Some, says he, Beethoven’s particular friends, assert that it is

just this symphony which is his masterpiece, that this is the true

style for high-class music, and that if it does not please now,

it is because the public is not cultured enough, artistically, to

grasp all these lofty beauties; after a few thousand years have

passed it will not fail of its effect. Another faction denies

that the work has any artistic value and professes to see in it

an untamed striving for singularity which had failed, however, to

achieve in any of its parts beauty or true sublimity and power. By

means of strange modulations and violent transitions, by combining

the most heterogeneous elements, as for instance when a pastoral

in the largest style is ripped up by the basses, by three horns,

etc., a certain undesirable originality may be achieved without

much trouble; but genius proclaims itself not in the unusual and

the fantastic, but in the beautiful and the sublime. Beethoven

himself proved the correctness of this axiom in his earlier works.

The third party, a very small one, stands midway between the

others--it admits that the symphony contains many beauties, but

concedes that the connection is often disrupted entirely, and that

the inordinate length of this longest, and perhaps most difficult

of all symphonies, wearies even the cognoscenti, and is unendurable

to the mere music-lover; it wishes that H. v. B. would employ his

acknowledgedly great talents in giving us works like his symphonies

in C and D, his ingratiating Septet in E-flat, the intellectual

Quintet in D (C major?) and others of his early compositions which

have placed B. forever in the ranks of the foremost instrumental

composers. It fears, however, that if Beethoven continues on his

present path both he and the public will be the sufferers.... The

public and Herr van Beethoven, who conducted, were not satisfied

with each other on this evening; the public thought the symphony

too heavy, too long, and Beethoven himself too discourteous,

because he did not nod his head in recognition of the applause

which came from a portion of the audience.

This clear, compendious and valuable statement of the conflicting

opinions of the first auditors of the “Eroica” renders farther

citations superfluous; but a story--characteristic enough to be

true--may be added: that Beethoven, in reply to the complaints of too

great length, said, in substance: “If ~I~ write a symphony an hour

long it will be found short enough!” He refused positively to make any

change in the work, but deferred to public opinion so far, as, upon

its publication, to affix to the title of the Symphony a note to the

effect, that on account of its great length it should be played near

the beginning of a concert, before the audience was become weary.

Beethoven, though choleric and violent in his anger, was placable.

The theft of the Quintet in C dedicated to Count Fries, as related by

Ries, and Beethoven’s warning against the pirated edition, will be

remembered. Nottebohm has sufficiently established the fact that the

engraved plates were not destroyed, as supposed by Ries, but afterwards

again used with the composer’s consent and even his corrections. A

short letter to the offending publisher (June 1) shows that his wrath

was already appeased, and seems to indicate a purpose to grant him the

copyright of a new quintet--a purpose which, under the pressure of his

opera, and the subsequent invasion of the French, remained unexecuted.

Ignatz Pleyel, born in 1757, the twenty-fourth child of a schoolmaster

at Ruppersthal, a village a few miles from Vienna, a favorite pupil

of Haydn and just now the most widely known and popular living

instrumental composer except his master, came from Paris this season to

revisit, after many years’ absence, the scenes of his youth. He brought

with him his last new quartets, “which,” writes Czerny,

were performed before a large and aristocratic society at the house

of Prince Lobkowitz. At the close, Beethoven, who was also present,

was requested to play something. As usual he let himself be begged

for an infinitely long time and at last almost dragged by two

ladies to the pianoforte. In an ill humor he grabs a second violin

part of the Pleyel quartet from a music desk, throws it on the rack

of the pianoforte and begins to improvise. He had never been heard

to improvise more brilliantly, with more originality and splendor

than on this evening! but through the entire improvisation there

ran through the middle voices like a thread or ~cantus firmus~ the

notes, in themselves utterly insignificant, which he found on the

accidentally opened page of the quartet, upon which he built up the

most daring melodies and harmonies in the most brilliant concerto

style. Old Pleyel could show his amazement only by kissing his

hands. After such improvisations Beethoven was wont to break out

into a ringing peal of amused laughter.

Beethoven’s abandonment (if there really was one) of the rooms in the

theatre in the spring of 1804, and his subsequent relinquishment of the

apartments in “das Rothe Haus” to share those of Breuning, compelled

his brother Kaspar to seek a lodging of his own, which he found for the

present on the Hohen Markt. But the new contract, with Baron Braun,

gave the composer again a right to the apartments in the theatre

building, which he improved, at the same time retaining the dwelling in

the Pasqualati house. The city directory for 1805 gives his address

at the theatre, and there he received visitors; at the Pasqualati

house he was accustomed to seclude himself for work, forbidding his

servant to admit any person whatever. In the summer he retired to

Hetzendorf, and wrought out his opera, sitting in the same crotched

oak in the Schönbrunn Garden where, four years before, he had composed

the “Christus am Ölberg.” Thus again he had three lodgings at the same

time, as in the preceding summer; with this difference, that now one

was no expense to him. The thousand times repeated story of Ries, that

in 1804 he had ~four~ dwellings at once, is a mistake.

[Sidenote: THE SKETCHES FOR “FIDELIO”]

Before his migration to Hetzendorf--say about the middle of

June--Beethoven had completely sketched the music of his opera. This

is made sufficiently certain by one of those whimsical remarks that he

was in the habit of making on the blank spaces of whatever manuscript

he happened to have before him. In this case he writes: “June 2d Finale

always simpler. All pianoforte music also. God knows why my pianoforte

music always makes the worst impression, especially when it is badly

played.” This is in the midst of sketches to the final chorus of the

opera, and is written upon the upper outer corner of page 291 of the

“Leonore” sketchbook which became the property of Mr. Paul Mendelssohn,

of Berlin. The principal value of this manuscript lies of course in

the insight which it gives the musician into the master’s methods of

composition;[30] but for the biographer the volume is by no means

without its value. Its striking confirmation of the previously formed

opinion, that two current notions in relation to the composition of

the opera are erroneous, well repays the toil of studying it through.

First: A misinterpreted sentence in Jahn’s article on “Leonore,

oder Fidelio,” has originated and given currency to the idea that

Beethoven’s “daring enthusiasm for the welfare of men and their rights”

led him to begin his sketches for the opera with the “second finale,

with its hymn-like character.” But the sketchbook, if it proves

anything, proves this: that Beethoven began at the beginning and took

up all the principal numbers in order, as they stood in Sonnleithner’s

text; that the final choruses were the last to be sketched; and

that this sketchbook happens to begin in the midst of the chorus of

prisoners (originally the second finale) because the previous studies

are wanting.

This volume contains the first sketches of Nos. 11, 18, 15a, 17a and

18a (appendix) of Jahn’s edition; Nos. 1 and 5 occur, but not in the

original studies; Nos. 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 are either entirely

wanting or only come up in mere fragmentary afterthoughts, as No. 9,

on page 51, where Beethoven has written at the top of the page: “in

the duet between P. and R.” and just below: “dann schleich ich,” with

a hint (4 bars of music unisono) for the accompaniment. Afterthoughts

for the duet “Um in die Ehe”--~Fidelio~ and ~Marcelline~--occur also

on pages 23, 344, and possibly one or two others, but not more.

The studies for ~Fidelio’s~ recitative “Ach brich noch nicht” and

aria “Komm Hoffnung” (No. 11), which are found near the end of the

volume, seem to form a marked exception to the rule; but if these are

really the first sketches, their appearance after the final scenes is

explained by two remarks in Beethoven’s hand on page 344: “Duetto with

Müller (~Marcelline~) and ~Fidelio~ aside,” and “Aria for ~Fidelio~,

another text which agrees with her.” These notes clearly indicate a

change of plan in connection with the duet, and that the beautiful air,

“Komm Hoffnung,” did not stand in Sonnleithner’s original text.

[Sidenote: PATIENT LABOR ON THE OPERA]

The other current error thoroughly exploded by the sketchbook is

this, namely, that the noblest passages in the opera are a sort of

spontaneous outpouring in music of feelings and sentiments awakened,

or rendered intense and vivid, by the unfortunate love-affairs of the

composer. Now, there is nothing from the first page to the last of this

manuscript that conveys the impression of any such spontaneity. Every

number, as it now stands complete in the score, was the tardy result of

persevering labor--of the most painstaking study.

Where Jahn says: “I have not had an opportunity to study many of

Beethoven’s sketchbooks, but I have found no instance in which one was

not compelled to recognize that the material chosen was not the best,

or to deplore that the material which he rejected had not been used,”

he might have added, with truth, that some of the first ideas noted to

passages, now among the gems of the opera, are commonplace and trivial

to such a degree, that one can hardly attribute them to Beethoven. Yet,

there they are in his own hand. Jahn’s compendious general description

of the contents of this manuscript cannot be improved, except in a

single passage, in which, probably trusting his memory a little too

much, he conveys the mistaken (as we think) impression, that the aria

of ~Marcelline~ is here first sketched.

The sketches [says he] are, naturally enough, of very different

kinds; in part they are widely varying efforts to give musical

expression to the same text, and many numbers, like the airs

of ~Marcelline~ and ~Pizarro~, the grave duet, a few striking

passages, appear for the first time with motivi wholly different

from those now to be found in the opera.... At other times, whole

pieces are written down in a breath essentially as they have

remained.

This is rather too strongly expressed, unless Jahn had in mind the

arias of ~Rocco~ and ~Marcelline~.

By the side of such passages are examples of indefatigable detail

work, which cannot find a conclusion, of turning not only single

motivi and melodies but the tiniest elements of them this way and

that, and out of all conceivable variations to draw out the form

that is best. One is amazed at this everlasting experimentation

and cannot conceive how it will be possible to create an organic

whole out of such musical scraps. But if one compares the completed

art-work with the chaos of sketches one is overwhelmed with wonder

at the creative mind which surveyed its task so clearly, grasped

the foundation and the outlines of the execution so firmly and

surely that with all the sketches and attempts in details the

whole grows naturally from its roots and develops. And though

the sketches frequently create the impression of uncertainty

and groping, admiration comes again for the marvelously keen

self-criticism, which, after everything has been tested with

sovereign certainty, retains the best.[31]

In the notices of the “Leonore” sketchbook, made for use in this

work, are copied ~eighteen~ different beginnings to ~Florestan’s~

air, “In des Lebens Frühlingstagen,” and ten to the chorus, “Wer ein

holdes Weib”; others being omitted, because illegible or little more

than repetitions. The studies for that wondrous outburst of joy, “O

namenlose Freude,” are numerous; but the first bars of the duet are the

same in all of them, having been taken by Beethoven from an “old opera.”

It certainly seems a little like cold-blooded cruelty thus ruthlessly

to demolish the structure of romance which has been rising for thirty

years on the sandy foundation laid by Schindler in his story of the

Countess Guicciardi, and of which, through some fancied connection, the

opera “Leonore” has become an imposing part. But facts are stubborn

things, and here they are irreconcilable with the romance.

Inborn genius for musical composition, untiring industry, and the

ambition to rival Cherubini in his own field, sufficiently explain the

extraordinary merits of this work of Beethoven; want of practice and

experience in operatic writing, its defects.

Beethoven’s seclusion at Hetzendorf from June to September (probably)

and his labor of reducing the chaos of the sketchbook into the

order and beauty of the score of “Leonore”--on which, as he told

Schindler, he wrought in the bright summer days, sitting in the

shades of Schönbrunn--are unbroken for us except by his first meeting

with Cherubini. Some time in July--for that master arrived in Vienna

after the 5th of that month, and Vogler was in Salzburg before the

28th--“Cherubini, Beethoven and Vogler were gathered together at

Sonnleithner’s; everybody played, Vogler first, and without ceasing,

so that the company meanwhile sat down to table. Beethoven was full

of attention and respect toward Cherubini.” Such is Jahn’s note of a

communication to him by Grillparzer; and Czerny told him: “B. did not

give Cherubini a friendly reception in 1805, as the latter complained

to Czerny later.”

At the end of the summer season Beethoven returned to town with his

opera ready to be put in rehearsal. Here Ries found him. “He was really

fond of me,” says he, “and gave me a comical proof of the fact in one

of his fits of absentmindedness”; and Ries goes on to relate in the

“Notizen”:

When I came back from Silesia, where, on Beethoven’s

recommendation, I had spent a considerable time as pianoforte

player for Prince Lichnowsky on his estate, I went into his room;

he was about to shave and had lathered himself up to the eyes (for

his fearful beard extended so far). He jumped up, embraced me

cordially and, behold! he had transferred the soap from his left

cheek to my right so completely that there was nothing left of it

on him. Didn’t we laugh!

With all his kindness to Ries, Beethoven had neither forgotten nor

forgiven the affair of the “Andante favori”:

One day when a small company including Beethoven and me breakfasted

with Prince (Lichnowsky) after the concert in the Augarten (8

o’clock in the forenoon), it was proposed that we drive to

Beethoven’s house and hear his opera “Leonore,” which had not

yet been performed. Arrived there Beethoven demanded that I go

away, and inasmuch as the most urgent appeals of all present were

fruitless, I did so with tears in my eyes. The entire company

noticed it and Prince Lichnowsky, following me, asked me to wait

in an anteroom, because, having been the cause of the trouble, he

wanted to have it settled. But the feeling of hurt to my honor

would not admit of this. I heard afterward that Prince Lichnowsky

had sharply rebuked Beethoven for his conduct, since only love for

his works had been to blame for the incident and consequently for

his anger. But the only result of these representations was that

Beethoven refused to play any more for the company.

It so happened, that Ries thus lost his only opportunity ever to hear

the “Leonore-Fidelio” music in its original form; but this Beethoven

could not anticipate, as he could have no suspicion that they were

so soon to be parted. Bonn, being now under French rule, Ries was

liable to conscription, and notice came that he was among the first

drawn. “He was therefore,” says the ‘Harmonicon,’ “obliged to return

home immediately, for his disobedience would have exposed his father

and family to the risk of ruin.” Before Ries’ departure from Vienna,

Beethoven, himself unable to afford him pecuniary assistance, again

proved his kindly feelings towards his pupil by giving him a letter

commending him to the benevolence of Princess Liechtenstein.

“To Beethoven’s rage,” says Ries, “the letter was not delivered, but I

kept the original, written on an unevenly cut quarto sheet, as a proof

of Beethoven’s friendship and love for me.” Three years will elapse

before we meet Ries again in Vienna--the greater part of which period

he passed at Paris in such discouraging circumstances, that he thought

seriously of abandoning his profession.

[Sidenote: FIRST PERFORMANCE OF “FIDELIO”]

At the Theater-an-der-Wien none of the new operas produced this season

had long kept the stage; although two of them--Schikaneder’s “Swetard’s

Zaubergürtel,” music by Fischer, and his “Vesta’s Feuer,” music by

J. Weigl--were brought out “with very extraordinary splendor of

decorations and costumes.” It was now Autumn and the receipts did not

cover the expenses of the theatre. “From the distance,” says Treitschke,

the storm of war rolled towards Vienna and robbed the spectators of

the calm essential to the enjoyment of an art-work. But just for

this reason all possible efforts were made to enliven the sparsely

attended spaces of the house. “Fidelio” was relied upon to do its

best, and so, under far from happy auspices, the opera was produced

on November 20 (1805). It was possible efficiently to cast only the

female parts with Mlles. Milder and Müller; the men left all the

more to be desired.

Anna Milder (born December 13, 1785), now just completing her

twentieth year, was that pupil of Neukomm to whom Haydn had said half

a dozen years before: “My dear child! You have a voice like a house!”

Schikaneder gave her her first engagement and she began her theatrical

career April 9, 1803, in the part of ~Juno~ in Süssmayr’s “Spiegel von

Arkadien,” with a new grand aria composed for her by him. Beethoven

had now written the part of ~Fidelio~ for her. In later years it was

one of her grand performances; though, judging from the contemporary

criticisms, it was now somewhat defective, simply from lack of stage

experience. Louise Müller, the ~Marcelline~, “had already (in April,

1805) developed in a few years into a tasteful and honest singer,

although she did not have the help of a voice of especial volume.” She

became, in the opinion of Castelli, “a most amiable actress and good

singer, particularly in the comic genre.”

Demmer, “trained in Cologne,” is reported in 1799, when singing at

Frankfort-on-the-Main, as having “a firm, enduring voice with a high

range; he played semi-comic rôles admirably. He was best in airs

in which there was little agility and more sustained declamation.”

Castelli praises him; but all contemporary accounts agree that he was

not equal to the part of ~Florestan~, for which he was now selected.

Sebastian Meier, brother-in-law to Mozart (the musical reformer of

this theatre), “was insignificant as a singer, but a valiant actor,”

says Castelli, who knew him most intimately. Schindler has an anecdote

of him as ~Pizarro~, apparently derived from Beethoven, to the effect

that he had a high opinion of his own powers; that he used to swear by

Mozart and confidently undertake everything. In view of this Beethoven

resolved to cure him of his weakness, and to this end wrote the passage

in Pizarro’s air:

[Illustration: Pizarro

Bass

Bald wird sein Blut verrinnen

Bald krümmet sich der Wurm

]

the voice moves over a series of scales, played by all the strings,

so that the singer at each note which he has to utter, hears an

appogiatura of a minor second from the orchestra. The ~Pizarro~

of 1805 was unable with all his gesticulation and writhing to

avoid the difficulty, the more since the mischievous players in

the orchestra below maliciously emphasized the minor second by

accentuation. ~Don Pizarro~, snorting with rage, was thus at the

mercy of the bows of the fiddlers. This aroused laughter. The

singer, whose conceit was thus wounded, thereupon flew into a rage

and hurled at the composer among other remarks the words: “My

brother-in-law would never have written such damned nonsense.”

Weinkopf (~Don Fernando~) had “a pure and expressive bass voice,”

but his part was too meagre and unimportant to affect the success or

failure of the opera.

Caché (~Jaquino~), according to Castelli, was a good actor,

who was also made serviceable in the opera because Meyer, the

stage-manager, knew that good acting, in comic operas, was

frequently more effective than a good voice. It was necessary to

fiddle his song-parts into his head before he came to rehearsals.

Rothe (~Rocco~) was so inferior both as actor and singer, that his name

is not to be found in any of the ordinary sources of Vienna theatrical

history.

One can well believe that very considerable difficulties attended

the performance, as Treitschke states. His words, in a passage above

cited, as well as certain expressions of Beethoven’s a few months

later, indicate that the opera was hurriedly put upon the stage, and

the inadequacy of the singers thus increased by the lack of sufficient

rehearsals. Seyfried says, “I directed the study of the parts with

all the singers according to his suggestions, also all the orchestral

rehearsals, and personally conducted the performance.” In 1805 Seyfried

was young, talented, ambitious, zealous, and nothing was wanting on his

part to insure success.

[Sidenote: INCIDENTS AT THE REHEARSALS]

Speaking of the rehearsals recalls to mind one of those bursts

of puerile wrath, which were passed over with a smile by some of

Beethoven’s friends, but gave serious offense to others. Mähler

remembered that at one of the general rehearsals the third bassoon

was absent; at which Beethoven fretted and fumed. Lobkowitz, who was

present, made light of the matter: two of the bassoons were present,

said he, and the absence of the third could make no great difference.

This so enraged the composer, that, as he passed the Lobkowitz Place,

on his way home, he could not restrain the impulse to turn aside and

shout in at the great door of the palace: “Lobkowitzian ass!”

There were various stumbling-blocks in the vocal score of “Leonore.”

Schindler on this point has some judicious remarks (in his third

edition), and they are borne out by his record of conversations with

Cherubini and Anna Milder. During his years of frequent intercourse

with Beethoven and subsequently, “Leonore” was a work upon whose origin

and failure he took much pains to inform himself, and its history as

finally drawn up by him is much more satisfactory and correct than

others of greater pretensions.

Outside the narrow circle of the playhouse, weightier matters than a

new opera now occupied and agitated the minds of the Viennese. On the

20th October, Ulm fell. On the 30th Bernadotte entered Salzburg, on

his way to and down the Danube. Vienna was defenceless. The nobility,

the great bankers and merchants--all whose wealth enabled and whose

vocations permitted it--precisely those classes of society in which

Beethoven moved, which knew how to appreciate his music, and of whose

suffrages his opera was assured, fled from the capital. On November 9th

the Empress departed. On the 10th the French armies had reached and

occupied the villages a few miles west of the city. On November 13th,

about 11 o’clock in the forenoon, the vanguard of the enemy, Murat and

Lannes at the head, 15,000 strong, representing all branches of the

service, entered Vienna in order of battle, flags flying and music

sounding.

On the 15th, Bonaparte issued his proclamation from Schönbrunn, which

he made his headquarters. Murat quartered himself in the palace of

Archduke Albert; General Hulin, in that of Prince Lobkowitz. It was

just at this most unlucky of all possible periods that Beethoven’s

opera was produced; on November 20, 21 and 22.

Beethoven’s friend, Stephan von Breuning, prepared a pretty surprise

for him by printing a short complimentary poem and having it

distributed in the theatre at the second performance. It is preserved

in the “Notizen” (p. 34).[32] Beethoven desired to retain the original

title of the opera, “Leonore,” and the directors of the theatre have

been severely censured from that day to this for persisting in giving

and retaining the title “Fidelio”; but unjustly; for, considering the

relations in which Paër stood to Baron Braun, it was surely enough to

have taken his subject, without stealing his title.

[Sidenote: RECOLLECTIONS OF A SINGER]

A young man, educated at the University of Munich, had for some time

past been private secretary to the Bavarian ~Chargé des Affaires~ at

Salzburg. The approach of the French armies after the fall of Ulm

made his position and prospects very uncertain. It was just then that

an agent of Baron Braun came thither in search of a young, fresh

tenor to succeed Demmer, whose powers were fast yielding to time. The

engagement was offered him and thus it came about, that J. A. Röckel,

in the Autumn of 1805, became first tenor in the Theater-an-der-Wien.

After appearing in divers characters with much success, considering

his inexperience, he was offered the part of ~Florestan~ in the

contemplated revival of “Fidelio.” A conversation with the singer at

Bath in April, 1861, is authority for these particulars, and a letter

from him dated February 26 of the same year adds more. Röckel wrote:

It was in December, 1805--the opera house An-der-Wien and both

the Court theatres of Vienna having been at that time under the

intendance of Baron Braun, the Court Banker--when Mr. Meyer,

brother-in-law to Mozart and Regisseur of the opera An-der-Wien,

came to fetch me to an evening meeting in the palace of Prince

Charles Lichnowsky, the great patron of Beethoven. “Fidelio” was

already a month previously performed An-der-Wien--unhappily just

after the entrance of the French, when the city was shut against

the suburbs. The whole theatre was taken up by the French, and

only a few friends of Beethoven ventured to hear the opera. These

friends were now at that soirée, to bring Beethoven about, to

consent to the changes they wanted to introduce in the opera in

order to remove the heaviness of the first act. The necessity of

these improvements was already acknowledged and settled among

themselves. Meyer had prepared me for the coming storm, when

Beethoven should hear of leaving out three whole numbers of the

first act.

At the soirée were present Prince Lichnowsky and the Princess, his

lady, Beethoven and his brother Kaspar, [Stephan] von Breuning,

[Heinrich] von Collin, the poet, the tragedian Lange (another

brother-in-law to Mozart), Treitschke, Clement, leader of the

orchestra, Meyer and myself; whether Kapellmeister von Seyfried was

there I am not certain any more, though I should think so.

I had arrived in Vienna only a short time before, and met Beethoven

there for the first time.

As the whole opera was to be gone through, we went directly to

work. Princess L. played on the grand piano the great score of the

opera and Clement, sitting in a corner of the room, accompanied

with his violin the whole opera by heart, playing all the solos

of the different instruments. The extraordinary memory of Clement

having been universally known, nobody was astonished by it, except

myself. Meyer and I made ourselves useful, by singing as well as

we could, he (basso) the lower, I the higher parts of the opera.

Though the friends of Beethoven were fully prepared for the

impending battle, they had never seen him in ~that~ excitement

before, and without the prayers and entreaties of the very delicate

and invalid princess, who was a second mother to Beethoven and

acknowledged by himself as such, his united friends were not likely

to have succeeded in this, even to themselves, very doubtful

enterprise. But when after their united endeavors from seven

till after one o’clock, the sacrifice of the three numbers was

accomplished, and when we, exhausted, hungry and thirsty, went to

restore ourselves by a splendid supper--then, none was happier and

gayer than Beethoven. Had I seen him before in his fury, I saw him

now in his frolics. When he saw me, opposite to him, so intently

occupied with a French dish, and asked me what I was eating, and I

answered: “I don’t know!” with his lion-voice he roared out: “He

eats like a wolf--without knowing what! Ha, ha, ha!”

The condemned three numbers were:

1. A great aria with chorus of ~Pizarro~;

2. A comic duo between ~Leonore~ (~Fidelio~) and ~Marcelline~, with

violin and violoncello solo;

3. A comic terzetto between ~Marcelline~, ~Jacquino~ and ~Rocco~.

Many years after, Mr. Schindler found the scores of these three

pieces amongst the rubbish of Beethoven’s music, and got them as a

present from him.

A question has been raised as to the accuracy of Röckel’s memory in

his statement of the numbers cancelled on this occasion; to which it

may be remarked, that the particulars of this first and extraordinary

meeting with Beethoven would naturally impress themselves very deeply

upon the memory of the young singer; that the numbers to be condemned

had been previously agreed upon by the parties opposed to the composer

in the transaction, and doubtless made known to Röckel; that Röckel’s

relations to Meyer were such as to render it in the highest degree

improbable, that he should confound ~Rocco’s~ gold aria with either of

the ~Pizarro~ airs with chorus belonging to Meyer’s part; that both of

these belong to the first and second original acts--i. e., to the first

act of the opera as Röckel knew it; that he (Röckel) in his letter

to the writer is not reporting upon the pieces actually omitted in

the subsequent performance three or four months later, but upon those

which, at this meeting, Beethoven was with great difficulty persuaded

to omit: that the objections made to them were not to the music, but

because they retarded the action; and, therefore, that the decision

now reached was by no means final, provided the end desired could be

attained in some other way. Perhaps it may yet appear that Beethoven,

now cunningly giving way, succeeded in winning the game, and retaining

all three of the pieces condemned.

Outside theatrical circles we catch also a glimpse or two of Beethoven

in these months. Pierre Baillot, the violinist, was in Vienna just

before the French invasion on his way to Moscow, and was taken by Anton

Reicha to see Beethoven.

They did not find him in his lodgings but in a by no means

elegant inn in the Vorstadt. What first attracted the attention

of the Frenchman was that Beethoven did not have the bulldog,

gloomy expression which he had expected from the majority of

his portraits; he even thought he recognized an expression of

good-nature in the face of the composer. The conversation had just

got well under way when it was interrupted by a terrific snore. It

came from a stableman or coachman who was taking his little nap in

a corner of the room. Beethoven gazed at the snorer a few moments

attentively and then broke out with the words: “I wish I were as

stupid as that fellow.”[33]

Schindler closes his account of these last five years in Beethoven’s

life with great propriety and elegance by quoting a passage copied by

the master from Christian Sturm’s “Betrachtungen.” It is made up of

scattered sentences which may be found on page 197 of the ninth edition

(Reutlingen, 1827):

To the praise of Thy goodness I must confess that Thou hast tried

all means to draw me to Thee. Now it hath pleased Thee to let me

feel the heavy hand of Thy wrath, and to humiliate my proud heart

by manifold chastisements. Sickness and misfortune hast Thou sent

to bring me to a contemplation of my digressions. But one thing

only do I ask, O God, cease not to labor for my improvement. Only

let me, in whatsoever manner pleases Thee, turn to Thee and be

fruitful of good works.

[Sidenote: WORKS PUBLISHED IN 1805]

The publications for the year 1805 were the Two Easy Sonatas, G minor

and G major, Op. 49, advertised by the Kunst- und Industrie-Comptoir,

on January 23; Trio (arranged from the Septet) for Pf., Violin (or

Clarinet) and Violoncello, E-flat, Op. 38, advertised by the same

institution on the same date; Prelude for the Pf., F minor, advertised

by the same on January 30; Romance for Violin and Orchestra, F major,

Op. 50, advertised by the same on May 15; Sonata in C major for Pf.,

Op. 53, dedicated to Count Waldstein, advertised with the Romance;

song, “An die Hoffnung,” Op. 32, advertised by the same on September

18; Six Variations for Pf. four hands, on “Ich denke Dein,” advertised

by the same on January 23; Minuet in E-flat for Pf., advertised by same

on January 30; Scene and Air, “Ah, perfido! spergiuro,” in pianoforte

score, published by Hoffmann and Kühnel.

The compositions which were completed were the opera “Leonore”

(“Fidelio”) in its first form; the Concerto for Pf. and Orchestra, G

major, Op. 58 (this on the authority of Nottebohm); the Pf. Sonata in F

major. Op. 54; perhaps also may be added the Concerto for Pf., Violin

and Violoncello, C major. Op. 56. It was sketched at the beginning of

the year and was written, as Schindler states, for Archduke Rudolph,

Seidler, violin, and Kraft, violoncello; it may well have been

completed so as to be played by the winter of 1805-1806.

FOOTNOTES:

[29] Again played by him at the opening of Schuppanzigh’s Augarten

concerts in the Spring.

[30] See Nottebohm’s study of the sketches for “Fidelio” in “Zweite

Beethoveniana,” p. 409 ~et seq.~; also what Jahn has to say, and the

results of Erich Prieger’s labors in connection with the reprint of the

original form of the opera.

[31] Jahn, “Gesammelte Schriften,” p. 244.

[32] To the opinions of the reviewers some attention must be given; it

does not seem advisable to quote them ~in extenso~. The “Freymüthige”

describes the military occupation of Vienna, the officers quartered

in the city proper, the private soldiery in the suburbs. At first

the theatres were empty, but gradually the French began to visit

them and at the time of writing were more numerous in the playhouses

than the Austrians. “Fidelio,” the new opera by Beethoven, did not

please. It was given a few times only and the house was empty after

the first performance. The music did not meet the expectations of

the cognoscenti and music-lovers, lacking the passionate expression

which is so compelling in Mozart and Cherubini. The music is beautiful

in places, but as a whole the opera is far from being a perfect or

successful work. The “Zeitung für the Elegante Welt” records that the

music is “ineffective and repetitious,” and did not add to the writer’s

opinion of Beethoven’s talent for vocal writing formed on hearing his

cantata (“Christus am Ölberg”). In its issue of January 8, 1806, the

correspondent of the “Allg. Mus. Zeitung” says that he had expected

something very different, in view of Beethoven’s undisputed talent.

Beethoven had often sacrificed beauty to newness and singularity and

therefore something new and original had been expected, but these were

the qualities which were least noticeable. The music is distinguished

neither by invention nor execution. The overture is not comparable

with that of “Prometheus.” As a rule there is nothing new in the

vocal parts; they are generally too long, the text is ceaselessly

repeated and the characterization misses fire, as, for instance, in

the duet after the recognition. A canon in the first act and an aria

in F [E] are more successful, though the pretty accompaniment with

its three horns ~obbligato~ and bassoon is somewhat overloaded. The

choruses, especially the song of the prisoners, are a failure. Dr.

Henry Reeve, of Norwich, England, one of the earliest collaborators

on the “Edinburgh Review,” then a young man of 25, was in Vienna at

the time of the French invasion and attended the second representation

of the opera on November 21st. Sir George Grove sent a copy of a page

from his journal to Thayer. He thought the plot a sad mixture of bad

action and romantic situations, but the airs, duets and choruses worthy

of all praise. The “overtures,” of which there was one for every act,

were too artificial to be generally agreeable and an appreciation of

their beauties would require frequent hearing. Beethoven sat at the

pianoforte and conducted the performance--a little, dark, young-looking

man, who wore spectacles.

[33] “Signale für die Musikalische Welt,” June 21, 1866.

Chapter IV

The Year 1806--Repetition of “Fidelio”--Changes in the Opera--Its

Withdrawal--Journey to Silesia--Correspondence with Thomson--The

Scottish Songs.

Excerpts from a letter written on June 2, 1806, by Stephan von Breuning

to his sister and brother-in-law, make a fair opening for the story

of the year 1806. In it he reports on “Fidelio.” The letter, though

written in the middle of the year, has reference to the period between

the original performance late in 1805 and the repetition in the spring

of 1806, a period in which it would seem, from the absence of all

epistolary writings, Beethoven was in no mood, or too much occupied

otherwise, for correspondence. Von Breuning writes:

Nothing, perhaps, has caused Beethoven so much vexation as

this work, the value of which will be appreciated only in the

future.... Beethoven, who had also observed a few imperfections

in the treatment of the text in the opera, withdrew it after

three representations. After order had been restored he and I

took it up again. I remodelled the whole book for him, quickening

and enlivening the action; he curtailed many pieces, and then it

was performed three[34] times with great success. Now, however,

his enemies in the theatre arose, and as he had offended several

persons, especially at the second representation, they succeeded in

preventing further performances. Before this, many obstacles had

been placed in his way; to let one instance stand as proof for the

others, he could not even get permission to secure an announcement

of the opera under the changed title “Fidelio,” as it is called in

the French original, and as it was put into print after the changes

were made. Contrary to promise the first title “Leonore” appeared

on the poster. This is all the more unpleasant for Beethoven since

the cessation of the performances on which he was depending for

his honorarium, which consists in a percentage of the receipts,

has embarrassed him in a financial way. He will recover from the

set-back all the more slowly since the treatment which he has

received has robbed him of a great deal of his pleasure in and love

for work....

The words “Fidelio” and “Leonore” are here misplaced, interchanged,

whether by Breuning or his copyist is not known. The letter is a

reflection of Beethoven’s disappointment and indignation at fancied

injuries; it was written in ignorance of divers material facts, and

contains inaccuracies, which--since its publication by Wegeler in

1838--have colored many attempts to write the early history of the

opera.

It is a circumstance, noteworthy and not easily to be explained, that

Breuning, instead of Sonnleithner, revised the text and made the new

disposition of the scenes. For the alterations and suppressions, both

in the text and the music, made at this time, the reader is referred

to the edition of “Leonore” prepared by Otto Jahn, and published by

Breitkopf and Härtel in 1852, and the preface to the edition of the

“Fidelio” of 1805 published by Erich Prieger.

At the performances in November, the effect of the overture had been

ruined by a passage in the Allegro, which was too difficult for the

wood-wind instruments. “Instead of simply removing this obstacle (31

measures),” says Schindler, “Beethoven thought it advisable to rewrite

the whole, inasmuch as he was already engaged upon a revision of other

parts of the work. He retains the motivi of the Introduction as well

as the Allegro, has the motivo of the latter played by violoncellos

and violins simultaneously for the sake of greater sonority, and on

the existing foundation rears a new structure, including several new

thoughts.”[35]

[Sidenote: THE OVERTURES TO “FIDELIO”]

And thus for Beethoven the winter passed. To compete with successful

new works which Schikaneder offered the Vienna audiences of 1806,

was no light matter; and it is easy to imagine, that Beethoven felt

this, and determined, at all events in his own field of instrumental

composition, to leave no doubt who was master. Hence, that monumental

work, the great overture to “Leonore” in its second form. He was, as

usual, dilatory in meeting his engagements. January and February passed

and March drew to its close, and the overture was not ready. This was

too much for Baron Braun’s patience. He, therefore, selected the best

night of the season--Saturday, March 29, the last before the closing

of the theatre for Holy Week and Easter--and gave Beethoven distinctly

to understand, that if the opera was not performed on that evening, it

should not be given at all. This was effectual and the new score was

sent in; but so late, as Röckel well remembered, as to allow but two or

three rehearsals with pianoforte and one only with orchestra; and these

were directed by Seyfried--the composer appearing at neither.

Beethoven and Breuning supposed that a change of title from “Fidelio”

to “Leonore” had been agreed to by the directors, and indeed the new

text-book and Breuning’s poem on the occasion were so printed; but

it was determined otherwise. By the new arrangement of the scenes,

the number of acts was reduced to two. The new playbill therefore

substitutes “Opera in two Acts” for “three”; excepting this, the

change of date, and of Röckel’s for Demmer’s name as ~Florestan~, it

is a facsimile of the previous ones, and announces: “Fidelio oder die

Eheliche Liebe.” For this determination the directors may well have

urged, not only a proper regard for the composer of “Sargino” and the

(Italian) “Leonore,” but the manifest impropriety of misleading the

public by giving a new title to a work which remained essentially

unchanged. As on the original production, Breuning wrote a poem: “To

Herr Ludwig van Beethoven, on the occasion of the reproduction of the

opera composed by him and first performed on November 20, 1805, now

given under the new title ‘Leonore.’”

[Sidenote: UNSUCCESSFUL PERFORMANCES]

The correspondent of the “Allg. Mus. Zeit.,” under date of April 2,

writes: “Beethoven has again produced his opera ‘Fidelio’ on the

stage with many alterations and abbreviations. An entire act has been

omitted, but the piece has benefited and pleased better.” On Thursday,

the 10th, it was given again. The following letters from Beethoven

to Sebastian Meier, referring to this performance, complain of “many

blunders” in the choruses, ask for new rehearsals, and say:

Please ask Mr. Seyfried to conduct my opera to-day, I want to look

at and hear it from a distance, thus at least my patience will not

be so greatly tried as if I were to hear my music bungled close

at hand! I cannot think otherwise than that it is done purposely.

I will say nothing about the wind-instruments, but that all ~pp~,

~crescendo~, all ~decres.~ and all ~forte~, ~ff~, have been elided

from my opera; at any rate they are not played. All delight in

composing departs when one hears it (one’s music) played ~thus~!

Seyfried’s autograph record of all performances in the

Theater-an-der-Wien, through a long series of years, gives “Sargino”

instead of “Fidelio,” for Saturday the 12th--and “Agnes Bernauer”

for the Sunday and Monday following. That this old, well-known drama

was so repeated affords a strong presumption that an opera--we think

“Fidelio”--was withdrawn “because obstacles had suddenly appeared”

after it was too late to supply its place with another. At all events,

the production of “Fidelio” on Thursday, April 10th, was the last; for

which fact, two explanations are given--that in Breuning’s letter, and

one by Röckel in his letter to the author. Breuning attributes it to

the composer’s enemies--to a cabal, to “several persons whom Beethoven

had offended, especially at the second representation”; Röckel, to

Beethoven’s own imprudence and folly.

Breuning, a Secretary in the War Office, could have had little leisure

for theatrical matters in those melancholy days during the French

occupation and immediately after; it is a cause of surprise, that

he found time for the revision of the “Fidelio” text; his record,

therefore, could hardly have been made except upon the representations

of his friend--the last man to admit that he was in fault. But

Röckel was behind the scenes in a double sense: he sang the part of

~Florestan~ and while Beethoven’s “friends were, most of them, married

men, not able to walk and dine out with him (as he writes) like myself,

another bachelor, to whom he took a fancy--I could call upon him in the

morning and in fine weather stroll and dine with him in the country.”

Breuning and Röckel are alike men of unimpeachable veracity; but the

latter speaks from personal knowledge and observation.

Breuning’s statement is improbable. Who were Beethoven’s enemies? Who

formed the cabal? Baron Braun, Schikaneder, Seyfried, the Stage-manager

Meier, Director Clement, the solo singers (Mlle. Milder, Weinkopf,

Röckel), were all his friends; and, for anything now known, so were

Mlle. Müller, Rothe and Caché. As to orchestra and chorus, they might

refuse to play under Beethoven as conductor--nothing more; and, as he

had already conducted four if not five times, this would create no

great difficulty, as the baton would necessarily pass into the hands

of Seyfried at the first or second subsequent performance. Moreover,

now that the opera was fairly upon the stage and making its way, it

was for the interest of all parties, from Baron Braun down to the

scene-shifters, to continue it so long as it would draw an audience.

That it was making its way is proved not only by all the contemporary

accounts, but by this: that notwithstanding the necessarily empty

houses in November, Beethoven’s percentage of the receipts finally

amounted to nearly 200 florins.

[Sidenote: THE COMPOSER IN A RAGE]

In the second of the notes to Meier, Beethoven is guilty of monstrous

injustice. A moment’s reflection shows this. The orchestra and chorus

had duly rehearsed and three times publicly performed “Fidelio” as

first written. Since then (see Jahn’s edition) most of the numbers,

perhaps every one, had been more or less changed. Now every musician

knows that it is easier to play a piece of new music correctly at

sight, than a well-known composition in which material alterations

have been made. And yet, because some forty men--playing on a dozen

different instruments, and after a single rehearsal at which the

composer was not present to explain his intentions--did not effect

the impossibility of reading the music correctly and at the same time

note all the marks of expression, Beethoven writes: “I cannot think

otherwise than that is done purposely!”

All things considered, there can be no hesitation in preferring the

testimony of the singer of ~Florestan~, to that of the Court War

Councillor.

When the opera was produced in the beginning of the following

year (writes Röckel) it was exceedingly well received by a select

public, which became more numerous and enthusiastic with each new

representation; and no doubt the opera would have become a favorite

if the evil genius of the composer had not prevented it, and as

he, Beethoven, was paid for his work by a percentage, instead of

a mere honorarium, an advantage which none enjoyed before him,

it would have considerably advanced his pecuniary arrangements.

Having had no theatrical experience, he was estimating the receipts

of the house much higher than they really were; he believed

himself cheated in his percentage, and without consulting his real

friends on such a delicate point, he hastened to Baron Braun--that

high-minded and honorable nobleman--and submitted his complaint.

The Baron, seeing Beethoven excited and conscious of his ~one

susceptibility~ (i. e., suspicious temper), did what he could to

cure him of his suspicions against his employees, of whose honesty

he was sure. Were there any fraud, the Baron said, his own loss

would be beyond comparison more considerable than Beethoven’s. He

hoped that the receipts would increase with each representation;

until now, only the first ranks, stalls and pit were occupied; by

and by the upper ranks would likewise contribute their shares.

“I don’t write for the galleries!” exclaimed Beethoven.

“No?” replied the Baron, “My dear Sir, even Mozart did not disdain

to write for the galleries.”

Now it was at an end. “I will not give the opera any more,” said

Beethoven, “I want my score back.” Here Baron Braun rang the bell,

gave orders for the delivery of the score to the composer, and

the opera was buried for a long time. From this encounter between

Beethoven and Baron Braun one might conclude that the former’s

feelings had been injured by the comparison with Mozart; but since

he revered Mozart highly, it is probable that he took offence

more at the manner in which they were uttered than at the words

themselves.--He now realized plainly that he had acted against his

own interests, and in all probability the parties would have come

to an amicable understanding through the mediation of friends if

Baron Braun had not very soon after retired from the management of

the united theatres, a circumstance that led to a radical change of

conditions.

In truth, Beethoven had overshot the mark. The overture was too novel

in form and grand in substance to be immediately understood; and, in

1806, there was not an audience in Europe able to find, in the fire and

expression of the principal vocal numbers, an adequate compensation

for the superficial graces and melodic beauties of the favorite operas

of the time, and which seemed to them to be wanting in “Fidelio.” Even

Cherubini, who was all this time in Vienna, failed to comprehend fully

a work which, though a first and only experiment, was destined to an

ever-increasing popularity, when nearly all his own then universally

admired operas had disappeared from the stage. Schindler records that

he “told the musicians of Paris concerning the overture that because of

its confusion of modulations he was unable to recognize the principal

key.” And farther, that he (Cherubini), in listening to “Fidelio,” had

come to the conclusion that till then Beethoven had paid too little

heed to the art of singing, for which Salieri was not to blame.

In 1836, Schindler conversed with the ~Fidelio~ of 1805-06, Madame

Milder-Hauptmann, on the subject: “She said, among other things, that

she, too, had had severe struggles with the master chiefly about the

unbeautiful, unsingable passages, unsuited to her voice, in the Adagio

of the air in E major--but all in vain, until, in 1814, she declared

that she would never sing the air again in its then shape. That worked.”

Anselm Hüttenbrenner, who became a pupil of Salieri a dozen years

later, wrote in a letter to Ferdinand Luib, under date February 21,

1858: “Speaking of Beethoven Salieri told me the composer had submitted

‘Fidelio’ to him for an opinion: he had taken exception to many

things and advised Beethoven to make certain changes; but Beethoven

had ‘Fidelio’ performed just as he had written it--and never visited

Salieri again.” These last words are too strong; Beethoven’s pique

against his old master was in time forgotten; for Moscheles (also in a

letter to Luib) writes on February 28, 1858: “I cannot recall seeing

Schubert at Salieri’s, but I do remember the interesting circumstance

that once I saw a sheet of paper lying at Salieri’s on which in great

letters written by Beethoven were the words: ‘~The pupil Beethoven was

here!~’”

A letter by Beethoven to Baron von Braun refers to the incidents just

described and asks permission to get from the theatre orchestral parts,

as follows:

~Flauto primo~, the three trombones and the four horn parts of my

opera. I need these parts, but only for a day, in order to have a

few trifles copied for myself which ~could not be written into the

score for want of room~, also because ~Prince Lobkowitz~ thinks ~of

giving the opera at his house~ and has asked it of me.

There were other reasons why Beethoven desired to render his score

perfect. Whether the opera was performed in the Lobkowitz palace is not

recorded; but Breuning ends his letter of June 2nd thus: “I will not

write you the news that Prince Lichnowsky has now sent the opera to the

Queen of Prussia, and that I hope the performances in Berlin will show

the Viennese what they have at home.”

Breuning’s hope was vain; the opera was not given in Berlin.

[Sidenote: MARRIAGE OF KARL KASPAR VAN BEETHOVEN]

The order of time requires a passing notice of a family event which

proved in the end a cause of infinite trouble and vexation to Beethoven

and all connected with him by the ties of kindred or friendship.

Whether his brother Kaspar’s salary was increased above 250 florins,

before his appointment in 1809 as Liquidators’-Adjunct with 1000

florins and 160 fl. for lodgings, does not appear; beyond a doubt it

had been. But, be this as it may, he now found himself in a position to

marry, and on the 25th of May “a marriage contract was closed between

Carl Caspar v. Beethoven, R. I. Officer of the Revenue, and of this

city (Vienna) and Theresia Reiss, daughter of Anton Reiss, civilian,

upholsterer.” Their only child, a son, was born--according to the

baptismal certificate--on September 4th, 1806.

Reiss was a man of considerable wealth, for one in his sphere of life,

and able, it is said, to give his daughter a marriage portion of 2000

florins; it appears, too, that the valuable house in the Alservorstadt,

owned by Karl at the time of his death, was an inheritance of his wife

from her father’s estate; indeed, half the right to the property was

legally secured to her. So much has been wantonly and falsely written

upon this marriage and its consequences, as to render it proper to add

here: Karl van Beethoven’s character and temperament were not fitted to

render a wife permanently happy; on the other hand his wife, before her

husband’s death, dishonored him by an intrigue with a medical student;

but there is no reason whatever to believe that the marriage, at the

time it took place, was not considered a good one for, and by, all

parties concerned.

The notices of Beethoven’s own movements during this year are scanty.

“Fidelio” and studies to instrumental works employed him during the

winter (1805-6), but not to the exclusion of the claims of social

intercourse, as one of his characteristic memoranda indicates. It is

written with lead pencil on a page of the new quartet sketches: “Just

as you are now plunging into the whirlpool of society--just so possible

is it to compose ~operas~ in spite of social obstacles. Let your

deafness no longer be a secret--even in art.”

Breuning’s report (June 2), that Beethoven “had lost a great deal of

his pleasure in and love for work,” had even then ceased to be true.

On the 26th of May, the first of the Rasoumowski Quartets had been

begun--and with it began a series of works which distinguished the

year 1806 as one of astonishing productiveness--but more on this point

in due time. It is quite certain that he took no summer lodgings: this

and other considerations confirm Schindler’s statement, that, when the

revision of a copy of his opera for Berlin had been finished, he went

into Hungary to enjoy “a short rest with his friend Count Brunswick.”

Thence he journeyed into Silesia to the seat of Prince Lichnowsky near

Troppau.

[Sidenote: NEGOTIATIONS WITH BREITKOPF AND HÄRTEL]

Two documents now come up for consideration which fill a hiatus left by

the author in the original edition of this work. They are the letters

to which reference was made by the English editor in his comments

on Beethoven’s love-affairs (Vol. I, p. 344). Both are addressed to

Breitkopf and Härtel, the first dated “Vienna, July 5, 1806,” the

second “Grätz, den 3ten Heumonath, 1806”--“Heumonath” meaning July.

The inaccuracy of the latter date is too obvious to call for extended

comment; Beethoven could not apologize on the third day of the month

for tardiness in replying to a letter in answer to one which he had

dispatched on the fifth. It is not permissible to play fast and loose

with Beethoven’s dates, despite their frequent faultiness; we must

accept them when they are upheld by corroborative evidence, but reject

them when it is plainly impossible to conceive them as correct. In

explanation of the obvious incorrectness of the second date it is

suggested that when Beethoven wrote “Heumonath,” i. e., July, he meant

to write “Herbstmonath,” i. e., September. Irrespective of their dates,

however, the letters furnish evidence of Beethoven’s creative activity

during the summer of 1806. The first letter is as follows:

Vienna, July 5, 1806.

I inform you that my brother is going to Leipsic on business of

his chancellary and I have given him to carry the overture to my

opera in pianoforte arrangement, my oratorio and a new pianoforte

concerto--you may also negotiate with him touching some new violin

quartets of which I ~have already completed one~ and am purposing

to devote myself almost wholly to this work. As soon as you have

come to an understanding with my brother I will send you the

pianoforte arrangement of my opera--you may also have the score.

I hear that the symphony which I sent you last year and ~which you

returned to me~ has been roundly abused in the Musikal. Zeitung,

I have not read it, if you think that you do ~me~ harm by this

you are mistaken, on the contrary you bring your newspaper into

discredit by such things--all the more since I ~have not made any

secret~ of the fact that you sent back ~this symphony~ and other

compositions--Please present my compliments to Herr V. Rochlitz, I

hope his bad blood toward me has become a little diluted, say to

him that I AM BY NO MEANS SO IGNORANT of foreign literature not to

know that ~Herr v. Rochlitz has written some very pretty things~,

and if I should ever come to Leipsic I am convinced that we shall

become right good friends without ~causing injury or loss to his

criticisms~....

The pianoforte concerto referred to is that in G major, Op. 58; the

Quartets, the set Op. 59; the symphony, the “Eroica.” The second letter

was written from Prince Lichnowsky’s castle, Grätz, near Troppau in

Silesia. Breitkopf and Härtel’s endorsement shows that it was received

and answered in September:

Grätz, Heu-Monath 3rd, 1806.

Rather too much to do and the little journey here I could not

answer your letter at once--although I at once decided to accept

your offer, since my comfort, too, will be promoted by such an

arrangement and many unavoidable disorders obviated--I willingly

obligate myself not to sell any more of my works to any one except

you nor abroad except in the cases now specified, viz: whenever

advantageous offers are made to me by foreign publishers I will

inform you of the fact; and if you are otherwise inclined I will at

once arrange that you shall have ~the same work for Germany~ for

a smaller honorarium.--The second case is this: if I should leave

Germany, which is easily possible, that you may ~still participate

as above~, if you so desire--If these conditions are agreeable to

you write me--I believe the plan mutually helpful--as soon as I

learn your opinion of the matter--you may have at once 3 violin

quartets, a new pianoforte concerto, a new symphony, the score of

my opera and my oratorio.

My present place of sojourn is here in Silesia so long as autumn

lasts--with Prince Lichnowsky--who sends greetings to you--My

address is L. v. Beethoven in Troppau.

Breitkopf and Härtel’s endorsement is as follows: “~Resp.~ (i. e.,

~responsum~). Let him propose the honorarium; if acceptable we will

send him a contract for three years.” In reply to this Beethoven wrote

a letter dated Vienna, Nov. 18, 1806, in which he said:

Partly my distractions in Silesia, partly the events which have

taken place in your country, were to blame that I did not answer

your letter before now--should the present condition of affairs

prevent your entering into an engagement with me, you are not bound

to anything--only I beg you to answer at once by post, so that in

case you do not care to make a contract with me--I need not let

my works lie idle. With regard to a contract for three years I am

disposed to enter into it with you at once if you will agree that

I sell several works to England or Scotland. It is understood of

course ~that the works which you have received from me or which

I sold you belong only to you, namely are your sole property and

have nothing to do with those of France, England or Scotland--but

I must have the privilege to dispose of other works in those

countries--But in Germany, you and no other publisher would be

the owner of my works~. I would willingly renounce the sale of my

works in those countries, but I have received from Scotland such

weighty offers and such an honorarium as I could not ask of you,

besides a connection with foreign countries is always important

for the fame of an artist and in the event of his travelling--As,

for instance, in the case of Scotland, I have the right to sell

the same works in Germany and France, I would gladly let you have

them for Germany and France--so that only London and Edinburgh (in

Scotland) would be lost to your sales.... For the present I offer

you three quartets and a pianoforte concerto--I cannot give you the

promised symphony yet--because a gentleman of quality has taken it

from me, but I have the privilege of publishing it in half a year.

I ask of you 600 florins for the three quartets and 300 fl. for the

concerto, ~both amounts~ in Convention Florins according to the 20

florin scale.

The negotiations were without result and the compositions mentioned

were published by the Industrie-Comptoir. The symphony referred to was

doubtless the fourth, in B-flat, and the “gentleman of quality” in all

likelihood Count von Oppersdorff, to whom it was dedicated.

In October Breuning wrote to Wegeler: “Beethoven is at present in

Silesia with Prince Lichnowsky and will not return till near the end of

this month. His circumstances are none of the best at present, since

his opera, owing to the cabals of his opponents, was performed but

seldom, and therefore yielded him nothing. His spirits are generally

low and, to judge by his letters, the sojourn in the country has not

cheered him.” This visit to the Prince came to an abrupt termination in

a scene which has been a fruitful theme for the silly race of musical

novelette writers. The simple truth is related by Seyfried in the

appendix to his “Studien” (page 23) and is here copied literally except

for a few additional words interspersed, derived by the present writer

from a conversation with the daughter of Moritz Lichnowsky:

When he (Beethoven) did not feel in the mood it required repeated

and varied urgings to get him to sit down to the pianoforte.

Before he began playing he was in the habit of hitting the keys

with the flat of his hand, or running a single finger up and down

the keyboard, in short, doing all manner of things to kill time

and laughing heartily, as was his wont, at the folly. Once while

spending a summer with a Mæcenas at his countryseat, he was so

pestered by the guests (French officers), who wished to hear him

play, that he grew angry and refused to do what he denounced as

menial labor. A threat of arrest, made surely in jest, was taken

seriously by him and resulted in Beethoven’s walking by night to

the nearest city, Troppau, whence he hurried as on the wings of the

wind by extra post to Vienna.[36]

In the “Grenzboten,” Vol. XVI, No. 14, April 3, 1857, Fräulein

Giannatasio del Rio relates that, in 1816, Beethoven told how once

during the invasion when the Prince had a number of Frenchmen as

his guests, he (the Prince) repeatedly tried to coerce him to

play for them on the pianoforte and that he had stoutly refused;

which led to a scene between him and the Prince, whereupon B.

indiscreetly and suddenly left the house.--He once said that it

is easy to get along with nobility, but it was necessary to have

something to impress them with.

To propitiate him for the humiliation which he had suffered, the bust

of his patron had to become a sacrifice; he dashed it into pieces from

its place on a cabinet to the floor. Alois Fuchs recorded an anecdote

which illustrates the feeling which made Beethoven so unwilling to play

before the French officers. After the battle at Jena (October 14, 1806)

Beethoven met his friend Krumpholz, to whom he was warmly attached,

and, as usual, asked him, “What’s the news?” Krumpholz answered

that the latest news was the report just received that the great

hero Napoleon had won another decisive victory over the Prussians.

Greatly angered, Beethoven replied to this: “It’s a pity that I do not

understand the art of war as well as I do the art of music, I would

conquer him!”

A very natural query arises here: how did Beethoven meet the expenses

of these costly journeys? In answer it may be said that there is good

reason to believe that he borrowed and used his brother Johann’s scanty

savings.

[Sidenote: THOMSON AND SCOTTISH SONGS]

A letter by Beethoven, dated November 1, introduces a new topic. At

the time of the Union of the Kingdoms of England and Scotland, 1707,

a “Board of Trustees for the Encouragement of Arts and Manufactures

in Scotland” was established. About 1785 George Thomson became its

Secretary. He had some knowledge of musical science, and was an

enthusiastic lover of Scottish airs and melodies. His official position

brought him into correspondence with educated and influential people in

all parts of the kingdom, and afforded him singular facilities for the

execution of an early formed project--that of making the most extensive

collection possible of the music of Scotland. Many compilations,

various in extent and merit, had been published, but all of them, as

Thomson justly remarks, “more or less defective and exceptionable.” In

one of his prefaces he says:

To furnish a collection of all the fine airs, both of the plaintive

and the lively kind, unmixed with trifling and inferior ones--to

obtain the most suitable and finished accompaniments, with the

addition of characteristic symphonies to introduce and conclude

each air--and to substitute congenial and interesting songs, every

way worthy of the music, in the room of insipid or exceptionable

verses, were the great objects of the present publication....

For the composition of the symphonies and accompaniments, he

entered into terms with Mr. Pleyel, who fulfilled part of his

engagement satisfactorily; but having then stopped short, the

editor found it necessary to turn his eyes elsewhere. He was so

fortunate, however, as to engage Mr. Koželuch, and afterwards, Dr.

Haydn, to proceed with the work, which they have finished in such a

manner as to leave him nothing to regret on Mr. Pleyel’s breach of

engagement, etc., etc.

Doubtless Thomson would have applied sooner to Haydn, had he known

that the great master would condescend to such a labor. The appearance

of William Napier’s two volumes of “Original Scots Songs, in three

parts, the Harmony by Haydn,” removed any doubt on this point. For

Napier, Haydn simply added a violin part and a figured bass; for

Thomson, a full pianoforte score, parts for violin and violoncello,

and an instrumental introduction and coda. A very remarkable feature

of the enterprise was, that the composers of the accompaniments had

no knowledge of the texts, and the writers of the poetry no knowledge

of the accompaniments. The poets, in many cases, had a stanza of the

original song as a model for the metre and rhythm; in all others, they

and the composers alike received the bare melody, with nothing else to

guide them in their work but Italian musical terms: allegro, moderato,

andante, etc., etc., affettuoso, espressivo, scherzando, and the like.

This is also true of the Welsh and Irish melodies. Beethoven began his

labors for Thomson with the last named. In the preface to the first

volume, dated “Edinburgh, anno 1814,” after describing his work in

collecting Irish airs, Thomson says:

They were sent to Haydn to be harmonized along with the Scottish

and Welsh airs; but after that celebrated composer had finished

the greater part of those two works, his declining health only

enabled him to harmonize a few of the Irish Melodies; and upon his

death, it became necessary to find another composer to whom the

task of harmonizing them should be committed.[37] Of all composers

that are now living, it is acknowledged by every intelligent and

unprejudiced musician, that the only one, who occupies the same

distinguished rank with the late Haydn is BEETHOVEN. Possessing

the most original genius and inventive fancy, united to profound

science, refined taste and an enthusiastic love of his art--his

compositions, like those of his illustrious predecessor, will

bear endless repetition and afford ever new delight. To this

composer, therefore, the Editor eagerly applied for symphonies

and accompaniments to the Irish Melodies; and to his inexpressible

satisfaction, Beethoven undertook the composition. After years of

anxious suspense and teazing disappointment, by the miscarriage

of letters and manuscripts, owing to the unprecedented difficulty

of communication between England and Vienna, the long expected

symphonies and accompaniments at last reached the Editor, three

other copies having previously been lost upon the road.

Near the close of his preface, Thomson says: “After the volume was

printed and some copies of it had been circulated, an opportunity

occurred of sending it to Beethoven, who corrected the few inaccuracies

that had escaped the notice of the Editor and his friends; and he

trusts it will be found without a single error.”

[Sidenote: BEETHOVEN’S SUGGESTED ARRANGEMENTS]

Following is a translation of the letter to Thomson referred to:

Vienna, November 1, 1806.

Dear Sir:

A little excursion to Silesia which I have made is the reason why

I have postponed till now answering your letter of July 1. On my

return to Vienna I hasten to communicate to you what I have to say

and what I have decided as to the proposals you were so kind as to

make me. I will speak with all candor and exactitude, which I like

in business affairs, and which alone can forestall any complaint on

either side. Here, then, my dear Sir, are my statements:

1^{mo}. I am not indisposed, on the whole, to accept your

propositions.

2^{do}. I will take care to make the compositions easy and

pleasing, as far as I can and as far as is consistent with that

elevation and originality of style which, as you yourself say,

favorably characterize my works and from which I shall never

derogate.

3^{tio}. I cannot bring myself to write for the flute, as this

instrument is too limited and imperfect.

4^{to}. In order to give the compositions which you will publish

greater variety and to leave myself a freer field in them, though

the task of making them easy would always be an embarrassment to

me, I shall promise you only three trios for violin, viola and

violoncello, and three quintets for two violins, two violas and one

violoncello. Instead of the remaining three trios, I will send you

three quartets and, finally, two sonatas for pianoforte with an

accompanying instrument, and a quintet for two violins and flute.

In a word, I would ask you with regard to the second series of the

compositions you ask for, to rely upon my taste and good faith and

I assure you that you shall be entirely satisfied.

If you cannot agree to any of these changes, I shall not insist

upon them obstinately.

5^{to}. I should be glad if the second series of compositions were

published six months after the first.

VI^{to}. I desire a clearer explanation of the expression which

I find in your letter that no copy printed under my name shall

be introduced into Great Britain; for if you agree that these

compositions are to be published also in Germany and even in

France, I do not understand how I shall be able to prevent copies

from being taken to your country.

7^{mo}. Finally as to the honorarium, I shall expect you to send

me 100 pounds sterling, or 200 Vienna ducats in gold, and not in

Vienna bank-notes, which under the present circumstances are at too

great a discount; for if paid in these notes the sum would be as

little in proportion to the works which I should deliver to you as

to the fees which I receive for all my other compositions. Even a

fee of 200 ducats in gold is by no means excessive payment for all

that is demanded to meet your wishes.

The best way of making the payment will be for you, on the dates

when I forward you the first and second series of compositions, to

send me each time by post a bill of exchange for 100 ducats in gold

drawn upon a house in Hamburg; or for you to commission somebody in

Vienna to hand me such a bill of exchange each time, as he receives

from me the first and second series.

At the same time please let me know the date on which each series

will be published by you in order that I may engage the publishers

who issue these compositions in Germany and France, to abide by the

same.

I hope that you will find my explanations reasonable and of such

a sort that we can reach some definite agreement. In this case it

will be best to draw up a formal contract which please have the

kindness to prepare in duplicate; and I will return you one copy

signed by me.

I await your answer, that I may begin on the work; and I remain

with distinguished consideration, my dear Sir,

Your obedient servant,

Louis van Beethoven.

P.S.

I shall be glad to meet your wish that I provide little Scottish

songs with harmonized accompaniments; and in this matter I await

a more definite proposal; since it is well known to me that Herr

Haydn was paid one pound sterling for each song.

The original of this letter--in possession of the heirs of Mr.

Thomson--is in French, the signature only being in Beethoven’s hand.

Of its various propositions, that in the postscript alone led to any

results.

[Sidenote: COMPOSITIONS OF 1806]

And now to the compositions of the year. A song translated by Breuning

from a French opera, “Le Secret,” was probably the first fruits of

the newly awakened “desire and love for work,” which proved so nobly

productive during his summer absence from Vienna; it is the one

published at different times under the titles “Empfindungen bei Lydiens

Untreue,” and “Als die Geliebte sich trennen wollte.” A slight token

of gratitude for the recent zealous kindness of Breuning in the matter

of the opera, such as this song, would not long be delayed even by

Beethoven. But, whether or not this was the first composition after

the withdrawal of “Fidelio,” it is certain that, just one week before

the date of Breuning’s letter, Beethoven had set himself resolutely

to work upon grander themes than Empfindungen bei Lydiens or any

other Mädchens Untreue. These are now to be considered. He began

the quartets, Op. 59, on May 26. Certain studies to “Fidelio,” not

previously mentioned, are contained in a sketchbook of the Landsberger

Collection of Autographs, the principal contents of which are sketches

for the second, fourth, fifth, sixth and ninth Symphonies, and for

“Fidelio.” This, at first view, seems to confirm an assertion of

Czerny’s--not accepted by Schindler, who in this case is the better

authority--namely, that the Ninth Symphony, except its choral Finale,

was projected many years before its composition; but the book itself

affords a strong argument against it; it being, as the present writer

is convinced, not a manuscript in its original form, but one made up

of parts of several different books, stitched together subsequently

for the better preservation of these various symphonic studies. In

it, however, the sketches for the Fourth Symphony are in immediate

connection with those for “Fidelio.” The list, then, of important

works sketched during the progress of the opera, is this: Triple

Concerto, Op. 56; Sonata in F minor, Op. 57; Pf. Concerto in G, Op.

58; Rasoumowsky Quartets, Op. 59; Fourth Symphony, B-flat, Op. 60;

Fifth Symphony, C minor, Op. 67; Sixth Symphony, “Pastorale,” Op. 68.

Omitting the first as belonging to 1805, and the last two as belonging

to 1807-1808, the other four, we conceive, may be dated 1806. They

afford a striking example of Beethoven’s habit of working on several

compositions at the same time, and, moreover, as we believe, of his

practice in such cases of giving the works opus numbers in the order of

their completion. In this order we will take them up. “The first work

which followed the exertions caused by the opera,” writes Schindler,

“was the Sonata in F minor, Op. 57.... The master composed it

straightway from beginning to end, during a short period of rest at the

house of his friend Count Brunswick, to whom, as is known, the sonata

is dedicated.”

Beethoven, journeying into Silesia after his visit to Brunswick, took

the manuscript and had it also with him on his return to Vienna per

extra post from Troppau after the explosion at Lichnowsky’s. “During

his journey,” wrote M. Bigot half a century afterwards on a printed

copy belonging to the pianist Mortier de Fontaine,

he encountered a storm and pouring rain which penetrated the trunk

into which he had put the Sonata in F minor which he had just

composed. After reaching Vienna he came to see us and laughingly

showed the work, which was still wet, to my wife, who at once began

to look carefully at it. Impelled by the striking beginning she sat

down at the pianoforte and began playing it. Beethoven had not

expected this and was surprised to note that Madame Bigot did not

hesitate at all because of the many erasures and alterations which

he had made. It was the original manuscript which he was carrying

to his publisher for printing. When Mme. Bigot had finished playing

she begged him to give it to her; he consented, and faithfully

brought it to her after it had been printed.

Czerny says, very justly, of the unauthorized change afterwards made in

the title: “In a new edition of the Sonata in F minor, Op. 57, which

Beethoven himself considered his greatest, the title ‘Appassionata,’

for which it is too great, was added to it. This title would be more

fitly applied to the E-flat Sonata, Op. 7, which he composed in a very

impassioned mood.”

The Pf. Concerto in G, Op. 58, is dated by Schindler 1804, “according

to information given by F. Ries”; the new edition of Breitkopf and

Härtel’s thematic catalogue says (p. 197): “The Concerto was finished

in the year 1805,” without mentioning its authority. If it had nothing

better than Ries’s anecdote to offer in proof, the opinion may still

be entertained confidently, that this work remained still unfinished

until the approach of the concert season, towards the end of the year

1806.[38]

[Sidenote: THE RASOUMOWSKY QUARTETS]

The Quartets, Op. 59, certainly belong to this year. “Quartetto

1^{mo}.... Begun on May 26, 1806,” are Beethoven’s own words; and the

opus number, the reports of their production during the next winter,

and, especially, the date of their publication, making allowance for

Rasoumowsky’s right to them for a year, all point to November or

December as the latest possible date for their completion. The idea

of employing popular airs as themes was by no means new to Beethoven.

Without referring to the example set by Haydn, Pleyel, Koželuch, it had

been proposed to him by Thomson; and as to Russian melodies, he must

have read the “Allg. Musik-Zeitung” very carelessly not to have had

his curiosity aroused by the articles on Russian music published in

that journal in 1802--a curiosity which, in the constant intercourse

between Vienna, Moscow and St. Petersburg, there would be no difficulty

in gratifying. Czerny writes, however, “He had pledged himself to weave

a Russian melody into every quartet.” But Lenz, himself a Russian and

a musician, says: “The Russian themes are confined to the Finale of

No. 1 and the third movement of the second Quartet.” This is a case

in which Czerny’s authority can scarcely be gainsaid; otherwise, it

might be supposed that the composer of his own motion introduced these

two themes in compliment to Rasoumowsky. “The Adagio, E major, in the

second Rasoumowsky Quartet, occurred to him when contemplating the

starry sky and thinking of the music of the spheres,” writes Czerny in

Jahn’s notes.

Perhaps no work of Beethoven’s met a more discouraging reception from

musicians, than these now famous Quartets. One friendly contemporary

voice alone is heard--that of the “Allg. Mus. Zeit.” Czerny told Jahn,

that “when Schuppanzigh first played the Rasoumowsky Quartet in F,

they laughed and were convinced that Beethoven was playing a joke

and that it was not the quartet which had been promised.” And when

Gyrowetz bought these Quartets he said: “Pity to waste the money!”

The Allegretto vivace of the first of these quartets was long a rock

of offence. “When at the beginning of the year 1812,” says Lenz, “the

movement was to be played for the first time in the musical circle of

Field Marshal Count Soltikoff in Moscow, Bernhard Romberg trampled

under foot as a contemptible mystification the bass part which he was

to play. The Quartet was laid aside. When, a few years later, it was

played at the house of Privy Councillor Lwoff, father of the famous

violinist, in St. Petersburg, the company broke out in laughter when

the bass played his solo on ~one~ note.--The Quartet was again laid

aside.”

Thomas Appleby, father of Samuel Appleby, collector of valuable papers

referring to the violinist Bridgetower, was a leader in the musical

world of Manchester, England, and a principal director of concerts

there. When these quartets came out in London, Clementi sent a copy

of them to him. They were opened and thrown upon the pianoforte. Next

day Felix Radicati and his wife, Mme. Bertinotti, called and presented

letters, they being upon a concert tour. During the conversation the

Italian went to the pianoforte, took up the quartets and seeing what

they were, exclaimed (in substance): “Have you got these here! Ha!

Beethoven, as the world says, and as I believe, is music-mad;--for

these are not music. He submitted them to me in manuscript and, at his

request, I fingered them for him. I said to him, that he surely did not

consider these works to be music?--to which he replied, ‘Oh, they are

not for you, but for a later age!’”

Young Appleby believed in them, in spite of Radicati, and after he

had studied his part thoroughly, his father invited players of the

other instruments to his house and the first in F was tried. The first

movement was declared by all except Appleby to be “crazy music.” At the

end of the violoncello solo on one note, they all burst out laughing;

the next four bars all agreed were beautiful. Ludlow, an organist, who

played the bass, found so much to admire and so much to condemn in the

half of this second movement, which they succeeded in playing, as to

call it “patchwork by a madman.” They gave up the attempt to play it,

and not until 1813, in London, did the young man succeed in hearing the

three Quartets entire, and finding them, as he had believed, worthy of

their author.

[Sidenote: THE YEAR’S PUBLICATIONS]

The Symphony in B-flat, Op. 60, was the great work of this summer

season. Sketches prove that its successor, the fifth in C minor, had

been commenced, and was laid aside to give place to this. Nothing more

is known of the history of its composition except what is imparted by

the author’s inscription on the manuscript: “Sinfonia 4^{ta} 1806. L.

v. Bthvn.”

In singular contrast to these grand works and contemporary with

their completion, as if written for amusement and recreation after

the fatigue of severer studies, are the thirty-two Variations for

Pianoforte in C minor. They belong to this Autumn, and are among the

compositions which their author would gladly have seen pass into

oblivion. Jahn’s notes contain an anecdote in point. “Beethoven once

found Streicher’s daughter practising these Variations. After he had

listened for a while he asked her: “By whom is that?” “By you.” “Such

nonsense by me? O Beethoven, what an ass you were!””

Although the composer did not succeed in bringing his new Symphony and

Concerto to public performance this year, an opportunity offered itself

for him to give the general public as fine a taste of his quality as

composer for the violin, as he had just given to the frequenters of

Rasoumowsky’s quartet parties in the Op. 59, namely, Op. 61, the work

superscribed by its author: ~Concerto par Clemenza pour Clement, primo

Violino e Direttore al Theatro a Vienne, dal L. v. Bthvn., 1806~;--or,

as it stands on Franz Clement’s concert programme of December 23 in

the Theater-an-der-Wien: “2. A new Violin Concerto by Hrn. Ludwig van

Beethoven, played by Hrn. Clement.” It was preceded by an overture by

Méhul, and followed by selections from Mozart, Cherubini and Handel,

closing with a fantasia by the concert-giver. When Dr. Bertolini told

Jahn that “Beethoven as a rule never finished commissioned works until

the last minute,” he named this Concerto as an instance in point; and

another contemporary notes that Clement played the solo ~a vista~,

without previous rehearsal. The list of publications this year is short:

~LI^{me} Sonata pour le Pianoforte~, F major, advertised April 9 in

the “Wiener Zeitung” by the Kunst- und Industrie-Comptoir. There is

no tradition that Beethoven ever explained why he called this his

~fifty-first~, or the F minor his ~fifty-fourth~ Sonata. The best

that Czerny could suggest is that “perhaps he sketched that number

in manuscript and then destroyed them or used them in another form.”

Others have made lists of all the works in sonata-form, including

the symphonies; but none has been so probably right as to produce

conviction.

~Grand Trio pour deux Hautbois et un Cor Anglais~, C major, advertised

by Artaria and Co., April 12, without opus number. At a later date it

was called Op. 87. The same work for two violins and viola, and as a

sonata for pianoforte and violin, was advertised at the same time.

“Andante” (Favori) in F major, for Pianoforte. This was originally the

second movement of the Sonata, Op. 53--according to the anecdote before

given from Ries’s “Notizen.”

“Sinfonia eroica,” Op. 55, dedicated to Prince Lobkowitz, advertised by

the Kunst- und Industrie-Comptoir on October 29.

Besides these works, Johann Traeg advertised on June 18 “6 Grands Trios

pour le Pianoforte, violon obligé et violoncello ad lib.,” Op. 60,

Nos. 1 and 2. These are arrangements of the Quartets, Op. 18. Also “3

Grands Trios pour le Pianoforte, Violon et Violoncello,” Op. 61, No.

1; arrangements of the Trios, Op. 9. Before February, 1807, the other

numbers of the two works had been completed and had left the press. The

opus numbers were not recognized by Beethoven, for, as is seen above,

60 and 61 belong to original works of a very different order.

FOOTNOTES:

[34] Twice only.

[35] In the chapter immediately preceding the present one in the

revised German edition of this biography, Dr. Riemann introduces the

following: “Through the efforts of Otto Jahn, Gustav Nottebohm and

Erich Prieger, it has been made possible measurably to observe the

transformations which ‘Fidelio’ underwent between its first production

and its publication. The mysterious disappearance (possibly theft) of

several scores made it extremely difficult to determine the form in

which it was represented--‘Fidelio’ in three acts in 1805, ‘Leonore’

in two acts in 1806, and ‘Fidelio’ in two acts in 1814--the statements

touching the omissions and restorations of single numbers being

insufficient and not free from contradictions. About 1850, however.

Otto Jahn succeeded in putting together a score of the second revision

of 1806 from the separate parts; of this he published a vocal score

with pianoforte accompaniment towards the close of 1853 through

Breitkopf and Härtel. He also gave some hints concerning its variations

from the score of 1805. After another half-century Erich Prieger

collected the material for a restoration of the work as it was at the

first production in 1805, compiled a vocal score and gave it to the

public through Breitkopf and Härtel. More than that--he occasioned its

performance at the centennial celebration in the Royal Opera House

in Berlin.” From Prieger’s preface we take in part the following

statements:

“In 1807 Breitkopf and Härtel published three numbers from the second

revision of 1806--viz: the Trio in E-flat, ‘Ein Mann ist bald gewonnen’

(afterwards elided), the canon quartet, and the duet ‘Gut, Söhnchen,

gut’; not until 1810 was a vocal score of the second version published.

It came from the press of Breitkopf and Härtel, but was without

overtures and finales. The overture in C, No. 3, which was performed

with the opera in 1806, was published by Breitkopf and Härtel, also

in 1810; the overture in C, No. 2, with which the representation of

1805 began, edited by Otto Jahn, was published by B. and H. at the end

of 1853. (It was performed in Leipsic on January 27 of that year.)

Nottebohm notes the performance of the four overtures on January

11, 1840, and a publication in 1842; but this refers to the work as

disfigured by cuts. The so-called ‘first’ C major overture found

amongst Beethoven’s posthumous effects and published by Haslinger as

Op. 138 is in reality the first of the series, the one which, according

to Schindler’s report (third edition, I, 127), was tried over once at

Prince Lichnowsky’s and put aside as too simple, but purchased at once

by Haslinger. It is true that Nottebohm discovered sketches for the

overture in company with sketches for the symphony in C minor and, from

this fact, argued that the overture had been composed between April,

1807, and December, 1808 (see ‘Beethoveniana,’ pp. 60 ~et seq.~): but

in his analysis of the sketchbook of 1803, extending from October,

1802, to April, 1804, he shows the presence of sketches for ‘Leonore’

among such for the ‘Eroica,’ which proves that Beethoven worked on the

opera as early as 1803 and that ‘these labors were so far advanced

when the performance of Paër’s opera became known (October 3, 1804)

that there could be no thought of an abandonment.’ But this demolishes

the theory that Op. 138 must have been composed in 1807-08, and we are

compelled to believe with Kalischer that Schindler’s account is correct

and that Haslinger (Steiner and Co.) had for years been in possession

of the first overture to ‘Leonore’ which ‘had been laid aside after

a trial in 1805,’ and that in 1823, at a time when Schindler was

Beethoven’s confidant, the composer demanded that it be published and

Haslinger refused, saying: ‘We bought those manuscripts and paid for

them; consequently they are our property, and we can do with them as we

will.’ Only one thing remains problematical, and that is, what could

have persuaded Haslinger to state that he had found the overture in a

packet of dances which he purchased at the sale of Beethoven’s effects.

Kalischer calls attention to a letter from Fanny Hensel to Rebekka

Dirichlet, written after the music festival at Düsseldorf in 1836 under

the direction of Mendelssohn (see ‘Die Familie Mendelssohn,’ II, 9):

‘Oh, Becky! We have got acquainted with an overture to ‘Leonore’; a

new piece. It is notorious that it has never been played; it did not

please Beethoven and he put it aside. The man had no taste! It is so

refined, so interesting, so fascinating that I know few things which

can be compared with it. Haslinger has printed a whole edition and will

not release it. Perhaps he will do so after this success.’ That seems

to have been the case; but Haslinger permitted the work to be played

as early as February 7, 1828, at a concert of Bernhard Romberg’s and

elsewhere. In his book ‘Beethoven’s Studien im Generalbass, etc.,’

1832, Seyfried connects this overture with the project, never carried

out, of a production of the opera in Prague in 1807. ‘For the theatre

in Prague,’ he says, ‘Beethoven wrote a less difficult overture which

Haslinger, afterward R. I. Court Music Dealer, ~acquired at auction~’;

to which Haslinger replied: ‘This overture is already engraved in score

and orchestral parts and, together with other arrangements of it, will

yet appear in the course of this year.’ Nottebohm, too, convinced that

the sketches for the overture had to be placed in 1807, and doubtless

influenced by Seyfried’s statement, accepted the theory that it had

been intended for Prague. Seyfried’s statement, however, in view of

the involved story of the manuscript in the hands of Haslinger, lacks

credibility, and is probably to be charged to the account of Haslinger,

who may not have wanted to tell the truth for fear that it might lessen

the market value of the work.”--

To this the English editor feels in duty bound to say that Nottebohm’s

argument seems to him at all points invulnerable. The autograph of

the overture is no longer in existence. The score bought by Haslinger

and the parts are copies which Beethoven corrected. On the first

violin part the copyist had written “Ouvertura”; Beethoven added “in

C, Characteristic Overture.” Under this title the composition was

announced by Haslinger in 1828. He did not publish it at the time,

but there were many references to it at its performance at Romberg’s

concert and at other times as a “Characteristic” overture which had

been found among Beethoven’s posthumous papers. Between 1828 and 1832,

when Haslinger finally gave the work to the public, somebody made the

discovery, which ought to have been made at sight of the manuscript,

certainly at the first performance in 1828 (the melody of ~Florestan’s~

song occurring in it as one of the themes), that there was a connection

between it and “Fidelio.” When Haslinger published it, therefore, he

abandoned the title under which he had announced it four years before,

and called it: “Overture in C, composed in the year 1805 for the opera

‘Leonore,’ etc.” Every student knows how valuable Nottebohm’s studies

of the sketches are in the determination of dates. Composers usually

write the overtures to their operas last; indeed, they must do so when

utilizing thematic material drawn from the vocal numbers. Mr. Thayer

has already called attention to the fact that the vocal numbers were

taken up in the order of their occurrence, as Beethoven’s sketches

show. They also show that the overture was sketched after all the vocal

numbers had been planned. And the overture thus sketched was that known

as No. 2. There is no hint of the overture No. 1 in the sketches made

in 1804 and the beginning of 1805. Schindler says that Haslinger bought

the overture immediately after it had been laid aside by Beethoven.

That would have been in 1805. But Haslinger was not in Vienna till

1810. If Steiner and Co., with which firm Haslinger associated himself

shortly after his arrival in the Austrian capital and of which the

firm of Tobias Haslinger was the successor, was meant by Schindler,

it remains a mystery that the publishers, so intimately connected

with Beethoven, should have kept an overture under lock and key for

23 years and then have given it out as a work bought at the sale of

Beethoven’s effects. That circumstance could only awaken the suspicion

that the composer did not think it worthy of his name and fame. If he

did so think, he would not have demanded that Haslinger publish it in

1823. Judging by internal evidence the overture certainly seems to be

an earlier work than the overtures which the world knows by the titles

“Leonore,” Nos. 2 and 3; but contemporary reports (a letter from Vienna

printed in the “Journal des Luxus und der Moden,” Weimar, 1808) offer

evidence in addition to the testimony of Seyfried that Beethoven did

write a new overture for the projected Prague performance. No doubt

Beethoven was convinced, soon after the revival in 1806, that the

third “Leonore” was too long and too severe a piece for its purpose;

he was still of that opinion when he revised the opera for the revival

of 1814, as is evidenced by his composing the “Fidelio” overture in

E, and, more than that, consenting to the use of the overture to “The

Ruins of Athens” at the first performance. Mr. Thayer was quite as

capable of judging of the value of the evidence in the case as his

editors; he was familiar with Nottebohm’s contention; and in his

history of the year 1807 he unhesitatingly sets down the overture

known as “Leonore, No. 1” as that designed for Prague. There is no new

evidence so far as this writer knows which could justify a reversal of

the opinion which has prevailed amongst musical scholars since 1872.

[36] Frimmel, in his “Beethoven” (second edition, 1893 p. 42), tells

the story in essentially the same manner on the authority of a grandson

of Dr. Weiser, house physician of Prince Lichnowsky; Dr. Weiser’s

version had previously been printed by Franz Xaver Bach in the “Wiener

Deutsche Zeitung” of August 31, 1873. In both cases the story ends with

Beethoven’s sending a letter to Lichnowsky containing this passage:

“Prince, what you are you are by accident and birth; what I am I am

through myself. There have been and will still be thousands of princes;

there is only one Beethoven.” Authentic or not, the expression might

well have come from the lips of Beethoven in a fit of anger.

[37] Thomson’s memory was a little at fault when this preface was

written; the proposal was made to Beethoven before Haydn’s death.

[38] But on March 27, 1806, Beethoven offered the Concerto to

Hoffmeister and Kühnel together with “Christus am Ölberg” for 600

florins. The work, if not completed, must have been well under way

early in the year.

Chapter V

Beethoven’s Friends and Patrons in the First Lustrum of the

Nineteenth Century--An Imperial Pupil, Archduke Rudolph--Count

Rasoumowsky--Countess Erdödy--Baroness Ertmann--Marie

Bigot--Therese Malfatti--Nanette Streicher--Zizius--Anecdotes.

He who dwells with wife and children in a fixed abode, usually finds

himself, as age draws on, one of a small circle of old friends; and

hoary heads, surrounded by their descendants, the inheritors of

parental friendships, sit at the same tables and make merry where they

had gathered in the prime of life. The unmarried man, who can call no

spot on earth’s surface his own, who spends his life in hired lodgings,

here to-day and there to-morrow, has, as a rule, few friendships of

long standing. By divergency in tastes, opinions, habits, increasing

with the years, often by the mere interruption of social intercourse,

or by a thousand equally insignificant causes, the old ties are

sundered. In the memoranda and correspondence of such a man familiar

names disappear, even when not removed by death, and strange ones take

their places. The mere passing acquaintance of one period becomes the

chosen friend of another; while the former friend sinks into the mere

acquaintance, or is forgotten. Frequently no cause for the change can

be assigned. One can only say--it happened so.

Thus it was with Beethoven, even to a remarkable degree; in part

because of his increasing infirmity, in part owing to peculiarities of

his character. It was his misfortune, also, that--having no pecuniary

resource but the exercise of his talents for musical composition, and

being at the same time too proud and too loyal to his ideas of art to

write for popular applause--he was all his life long thrown more or

less upon the generosity of patrons. But death, misfortune or other

causes deprived him of old patrons, as of old friends, and compelled

him to seek, or at least accept, the kindness of new ones. A part of

this chapter must be devoted to certain new names in both categories,

which become prominent in his history in the years immediately before

us.

[Sidenote: A TALENTED ARCHDUKE]

Archduke Rudolph Johann Joseph Rainer, youngest son of Emperor Leopold

II, and half-brother of Emperor Franz, was born January 8, 1788, and

therefore was, at the end of 1805, just closing his seventeenth year.

Like his unfortunate uncle, Elector Maximilian, he was destined to the

church, and like him, too, he had much musical taste and capacity. His

private tutors were all men of fine culture, and one of them, Joseph

Edler von Baumeister, Doctor of Laws, remained in later years in his

service and will be met with hereafter. In music he, with the children

of the imperial family, was instructed by the R. I. Court Composer,

Anton Tayber, and made such good progress that, if tradition may be

trusted, he, while still but a boy, played to general satisfaction in

the salons of Lobkowitz and others. But an archduke has not much to

fear from hostile criticism; a better proof that he really possessed

musical talent and taste is afforded by the fact that, so soon as he

could emancipate himself from Tayber, and have a voice in the selection

of a teacher, he became a pupil of Beethoven. It is largely possible

that the old relation of the composer to Maximilian may have had

some influence upon the determination of his nephew; and it is very

probable that Rudolph’s decision was based upon the great reputation of

Beethoven and the respect in which, as he saw, the artist was held by

the Schwarzenbergs, Liechtensteins, Kinskys, and their compeers. But

whatever weight be allowed to these and like considerations, it must

have been something more than a capricious desire to call the great

pianist “master,” which made him his pupil, friend and patron until

death parted them. One necessarily thinks better of his musical talents

for this, just as Maximilian’s musical taste and insight stand higher

in our estimation because of his early appreciation of Mozart’s genius.

The precise date of Beethoven’s engagement has eluded the research of

even the accurate and indefatigable Köchel. There is so little doubt,

however, that he was the immediate successor of Tayber, as to render

reasonably certain that it occurred at the end of the young Archduke’s

fifteenth year--that is, in the winter of 1803-4. It is perhaps worth

remarking, that the “Staats-Schematismus” for 1803 first gives, in the

R. I. Household, a separate chamber to the boys, Rainer and Rudolph;

three years later “Archduke Rudolph, coadjutor of the Archbishopric of

Olmütz,” is given one alone; but before 1806 he certainly was the pupil

of Beethoven.

In Fräulein Giannatasio’s notices from the years 1816-18,[39] she

relates:

At that time Beethoven gave lessons to Archduke Rudolph, a brother

of Emperor Franz. I once asked him if the Archduke played well.

“When he is feeling just right,” was the answer, accompanied by

a smile. He also laughingly referred to the fact that he would

sometimes hit him on the fingers, and that when the august

gentleman once tried to refer him to his place, he pointed for

justification to a passage from a poet, Goethe, I think.

It must have been a mistake of the young lady’s to make Beethoven speak

here in the present tense; for it is incredible that he should have

taken such a liberty in 1816-17, when Rudolph was a man of some thirty

years; or indeed at any time after the first lessons in his boyhood.

The anecdote therefore in some degree supports the conjecture above

offered. So also does Schindler’s statement--a point on which he was

likely to be well informed by the master himself--that the pianoforte

part of the Triple Concerto, Op. 56, was written for the Archduke;

for this work was sketched, at the latest, in the spring of 1805, and

surely would not have been undertaken until the composer thoroughly

knew his pupil’s powers, and that his performance would do the master

no discredit. And finally, what Ries relates is in the tone of one

who had personal knowledge of the circumstances detailed; and thus

determines the date as not later than 1804:

Etiquette and all that is connected with it was never known to

Beethoven [?] nor was he ever willing to learn it. For this

reason he often caused great embarrassment in the household of

Archduke Rudolph when he first went to him. An attempt was made

by force to teach him to have regard for certain things. But this

was intolerable to him; he would promise, indeed, to mend his

ways but--that was the end of it. Finally one day when, as he

expressed it, he was being tutored [~als man ihn, wie er es nannte,

hofmeisterte~] he angrily forced his way to the Archduke and flatly

declared that while he had the greatest reverence for his person,

he could not trouble himself to observe all the regulations which

were daily forced upon him. The Archduke laughed good-naturedly

and commanded that Beethoven be permitted to go his own gait

undisturbed--it was his nature and could not be altered.

At all events it may be accepted as certain that Beethoven had

now, 1805-6, formed those relations with the Archduke, which were

strengthened and more advantageous to him with each successive year,

until death put an end to them.

Two brothers, differing in age by nineteen years, owed their rise

from the condition of singers at the Russian Court into positions

of great wealth and political importance to their gratification of

the lascivious lusts of two imperial princesses, afterwards known in

history as the Empresses Elizabeth Petrowna and Catherine II. Thus the

two Rasums, born in 1709 and 1728, of half-Cossack parentage, in the

obscure Ukraine village of Lemeschi, became the Counts Rasoumowsky,

nobles of the Russian Empire. They were men of rare ability, and, like

Shakespeare’s ~Duncan~, “bore their faculties so meek,” that none of

the monarchs under whom they served, not even those who personally

disliked either of them, made him the victim of imperial caprice or ill

will. A whimsical proof of the rapidity with which the new name became

known throughout Europe is its introduction in 1762 into a farce of the

English wit, Samuel Foote.[40] The Empresses provided their paramours

with wives from noble families and continued their kindness to the

children born of these unions--one of whom came in time to occupy a

rather prominent place among the patrons of Beethoven.

[Sidenote: COUNT ANDREAS RASOUMOWSKY]

Andreas Kyrillovitch (born October 22, 1752), fourth son of the

younger Rasoumowsky, was destined for the navy and received the best

education possible in those days for his profession, even to serving in

what was then the best of all schools, an English man-of-war. He had

been elevated to the rank of captain when, at the age of 25, he was

transferred to the diplomatic service. He was Ambassador successively

at Venice, Naples, Copenhagen and Stockholm; less famous, perhaps, for

his diplomacy than notorious for the profuseness of his expenditures,

and for his amours with women of the highest rank, the Queen of Naples

not excepted.

Rasoumowsky was personally widely known at Vienna, where he had

married (November 4, 1788) Elizabeth, Countess Thun, elder sister of

the Princess Charles Lichnowsky, and whither he was transferred as

Ambassador early in 1792, being officially presented to the Emperor on

Friday, May 25, as the “Wiener Zeitung” records. Near the end of Czar

Paul’s reign (in March, 1799) he was superseded by Count Kalichev;

but on the accession of Alexander was restored, his “presentation

audience” taking place October 14, 1801. His dwelling and office

had formerly been in the Johannes-Gasse, but now (1805-6) he was in

the Wallzeil, but on the point of removing to a new palace built by

himself. Schnitzer says: “Rasoumowsky lived in Vienna like a prince,

encouraging art and science, surrounded by a luxurious library and

other collections and admired and envied by all; what advantages

accrued from all this to Russian affairs is another question.” This

palace, afterwards nearly destroyed by fire and rebuilt, is now, after

various vicissitudes, the seat of the Imperial Geological Institute,

Landstrasse, Rasoumowsky-Gasse No. 3.

True to the traditions of his family, the Count was a musician and one

of the best connoisseurs and players of Haydn’s quartets, in which he

was accustomed to play the second violin. It is affirmed, evidently

on good authority, that he had studied these works under that master

himself. It would seem a matter of course, that this man, so nearly

connected, too, with Lichnowsky, was one of the first to appreciate

and encourage the genius of the young Beethoven upon his removal from

Rome to Vienna. In fact, this has been affirmed most positively and

discoursed upon at great length; and yet the few known data on this

point--all of a negative character--are in conflict with that opinion.

Neither Wegeler nor Ries mentions Rasoumowsky. Whatever Seyfried and

Schindler may conjecture, all the facts given by them belong to the

period on which we are now entering. Up to Op. 58, inclusive, not

a composition of Beethoven’s is dedicated to Rasoumowsky. Just now

(end of 1805), the Count has given the composer an order for quartets

with Russian themes, original or imitated; but only once, in all the

contemporary printed or manuscript authorities yet discovered, have the

two names been brought into connection; namely, in the subscription to

the Trios in 1795, where we find the Countess of Thun, her daughters

and the Lichnowskys down (in the aggregate) for 32 copies, and “S. E.

le Comte Rasoumoffsky, Embassadeur de Russie”--for one.

[Sidenote: COUNTESS ERDÖDY AND BARONESS ERTMANN]

The Hungarian Count Peter Erdödy married, June 6, 1796, the Countess

Anna Marie Niczky (born 1779), then just seventeen years of age.

Reichardt describes her, in December, 1808, as a “very beautiful, fine

little woman who from her first confinement (1799) was afflicted with

an incurable disease which for ten years has kept her in bed for all

but two to three months”--in which he greatly exaggerates the evil

of her condition--“but nevertheless gave birth to three healthy and

dear children who cling to her like burs; whose sole entertainment

was found in music; who plays even Beethoven’s pieces right well and

limps with still swollen feet from one pianoforte to another, yet is

so merry and friendly and good--all this often saddens me during an

otherwise joyous meal participated in by six or eight good musical

souls.” There is nothing to show how or when the very great intimacy

between the Countess and Beethoven began; but for many years she is

prominent among the most useful and valued of his many female friends,

and it is not at all improbable that the vicinity of the Erdödy estate

at Jedlersee am Marchfelde was one reason for his frequent choice of

summer lodgings in the villages on the Danube, north of the city. Their

intercourse was at length (about 1820) abruptly terminated by the

banishment for life of the Countess beyond the limits of the Austrian

Empire--unhappily, for reasons that cannot be impugned. It is a sad and

revolting story, over which a veil may be drawn. There is no necessity,

arising from Beethoven’s relations to her, to give it now the publicity

which was then so carefully and effectually avoided. It is even

possible that Beethoven’s heart was never wrung by a knowledge of the

particulars.

The Baroness Dorothea von Ertmann, wife of an Austrian officer who

was stationed in those years at or near Vienna, studied Beethoven’s

compositions with the composer, and became, as all contemporary

authorities agree, if not the greatest player of these works at least

the greatest of her sex. Reichardt, a most competent judge, heard her

repeatedly in the winter of 1808-09 and recorded a highly favorable

impression of her.

Well might the master call her his “Dorothea-Cäcilia!” In that

delightful letter, in which the young Felix Mendelssohn describes his

visit at Milan (1831) to the Ertmanns, “the most agreeable, cultured

people conceivable, both in love as if they were a bridal couple, and

yet married 34 years,” where he and the lady delighted each other by

turns in the performance of Beethoven’s compositions and “the old

General, who now appeared in his stately gray commander’s uniform,

wearing many orders, was very happy and wept with joy”; and in the

intervals he told “the loveliest anecdotes about Beethoven, how, in

the evening when she played for him, he used the candle snuffers as a

toothpick, etc.” In this letter there is one touching and beautiful

reminiscence of the Baroness. “She related,” says Mendelssohn, “that

when she lost her last child, Beethoven at first did not want to come

into the house; at length he invited her to visit him, and when she

came he sat himself down at the pianoforte and said simply: ‘We will

now talk to each other in tones,’ and for over an hour played without

stopping, and as she remarked: ‘he told me everything, and at last

brought me comfort.’”

It was noted in a former chapter, that the leading female pianists

also of Vienna were divided into ~pro~ and ~anti~ Beethovenists. The

former party just at this time gained a valuable accession in a young

lady who, during her five years’ residence there, became one of the

most devoted as well as most highly accomplished players of Beethoven’s

compositions--Marie Bigot. From 1809 to her death in 1820 she lived in

Paris, where her superiority, first as dilettante, then as professional

player and teacher, made her the subject of one of the most pleasing

sketches in Fétis’s “Biographie Universelle des Musiciens.” From this

we learn that she was born of a family named Kiene on March 3, 1786, at

Colmar in Alsatia and married M. Bigot, who took her to Vienna in 1804.

In the Austrian capital she became acquainted with Haydn, and formed a

friendship also with Beethoven and Salieri. Such associations naturally

fired her ardently musical nature, and at 20 years of age she had

already developed great skill and originality. The first time that she

played in the presence of Haydn, the old gentleman was so moved that he

clasped her in his arms and cried: “O, my dear child, I did not write

this music--it is you who have composed it!” And upon the printed sheet

from which she had played he wrote: “On February 20, 1805, Joseph Haydn

was happy.” The melancholy genius of Beethoven found an interpreter in

Madame Bigot, whose enthusiasm and depth of feeling added new beauties

to those which he had conceived. One day she played a sonata which he

had just composed, in such a manner as to draw from him the remark:

“That is not exactly the character which I wanted to give this piece;

but go right on. If it is not wholly mine it is something better.” (~Si

ce n’est pas tout à fait moi, c’est mieux que moi.~)

[Sidenote: BEETHOVEN AND MADAME BIGOT]

Bigot, according to Reichardt, was “an honest, cultivated Berliner,

Librarian of Count Rasoumowsky.” As this was precisely in those years

when Beethoven was most patronized by that nobleman, the composer and

the lady were thus brought often together and very warm, friendly

relations resulted. Jahn possessed for many years the copy of a very

characteristic letter of Beethoven to the Bigots, which leads one to

suspect that his attentions to the young wife had at one time the

appearance of being a little too pointed. The letter is undated; but

as the precise date happens to be of no importance, and was of course

before 1809, it may be inserted here in order to explode at the outset

the nonsense which has been published concerning a fancied inordinate

passion of the master for the young lady. Perhaps for this very reason

Jahn finally sent it to the “Grenzboten” (II, 1867):

Dear Marie, dear Bigot!

It is only with the deepest regret that I am compelled to

recognize that the purest and most harmless feelings can often be

misunderstood--as affectionately as you have met me I have never

thought of interpreting it otherwise than that you were giving

me your friendship. You must deem me very vain and contemptible

if you assume that the advances of such excellent persons as

yourselves could make me believe that I had at once won your

love--moreover, it is one of my first principles never to stand in

other than friendly relations with the wife of another man, I do

not wish by such relations to fill my soul with distrust against

her who may some day share my fate with me--and thus ruin for

myself the loveliest and purest life. It is possible that I have

jested with Bigot a few times in a way that was not too refined, I

told you myself that I am occasionally ill behaved. I am natural

in my intercourse with all my friends and hate all restraint. I

count Bigot amongst them, if something that I do displeases him,

friendship demands that he tell me so--and I will certainly have

a care never to offend again--but how can good Marie put so bad a

construction on my actions....

With regard to my invitation to go driving with you and Caroline

it was but natural that I should believe, Bigot having opposed

your going with me alone, that both of you deemed it unbecoming

or objectionable--and when I wrote I had no other purpose than to

make you understand that I saw no ~harm~ in it, and when I declared

that it was a matter of great importance to me that you should

not refuse it was only to persuade you to enjoy the gloriously

beautiful day, I had your and Caroline’s pleasure in mind more than

my own and I thought to compel you to accede to my wishes when I

said that ~mistrust on your part or a refusal would really offend

me~--you ought really to ponder how you will make amends for having

spoilt for me a day that was so bright because of my cheerful

mood and the cheerful weather--if I said that you misunderstood

me, your present judgment of me shows that I may have been right,

not to think about that which you thought about in connection

with the matter--when I said that ~something evil~ might come of

it if I came to you, that was more than anything else a ~joke~

which had only the one purpose of showing how everything about you

attracts me, that I have no greater wish than always to live with

you, is also the truth--even in case there was a hidden meaning

in it even the most sacred friendship can yet have secrets, but

to ~misinterpret~ the secret of a friend--because one cannot at

once guess it, that you ought not to do--dear Bigot, dear Marie,

~never, never~ will you find me ignoble, from childhood I learned

to love virtue--and all that is beautiful and good--you have hurt

me to the heart. It shall only serve to make our friendship the

firmer. I am really not at all well to-day and I shall scarcely

be able to see you, yesterday after the quartets my feelings and

imagination continually called up before me the fact that I had

made you suffer, I went to the Ridotto (ball) last night to seek

distraction, but in vain, everywhere I was haunted by the vision of

all of you, ceaselessly it said to me they are so good and probably

are suffering because of you. Dejected in spirits I hurried

away.[41] Write me a few lines.

Your true

Friend Beethoven

embraces you all.

[Sidenote: MALFATTI, BERTOLINI AND MME. STREICHER]

Gleichenstein introduced Beethoven to a family named Malfatti. The

culture, refinement, musical taste and high character of the parents,

and the uncommon grace and beauty of their two charming children,

young girls now of twelve to fourteen years, rendered the house very

attractive to the composer. There was less than a year’s difference

in the ages of the children; Therese was born January 1st and Anna

December 7th of the same year; whether 1792 or 1793, our friendly

authority was not certain. Anna became, in due time (1811), the wife

of Gleichenstein; and Therese was at one time the object of one of

Beethoven’s short-lived, unrequited passions. Her niece writes: “That

Beethoven loved my aunt, and wished to marry her, and also that her

parents would never have given their consent, is true.”[42] There is

nothing to determine conclusively when the master’s fondness assumed

this intenser form; but there are good reasons (which may perhaps

appear hereafter) for believing, that it was at least five years later

than our present date. His attentions to the young lady, at all events,

attracted no notice outside the family circle, nor did her rejection

of them prevent the continuance of warm, friendly relations between

the parties, up to and after her marriage in 1817. Dr. Sonnleithner

establishes both these facts:

Frau Therese Baroness von Drosdick, ~née~ Malfatti (died in Vienna,

60 years old, on April 27, 1851), was the wife of Court Councillor

Wilhelm Baron von Drosdick. She was a beautiful, lively and

intellectual woman, a very good pianoforte player and, besides,

the cousin of the famous physician and friend of Beethoven’s,

Dr. von Malfatti. Herein lies the explanation of an unusually

kind relationship with Beethoven which resulted in a less severe

regard for conventional forms. Nothing is known of a particular

intimacy between her and Beethoven. A relative of the Baroness,

who knew her intimately, knows also that she and Beethoven formed

a lasting friendship, but as to any warmer feeling on either side

he knew nothing, nor anything to the contrary; but he says: “When

conversation turned on Beethoven, she spoke of him reverentially,

but with a certain reserve.”

Through these Malfattis, Beethoven became also known personally to

the physician of the same name and “they were great friends for a

long time. Towards each other they were like two hard millstones, and

they separated. Malfatti used to say of Beethoven: ‘He is a disorderly

(~konfuser~) fellow--but all the same he may be the greatest genius.’”

The assistant of Malfatti, Dr. Bertolini, was long the confidential

physician of Beethoven; and through him he became personally known

to the present head of the great firm of “Miller & Co.,” wholesale

merchants in Vienna, who for many years was fond of describing his

interviews, in youth, with the “great Beethoven.” Though nothing

specially worthy of record took place, Mr. Miller’s recollections are

interesting as additional testimony to the activity of the master’s

mind and his enjoyment of jocose, witty and improving conversation.

Through a caprice of Beethoven, his cordial relations to Dr. Bertolini

came to an abrupt end about 1815; but the doctor, though pained and

mortified, retained his respect and veneration for his former friend to

the last. In 1831, he gave a singular proof of his delicate regard for

Beethoven’s reputation; supposing himself to be at the point of death

from cholera, and being too feeble to examine his large collection of

the composer’s letters and notes to him, he ordered them all to be

burned, because a few were not of a nature to be risked in careless

hands.

The reader will not have forgotten Marie Anna Stein of

Augsburg--pianoforte-maker Stein’s “Mädl,” as Mozart called her. After

the death of her father (February 29, 1792), she, being then just 23

years of age, assisted by her brother, Matthäus Andreas, a youth of

sixteen years, took charge of and continued his business. The great

reputation of the Stein instruments led to the removal of the Steins to

Vienna. An imperial patent, issued January 17, 1794, empowered Nanette

and Andreas Stein to establish their business “in the Landstrasse 301,

zur Rothen Rose,” and in the following July they arrived, accompanied

by Johann Andreas Streicher, an “admirable pianist and teacher” of

Munich, to whom Nanette was engaged. The business flourished nobly

under the firm-name “Geschwister Stein” until 1802, “when they

separated and each carried on an independent business.” It is known

that Beethoven, immediately upon the arrival of the Steins, renewed his

intercourse with them, of which, however, there is but a single record

worth quoting, until a period several years later than that before us.

Reichardt writes in his letter of February 7, 1809: