracity of these purported connections/allusions. So i guess i’m saying if you hear something Beethovenian in there, good for you, but i’m sceptical; as someone who grew up steeped in LvB’s symphonies (my father was a Beethoven nut), i thought i’d detect at least something of Beethoven in there somewhere, but no: to my ear, Lindberg has either made the connection(s) so tenuous it may as well be non-existent or else it’s all, as i suggested, just a red herring.
Beethoven’s Ninth: i can sum up my chief objections in just two words, both of which i use implying their various meanings: “unbalanced” and “hysterical”.
True, suggestion (auto- or otherwise) may play a part; this is, after all, the same listener who once convinced himself he could hear an allusion to Perotin’s Viderunt Omnes about two minutes into Knussen 3…
Yup, I can see how one might apply those two adjectives to the Beethoven; the difference is (perhaps it’s the Elgar-lover in me? ;-)) that I’d consider said traits to be a good thing! After all, there’s unbalanced and hysterical and then there’s a certain Frenchman’s Op.14, completed just six years later (which, incidentally, I love a fair bit more than I do the Choral)…
Just listened to the Ninth again (Barenboim’s performance from his complete Beethoven Proms series in 2012): UGH.
Lindberg showing a popular side seems to be causing some upset. But I like this one. It reads as a pan-homage love-letter to the Beethovenian/Romantic music tradition, which as never gone away. ‘Two episodes’ seems perfectly drawn for a festival/pickup/pops orchestra playing for a casual audience on a lovely summer evening.
I feel like this performance/interpretation misses dozens of opportunities in the first half to shape the drama and play above the time changes. The through-line gets lost more than once. The second half runs on rails and works well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SluRb3ACdFE
The promo video for Two Episodes reveals a slight bit more about the 9th ‘quotes’.