Ravinia Festival

Composed in 1800-2. The orchestra includes one flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns, strings and solo violin.

Acting as his brother's business agent, Caspar Carl van Beethoven offered a batch of musical manuscripts to the Leipzig publisher Breitkopf & Härtel on October 18, 1802. The asking price for two sets of piano variations (Opp. 34 and 35) amounted to 50 ducats, while Beethoven hoped to sell the "two adagios for violin with complete instrumental accompaniment" for 24 ducats. Three weeks later, Gottfried Christoph Härtel wrote a letter accepting the variations, but cordially declining the "adagios." He explained that legitimate publishers like himself had to minimize costs in order to compete with the pirate printers issuing less-expensive scores.

Caspar Carl tried to peddle the violin pieces to Johann Anton André in Offenbach, but he also refused the scores. Ludwig eventually issued these two works, both retitled "romances," through different firms. Hoffmeister published the Romance in G Major, Op. 40, in 1803, and Vienna's Bureau des Arts et d'Industrie released the Romance in F Major, Op. 50, in 1805. Scholars have reasonably assumed that these solo violin works and an earlier unpublished violin concerto (1790-92) served as preliminary studies culminating in 1806 with the magisterial Violin Concerto in D Major.

Probably performed for the first time in 1798. The score calls for solo violin and an orchestra of one flute, two oboes, two bassoons, two horns and strings.

Beethoven composed the F-major work sometime around 1798, four years earlier than its companion. The solo violin immediately submits a gentle melody gently supported by tutti strings. Winds join for the orchestral repetition of this eight-measure theme. A brief cadence is followed by a moment of silence. The violin returns with another melodic idea that grows more virtuosic and agitated. A weaving triplet pattern provides a link to the return of the opening theme. Another episode moves quite dramatically through different minor keys. The violin plays a pseudo-cadenza (the orchestra repeats a single chord, instead of going silent) then Beethoven restates his initial violin melody a final time.

Allegro ma non troppo
Larghetto [attacca]
Rondo: Allegro

First performed in Vienna on December 23, 1806, by violinist Franz Clement. The orchestra includes one flute, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani, strings and the solo violin.

"Proceed along the path which you have hitherto trodden so splendidly and so gloriously. Nature and art vie in making you one of the greatest artists. Follow both, and you need not fear that you will fail to reach the great--the greatest goal on earth to which the artist can attain. Be happy, my dear young friend, and come back soon, so that I may hear again your delightful, splendid playing." In 1794, Beethoven inscribed these words of encouragement and praise in the autograph book of 14-year-old violin Wunderkind, Franz Clement (1780-1842). A child prodigy of Mozartian abilities, Clement made numerous tours throughout Europe, prodded along by his exploitative father.

Beethoven crossed paths with Clement a dozen years later in Vienna, when the young violinist became leader of the orchestra at the Theater an der Wien. Anxious to reestablish professional ties with Clement, Beethoven hastily composed a concerto for the violinist's already announced December concert date. (Sketches for the violin concerto exist side-by-side with music for the Symphony No. 5 and transcriptions of Handel's Messiah.) According to legend, Beethoven finished the score so close to the premiere that Clement played the solo part without previous rehearsal. Although this report may seem a bit fanciful, it should not be dismissed lightly; Clement was known for his technical perfection and phenomenal aural memory, which allowed him to transcribe complete choral-orchestral works from memory (for example, Spohr's The Last Judgment and Haydn's The Creation). Between concerto movements, Clement allegedly played his own composition on the G-string, with the violin held upside-down! Perhaps apologizing for his tardiness, Beethoven penned a witicism on his manuscript: "Concerto par Clemenza pour Clement" (clemenza means "clemency or mercy").

Beethoven dedicated his published violin concerto score (1808) to longtime friend Stephan von Breuning. The Breunings became surrogate relatives to Beethoven, whose own family suffered from his father's alcoholic fits of violence. Frau Hélène, the widow Breuning, became a stable mother figure. The boys--Christopher, Lorenz and Stephan--were boyhood cronies. Stephan and Ludwig once fell in love with the same young woman, Jeannette d'Honrath. Beethoven also may have harbored romantic feelings for Eleonore von Breuning, a sister. Stephan moved to Vienna in 1801, accepted work with the Imperial War Council and reunited with his friend Ludwig.

The Breuning connection continued one step further in relation to the violin concerto. At the insistence of Muzio Clementi, the Italian pianist-composer-music publisher living in London, Beethoven rewrote this work as a piano concerto, doing little more than adding a left-hand accompaniment to the right-hand melody. For this edition, Beethoven composed solo cadenzas, including a novel first-movement cadenza for piano and timpani. Clementi's edition was dedicated to Julie von Breuning (née Julie von Vering), Stephan's 18-year-old bride who died tragically in 1809, one year after their marriage. Beethoven left no authentic cadenzas for the violin version. Clement, according to traditional practice, probably improvised a cadenza during performance. Later violinists, notably Joseph Joachim and Fritz Kreisler, have contributed their own cadenzas. Max Rostal, an English violinist of Austrian birth, has transcribed Beethoven's piano cadenzas (retaining the timpani part) for violin.

The violin concerto offers a congenial, broadly scaled contest between solo violin and orchestra. Four timpani strokes (the pitch D) introduce the woodwind's first phrase. Again, before the second phrase, Beethoven repeats four percussive pitches (A). The sequence repeats with timpani and strings, but the pitches are altered to D-sharp and A. This unusually prominent timpani gesture-criticized by contemporary reviewers who mockingly referred to this work as the "Concerto for Timpani"-lends an oft-overlooked cohesion to the Allegro ma non troppo. A second theme wavers between major (woodwinds) and minor (strings), but always combined with the repeated pitches. Beethoven delays the solo entrance as long as possible, then the violin joins with a variation of the first theme. In course, the lyrical contrasting melody returns, but the violin plays only one phrase, spending the rest of its time weaving a countermelody. Development begins almost imperceptibly. Themes retain their complete identities, but the violin still circumvents the second theme. Before restating his main melodies, Beethoven introduces a ravishing new G-minor theme in the violin. Recapitulation heightens dialogue between the solo and orchestra. Only after the unaccompanied cadenza does the principal violin render the complete second theme over ensemble pizzicatos.

The Larghetto adopts a modified variation form. Muted orchestral strings state the tranquil theme. The solo violin remains an indirect participant in the first two variations, layering virtuosic decorations above the wind melody (horns and clarinet, then bassoon). Variation 3 belongs to the orchestral strings and winds alone. The violin returns with a new, embellished melody. This idea alternates with another variation of the first theme. An ad libitum violin cadenza connects to the final movement. Beethoven begins his rondo with a catchy, folkish melody that reappears almost without alteration between contrasting themes. After its cadenza, the violin remains an active musical participant until the final chordal outburst of the elaborate coda.

Program notes © Todd E. Sullivan 2003

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