Four Centuries of Great Music August 21, 2022 The Symphony Through the Centuries Episode 2

Welcome to the second episode of the Four Centuries of Great Music series Symphonies through the Centuries.  Tonight we are talking about Ludwig van Beethoven and a couple of his symphonies.  As with much of the music that he tackled, Beethoven changed the  symphony.  But this change was not instantaneous but occurred in an evolution.  Beethoven’s first symphony was in the classical style following mostly from his predecessors, the late Haydn and Mozart symphonies with a typical 4 movement, Fast, Slow, Minuet and Trio and Finale which often combined both slow and fast components.  But the second symphony replaced the Minuet and Trio with the scherzo - a lighthearted, playful movement. 

Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2 in D major op. 36 in 4 movements 1. Adagio molto, Allegro con brio; 2. Larghetto; 3. Scherzo-Allegro and 4. Allegro Molto

Piano Trio Version of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2 in D major op. 36
But since every one could not attend symphony concerts to hear this music, Beethoven's pupil Ferdinand Ries arranged the second symphony for piano trio so this work could be enjoyed in homes in the 19th century. 


We will be closing this second hour of this second episode of the Four Centuries of Great Music series Symphonies through the Centuries with Beethoven’s 6th symphony in F major op 68 often called the Pastorale.   The 6th symphony is often described as Beethoven’s most emotional symphony.   This is also one of Beethoven's few works containing explicitly programmatic content.  Beethoven composed this symphony to express emotions, such as the joyfulness for being in the country at the beginning of the symphony, the energized spirit in the third movement's folk dance, and the inner peace being achieved in the finale after the stormy fourth movement.

The symphony has five, rather than the four movements typical of symphonies although there are no pauses between the last three movements. Beethoven wrote a programmatic title at the beginning of each movement:

1. Erwachen heiterer Empfindungen bei der Ankunft auf dem Lande - Awakening of cheerful feelings on arrival in the countryside
2. Szene am Bach - Scene by the Brook
3. Lustiges Zusammensein der Landleute - Merry gathering of country folk
4. Gewitter, Sturm - Thunder, storm
5. Hirtengesang. Frohe und dankbare Gefühle nach dem Sturm - Shepherd's song. Cheerful and thankful feelings after the storm

The symphony begins with a placid and cheerful movement first movement marked Allegro ma non troppo depicting the composer's feelings as he arrives in the country. The movement, in 2/4 meter, is in sonata form, and its motifs are extensively developed.

The second movement marked Andante molto mosso is another sonata-form movement, this time in 12/8 and in the key of B♭ major, the subdominant of the main key of the work. It begins with the strings playing a motif that imitates flowing water.
Towards the end is a cadenza for woodwind instruments that imitates bird calls. Beethoven helpfully identified the bird species in the score: nightingale (flute), quail (oboe), and cuckoo (two clarinets).

The third movement is a scherzo marked Allegro and is in 3/4 time, which depicts country folk dancing and reveling. It is in F major, returning to the main key of the symphony. The movement is an altered version of the usual form for scherzi, in that the trio appears twice rather than just once.  The final return of the theme conveys a riotous atmosphere with a faster tempo. The movement ends abruptly, leading without a pause into the fourth movement.

The fourth movement, in F minor is marked Allegro and is in 4/4 time, is the part where Beethoven calls for the largest instrumentation in the entire piece. It depicts a violent thunderstorm with painstaking realism, building from distant thunder and a few drops of rain to a great climax with loud thunder, lightning, high winds, and heavy downpours of rain (16-note tremolo passages on the strings).

The finale, which is in F major is marked Allegretto and is in 6/ 8 time. The movement is in sonata rondo form, in an Intro-[A-B-A]-C-[A-B-A]-Coda structure. Like many finales, this movement emphasizes a symmetrical eight-bar theme, in this case representing the shepherds' song of thanksgiving.  The final A section starts quietly and gradually builds to an ecstatic culmination for the full orchestra There follows a fervent coda suggestive of prayer, marked by Beethoven pianissimo, sotto voce; most conductors slow the tempo for this passage. After a brief period of afterglow, the work ends with two emphatic F-major chords.


Thank you for listening to today’s episode of Four Centuries of Great music which has been the second episode of our series Symphonies through the Centuries.  Join us again next week as we continue this series.