Beethoven the Revolutionary

I have to admit my thoughts on Beethoven are fairly routine, not going much deeper than he was great.  But in fact he was probably more influential than Mozart in terms of shaping the classical music tradition.  I learned only a year ago that he was perhaps the prime mover in coming up with the orchestral concertos in their current form.  Previously, you had the soloist state a theme and then the orchestra would follow and there was relatively little interaction between the two.  This started to change around his Piano Concerto #4 and really took off in Piano Concerto #5 where the soloist and orchestra may play different themes and certainly play quite different melodies at the same time.  I received these pearls of wisdom at a pre-concert talk last season (when I managed to make the entire Beethoven Piano Concerto cycle).  In fact, over the past 3 years, I've seen his piano concerto #5 three times.  I had yet another opportunity this November, but really something had to give.  I will see be seeing piano concertos #3 and #4 paired with two 2 Nielsen symphonies (#2 and #4), so that should be fun.

The fall arts season has started with a vengeance.  This week is Culture Weekend with a number of free museums open to the public.  (Sadly I'm pretty wiped out from work so I may just rest tomorrow, but I plan on taking the kids or at least my son to the Gardiner on Sunday.)  The following weekend is Nuit Blanche, though I may be so overbooked with theatre, that I skip it.  And then we'll be in Chicago for a weekend! So far I've only gotten my tickets to the TSO, but I'll probably be booking a few other things very quickly before the sell out (the Yo-Yo Ma concert at TSO in late May is definitely going to be one hot ticket).  (Actually, I did get tickets to Stevie Wonder for late November, and they weren't actually that hard to come by.)

So far, in terms of chestnuts, it is looking like 2 Beethoven symphonies (#7 and #9), 2 Beethoven piano concertos, Dvorak's 8th Symphony (getting to the 9th may just be too difficult this year), Tchaikovsky's 5th symphony and probably Vivaldi's Four Seasons.  Slightly less frequently performed, there is Brahms' Double Concerto and Elgar's Enigma Variations, which I heard done quite well last year at the VSO.  It doesn't look like any Prokofiev this year (last season the VSO did a rousing version of Prokofiev's Symphony 5).  And maybe just a single Shostakovich symphony, so maybe the interest in him is fading just a bit from a peak a couple of years ago.  Now I do have the opportunity to see Shostakovich's piano quintet, which I'd like to see but just comes in the middle of a huge number of concerts, so a little restraint is in order.  (I'm pretty sure I saw the Vogler Quartet do this in Vancouver last season -- I mean if I can work it in, I'll see.)  One that is sort of tempting, but a bit overpriced is Tafelmusik doing Beethoven's Symphony 5 (and Beethoven's Mass in C Major).  While I'm sure they will do a fantastic job, it just seems a bit of a cash cow, since it isn't really the music that Tafelmusik really specializes in.  Still, if I want to hear Beethoven's 5th this season, I think it is my only chance (unless the Casa Loma orchestra pops up again).  I do have a more traditional Tafelmusik event on my calendar for April, and that should be fun.

As I was trying to look up some of this information, I found out that the Pacifica Quartet is going to be putting on an awesome concert in Vancouver in mid Jan (2015) with Dvorak's Piano Quintet and Shostakovich's 9th String Quartet, and I would strongly encourage anyone vaguely interested to go.  However, I can't even get jealous -- or regret for a minute that I am here -- as I will probably be in Washington D.C. on that date anyway.  I've also seen Pacifica do both pieces: the Shostakovich as part of their amazing Shostakovich cycle and then the Dvorak all the way back in 2000, just before they really made it big.  (It would be great if Pacifica makes a tour through Toronto, though it won't happen this season.)  I've only seen Dvorak's 8th Symphony 2 or 3 times (last month at Casa Loma and in 2011 the VSO paired it with Shostkovich's Cello Concerto 2!) but the 9th Symphony at least 5 times, including the VSO in 2013, in Prague and 3 times with the CSO!).  So while I do hope to see it again fairly soon, I probably don't have to knock myself out this season.

Ok, so to get back to tonight, I was at the TSO to see Beethoven's 9th Symphony.  I'm pretty sure I've only seen it one time previously, as I've always been scared off by the length.  At any rate, the conductor, Peter Oundjian, gave a few pointers on things to watch for, particularly how the cellos and basses are almost in a recitative with the rest of the orchestra at the start of the 4th movement.  It turns out that Beethoven was essentially the first composer to fuse voices in symphonic form, something later picked up Mahler.  So quite the musical revolutionary.

My seat was kind of strange, basically hanging over the side of the stage and overlooking the symphony, though the sound was still decent and not too unbalanced.  Fortunately, the other seats in my subscription are a bit further back and slightly more centered.  I was right on top of the cellos (I don't know if they will always have them reversed or if this was just for Beethoven) and could really see what Oundjian meant about the start of the 4th.  There was one major advantage in being that far up and that was how close I was to the Mendelssohn Choir, which meant being surrounded by voices throughout the 4th movement.  It's really hard to describe how overwhelming it was (but in a good way).  I doubt I will ever feel the symphony that viscerally again.  It was definitely an experience.  And with that, I think it is finally time for bed.  It has been a super-long week.