Beethoven's Symphonies: An Artistic Vision
-
- £8.49
-
- £8.49
Publisher Description
“[Beethoven’s] music never grows old— and, enjoyed alongside Mr. Lockwood’s expert commentary, it sparkles with fresh magic.”—Wall Street Journal
More than any other composer, Beethoven left to posterity a vast body of material that documents the early stages of almost everything he wrote. From this trove of sketchbooks, Lewis Lockwood draws us into the composer’s mind, unveiling a creative process of astonishing scope and originality.
For musicians and nonmusicians alike, Beethoven’s symphonies stand at the summit of artistic achievement, loved today as they were two hundred years ago for their emotional cogency, variety, and unprecedented individuality. Beethoven labored to complete nine of them over his lifetime—a quarter of Mozart’s output and a tenth of Haydn’s—yet no musical works are more iconic, more indelibly stamped on the memory of anyone who has heard them. They are the products of an imagination that drove the composer to build out of the highest musical traditions of the past something startlingly new.
Lockwood brings to bear a long career of studying the surviving sources that yield insight into Beethoven’s creative work, including concept sketches for symphonies that were never finished. From these, Lockwood offers fascinating revelations into the historical and biographical circumstances in which the symphonies were composed. In this compelling story of Beethoven’s singular ambition, Lockwood introduces readers to the symphonies as individual artworks, broadly tracing their genesis against the backdrop of political upheavals, concert life, and their relationship to his major works in other genres. From the first symphonies, written during his emerging deafness, to the monumental Ninth, Lockwood brings to life Beethoven’s lifelong passion to compose works of unsurpassed beauty.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this captivating study of Beethoven's nine symphonies, Beethoven expert Lockwood wonderfully recreates the cultural and historical background of each work, the challenges the composer faced while writing it, and its enduring artistic qualities. Lockwood illustrates elegantly that Beethoven's preoccupation with the symphonic form grew out of his restless longing to achieve originality and his desire to experiment with various musical forms. With close attention to detail, Lockwood examines sketches and the process of composition. The second symphony, for example, written between 1800 and 1802, shows the increasing influence that French music had on Beethoven, as well as his engagement with the ideas of heroism and the ideals of the French Revolution. The eighth symphony, written in 1812, "reflects a wide range of stylistic directions," expressing his "sense of freedom and widening artistic space." With his now most familiar tune, the "Ode to Joy" from the ninth symphony, Beethoven sought to compose an easy-to-sing melody whose simplicity and power made it memorable. Lockwood's engaging study offers an excellent introduction and listening guide to Beethoven's symphonies.