This Week in Classical Music: December 16, 2024. Beethoven and more. Today is the birthday of Ludwig van Beethoven, and it’s a relief to celebrate it this year: gone, or mostly gone is the insanity of 2020 when the gender and the color of a composer became the determinant of his (and especially her) value.In 2020 Beethoven became one of the white, male and mostly dead bunch, and for that, wasn’t considered to be worth much.We still remember the infamous “musicology” article titled “Beethoven was an above-average composer: let’s leave it that.”Fortunately, in 2020 Beethoven is back to being one of the greatest, occupying an enormous space in the musical culture of Europe and the world. One of his most profound compositions was the piano sonata no. 29, op. 106 nicknamed “Hammerklavier,” one of the greatest piano sonatas ever written.It was composed from the fall of 1817 through the first half of 1818, after a period when Beethoven’s output was unusually slim.Hammerklavier is unusually long, running about 40 to 45 minutes (the slow third movement alone takes from 15 to 25 minutes, depending on the performer – about 20 minutes in the version we’re about to hear), and was by far the longest piano piece written up to that time.Despite its length, it is intense from the beginning to the end, full of amazing musical ideas, and is never dull.As this sonata is one of the most important pieces in the piano repertoire, practically all great (and many not-so-great) pianists tackled it during their careers.Thus, we are left with many remarkable performances of which it’s impossible to select the “best” one (or even ten).Here is the great Soviet pianist Emil Gilels, in a 1983 recording (his contemporary and competitor Sviatoslav Richter’s interpretation is also excellent).And let’s make one thing clear: Florence Price, for all her obvious gifts, didn’t come even remotely close to creating something as profound and significant, all accolades from the woke musicologists and media aside.
We’ve been recently reminded by one of the listeners that we’ve never written about Rodion Shchedrin. What can we say?We admit to being prejudiced, and that’s the reason why we’ve never posted an entry about Shchedrin.His rendition of Bizet’s Carmen, which he created for his wife, the ballerina assoluta Maya Plisetskaya, is very good, though we still think that his main life achievement was to be married to her for 57 years (Plisetskaya was seven years his older). Shchedrin was born on this day 91 years ago in Moscow.He studied the piano and composition at the Moscow Conservatory.In 1973 he succeeded Shostakovich as the chairman of the Composers’ Union of the Russian Federation.He composed in many genres, from the opera (he wrote seven of them) to ballet music, symphonies, concertos for orchestra and individual instruments, vocal music and piano works.Much of it has been recorded and you can hear it on YouTube and streaming services.
Rosalyn Tureck, a great interpreter of the music of Back, was born 110 years ago, on December 14th of 1914 in Chicago.Ida Haendel, the wonderful violinist, was born on December 15th of 1928 in Chelm, Poland.She won the Warsaw Conservatory gold medal and the first Huberman Prize for playing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto at the age of five (yes, it’s not a typo; at nine she played the same concerto in London on her tour of the country).And Fritz Reiner, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century, was born in Budapest on December 19th of 1888.He, and later another Hungarian Jewish conductor, Georg Solti, made the Chicago Symphony into one of the best orchestras in the world, something the orchestra board seems intent on dismantling.
Beethoven, 2024
This Week in Classical Music: December 16, 2024. Beethoven and more. Today is the birthday of Ludwig van Beethoven, and it’s a relief to celebrate it this year: gone, or mostly gone
is the insanity of 2020 when the gender and the color of a composer became the determinant of his (and especially her) value. In 2020 Beethoven became one of the white, male and mostly dead bunch, and for that, wasn’t considered to be worth much. We still remember the infamous “musicology” article titled “Beethoven was an above-average composer: let’s leave it that.” Fortunately, in 2020 Beethoven is back to being one of the greatest, occupying an enormous space in the musical culture of Europe and the world. One of his most profound compositions was the piano sonata no. 29, op. 106 nicknamed “Hammerklavier,” one of the greatest piano sonatas ever written. It was composed from the fall of 1817 through the first half of 1818, after a period when Beethoven’s output was unusually slim. Hammerklavier is unusually long, running about 40 to 45 minutes (the slow third movement alone takes from 15 to 25 minutes, depending on the performer – about 20 minutes in the version we’re about to hear), and was by far the longest piano piece written up to that time. Despite its length, it is intense from the beginning to the end, full of amazing musical ideas, and is never dull. As this sonata is one of the most important pieces in the piano repertoire, practically all great (and many not-so-great) pianists tackled it during their careers. Thus, we are left with many remarkable performances of which it’s impossible to select the “best” one (or even ten). Here is the great Soviet pianist Emil Gilels, in a 1983 recording (his contemporary and competitor Sviatoslav Richter’s interpretation is also excellent). And let’s make one thing clear: Florence Price, for all her obvious gifts, didn’t come even remotely close to creating something as profound and significant, all accolades from the woke musicologists and media aside.
We’ve been recently reminded by one of the listeners that we’ve never written about Rodion Shchedrin. What can we say? We admit to being prejudiced, and that’s the reason why we’ve never posted an entry about Shchedrin. His rendition of Bizet’s Carmen, which he created for his wife, the ballerina assoluta Maya Plisetskaya, is very good, though we still think that his main life achievement was to be married to her for 57 years (Plisetskaya was seven years his older). Shchedrin was born on this day 91 years ago in Moscow. He studied the piano and composition at the Moscow Conservatory. In 1973 he succeeded Shostakovich as the chairman of the Composers’ Union of the Russian Federation. He composed in many genres, from the opera (he wrote seven of them) to ballet music, symphonies, concertos for orchestra and individual instruments, vocal music and piano works. Much of it has been recorded and you can hear it on YouTube and streaming services.
Rosalyn Tureck, a great interpreter of the music of Back, was born 110 years ago, on December 14th of 1914 in Chicago. Ida Haendel, the wonderful violinist, was born on December 15th of 1928 in Chelm, Poland. She won the Warsaw Conservatory gold medal and the first Huberman Prize for playing Beethoven’s Violin Concerto at the age of five (yes, it’s not a typo; at nine she played the same concerto in London on her tour of the country). And Fritz Reiner, one of the greatest conductors of the 20th century, was born in Budapest on December 19th of 1888. He, and later another Hungarian Jewish conductor, Georg Solti, made the Chicago Symphony into one of the best orchestras in the world, something the orchestra board seems intent on dismantling.