Updates about classical music
Beethoven, Franz Schubert: musical dialogue and the C-minor series. No investigation of the C-minor dialogue among composers can be complete without the astonishing C-minor sonata by Franz Schubert, whose birthday we recognized on January 31. Schubert, a native of Vienna, was 15 years Beethoven’s junior, although he died just one year after Beethoven at the […]
Beethoven and the C-minor dialogue. We return to Beethoven with two of his best-known sonatas in C-minor: the Pathétique and the Opus 111. Listen for the development of the theme that Bach put forward in his Musical Offering! Sonata Pathétique (1st movement) played by Dubravka Tomsic: Opus 111 (1st movement) played by Alfred Brendel:
Beethoven, Mozart, Bach: A Musical Dialogue. We continue the investigation of the C-minor dialogue with Bach’s Ricercar à 6 and Mozart’s sonata K.457. When the elderly J.S. Bach visited his son who was court musician for Frederick II, the king presented the elder Bach with a difficult theme, and challenged him to improvise a three-part […]
Beethoven, Mozart, Bach: A musical dialogue. Any discussion of musical masters in dialogue must acknowledge the towering figure of Johann Sebastian Bach. The C-minor series we are about to explore had as its genesis Bach’s Musical Offering – a set of pieces based on a theme proposed to him in 1747 by Frederick II, King […]
Mozart, Beethoven: A musical dialogue. Notes by Margaret Scialdone. Beethoven ‘s use of thematic material from Mozart was not limited to opera. Note the development of the opening theme of Mozart’s C-minor Piano Concerto, K491, in Beethoven’s C-minor Piano Concerto, Opus 37. (We’ll be looking more at the C-minor key in the coming days.) First, […]
Mozart, Beethoven: A musical dialogue Notes by Margaret Scialdone, In 1798, Beethoven turned again to Mozart’s opera “The Magic Flute”, this time composing twelve variations on Papageno’s aria, “Ein Madchen oder Weibchen” in which the ridiculous bird-catcher expresses his desperation for a mate. The translation of the words to the Ein Madchen oder Weibchen are: […]
Mozart, Beethoven dialogue continued Notes by Margaret Scialdone. We continue the Mozart-Beethoven dialogue with Beethoven’s 7 Variations on “Bei Männern, welche Liebe Fühlen” (‘A man who can feel love must have a good heart’), the beautiful duet sung by Pamina and Papageno in the first act of “The Magic Flute”. Mozart’s opera employs fantastical characters […]
Mozart – Beethoven a musical dialogue over time. Notes by Margaret Scialdone. Mozart’s opera Don Giovanni, the story of a dissolute lecher who is finally dragged to Hell, provided a rich source of material for Beethoven. In the opening scene, Don Giovanni kills the Commendatore, who has rushed to avenge the rape of his daughter, […]
Mozart’s birthday; Beethoven’s regard for him. Notes by Margaret Scialdone. ~ As January 27th is the 265th birthday of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, we’ll step away from the sonatas for a few days and allow Beethoven to pay homage to his great predecessor. The teenaged Beethoven first went to Vienna in 1787, and it’s believed that […]
Schiller Institute NYC Chorus Robert Burns – Friend of FreedomJoin us for a birthday celebration.Sunday, January 24th, 6:00 pm EST As the story goes, in 1793, at a private dinner in England, when the host proposed the health of William Pitt [first prime minister of Great Britain], the poet said, sharply, “Let us drink the health of […]