SEASON 3 EPISODE 8
ERIC HARRISON, HOST:
Good afternoon and thanks for tuning in to Little Rock Public Radio and Classical KLRE-FM, 90.5. I'm Eric Harrison, I write about arts and culture at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and I’ll be your host for the next two hours.
You're listening to ‘Major and Minor Masterpieces,’ where we focus each week on a broad range of classical music, from chamber music to choral works to full symphonies and maybe even a touch or two of opera.
This week’s theme is “Eroica” — composer Ludwig van Beethoven and the “heroic” theme that surfaces in several of his works in the early 1800s.
Beethoven used the theme we have come to associate primarily with his Third Symphony no less than four times, starting with the seventh of his 12 unpublished “Contredanses” from 1800-02 and in the finale of his only ballet, “The Creatures of Prometheus,” composed in 1801.
In each case, Beethoven employs a theme-and-variations format in his favorite key, E-flat major. You’ll hear it first in the Variations and Fugue for Piano, op. 35, now commonly known as the “Eroica Variations,” written in 1802.
In a departure from the classical theme-and-variations form, Beethoven opens the piece, not with the main theme, but with the bass line to the main theme, following with three variations of the bass line before finally stating the main theme. It’s a pattern he would repeat in the finale of his ballet and again in his Symphony No. 3, in which the theme and variations form the final movement.
Pianist Louis Lortie performs the theme, 15 variations and a final fugue.
(LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S “EROICA,” E-FLAT MAJOR)
You’ve heard Pianist Louis Lortie perform Ludwig van Beethoven’s “Eroica” Variations in E-flat major.
As we mentioned earlier, Beethoven’s 12 Contredanses (a popular dance form in the 18th century) also used the “heroic” theme, most commonly associated with his Third symphony. As we listen, pay particular attention to No. 7, where the “Prometheus/Eroica” theme makes its first appearance. Let’s listen as Michael Tilson Thomas conducts the Orchestra Of St. Luke's.
(LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S “CONTREDANSES” NO. 1 - 12)
Michael Tilson Thomas conducted the Orchestra Of St. Luke's in Beethoven’s 12 Contredanses
Neapolitan composer and choreographer Salvatore Vigano received a commission from Austrian Archduchess Maria Theresa for a work for the Vienna Court Theatre. He created an allegorical libretto based on the Greek mythical titan Prometheus, who stole fire from Zeus for the benefit of the first version of mankind that he had created out of clay. (For his crime, Prometheus was sentenced to a harsh punishment: to be chained to a rock and have an eagle come every day and eat his liver, which magically regrew overnight. Zeus didn’t mess around.)
While Viganò usually composed his own music for his performances, he felt this was too important and asked Beethoven to step in instead. For the two-act ballet, Beethoven’s only full-length work in the form, he wrote an overture, an introduction, 15 numbers and a finale, in which we hear the theme that is the theme of this week’s show. The music was eventually published as Beethoven’s op.43.
Today we’ll hear the overture and movements 11-16, including the finale with the “Eroica” theme. Sir Charles Mackerras conducts the Scottish Chamber Orchestra.
(LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S “THE CREATURES OF PROMETHEUS”)
Sir Charles Mackerras conducted the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in the overture and the final six movements of Beethoven’s ballet “The Creatures of Prometheus” on Major and Minor Masterpieces, on Little Rock Public Radio and classical KLRE-FM, 90.5.
(SOUNDBITE OF WOJCIECH “BOITEG” CIESLINKSKI’S “FIRST VIOLIN”)
—PROGRAM BREAK—
[EDUCATIONAL SEGMENT]
SARAH BUFORD, PRODUCER:
Hey listeners, welcome back to Major and Minor Masterpieces. I’m your producer, Sarah Buford, and it's time for our show’s little educational session, in which we break down some of the terminology we use when describing classical music and its history.
I understand that while you were preparing the script for this episode, Eric and you also were researching some percussion instruments in particular… and you noticed a fun little pattern.
ERIC HARRISON, HOST:
That’s right, Sarah. I was perusing the list of percussion instruments used in a 20th century piece and realized how many of them start with the letter “T."
For example, there is the tam-tam, which is a large gong of Chinese origin, which is used in several familiar pieces, including “Mars” from Gustav Holst’s “The Planets” and the final movement of Peter Tchaikovsky’s Second Symphony.
Then there is the tambourine, which most often makes its appearance in more exotic musical locales, usually with Spanish or Middle Eastern connections, like Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherazade” or the “Dance of the Seven Veils” in Richard Strauss’ opera “Salome."
More commonly, you’ll hear the timpani, or kettledrums, which started out in military bands but show up in innumerable classical pieces, and the triangle, used to particularly great effect, for example, in Niccolo Paganini’s Second Violin Concerto, titled “La Campanella,” representing the “little bell” of the title.
Outside the normal use as symphony instruments, we also have the tabla, a hand-drum of Indian origin, and the Taiko, a family of Japanese drums in various sizes.
SARAH: Well, you’ve certainly described these percussion instruments to a “T,” dare I say? When in doubt, if you need to recall any instruments for the game Categories, think about the letter T. There’s plenty of them in the percussion section.
Now let’s get back to more Major and Minor Masterpieces.
[END OF EDUCATIONAL SEGMENT]
(SOUNDBITE OF WOJCIECH “BOITEG” CIESLINKSKI’S “FIRST VIOLIN”)
ERIC: Beethoven wrote his Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, op. 55 in 1803–1804, at the start of what has been characterized by music scholars as the composer's innovative “middle period.”
Beethoven’s first two symphonies, while they pushed the envelope of the so-called “Classical” symphony, as established by the works of Mozart and Haydn, were essentially in that same Classical form. Not so with the Third — it broke all the boundaries in symphonic form, length, harmony, emotional and cultural content, and is widely considered as the first symphony of the Romantic era.
To begin with, it’s basically twice the length of its predecessors (most Mozart and Haydn symphonies, and Beethoven’s first two, took about a half hour to perform; this comes in at just under an hour). Instead of a slow introduction, it begins with only two brusque, almost brutal, chords, followed by an interplay of tension-building intensity. The slow second movement is a powerful funeral march in the companion key of c minor; the third, an energetic Scherzo — the first symphonic use of this form to replace the traditional minuet. And the finale is a set of variations on that now familiar theme, once again starting, not with the theme itself, but with variations on its bass line, concluding with a fugue and a dashing coda.
The title is one of the few Beethoven actually applied to his own work; he had initially dedicated it to Napoleon, whom Beethoven had idolized as a revolutionary champion. But when Napoleon had himself crowned emperor in 1804, Beethoven flew into a rage, tearing the title page with the dedication in half and throwing it on the ground, proclaiming, “He is nothing but an ordinary mortal! He will trample all the rights of men underfoot to indulge his ambition!” When the manuscript was published in 1806, it bore the title (in Italian) “Heroic Symphony … composed to celebrate the memory of a great man.”
The Philadelphia Orchestra, with Christoph Eschenbach on the podium, performs Beethoven’s “Eroica” symphony in this 2006 live recording.
(LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S “EROICA” SYMPHONY NO. 3)
You’ve heard Christoph Eschenbach conduct the Philadelphia Orchestra in this 2006 live recording of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3, “Eroica,” to conclude this week’s edition of Major and Minor Masterpieces.
(SOUNDBITE OF WOJCIECH “BOITEG” CIESLINKSKI’S “FIRST VIOLIN”)
Thanks for tuning in. I've been your host, Eric Harrison, of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Our producer is Sarah Buford. And our transition and credit music is by our friend Wojciech Chiselinski.
Tune in again next week for Major and Minor Masterpieces on Little Rock Public Radio and classical KLRE-FM, 90.5.