Thursday, September 27, 2012
Better Heard Than Viewed
NYT wickedly pans heralded dance program that features four dancers, each acting as an instrument in a string quartet, portraying one of Beethoven's greatest works, the "Heiliger Dankgesang" movement--while the music DOES NOT play. Interesting concept, but the execution? Anyway, here's the unheard music, one of the most profound wordless pieces ever written by man.
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I know I didn't oversleep; can it be Sunday in the Church of Beethoven already? Anyway, one of the oddest sections in the movie nobody-but-me saw called "Copying Beethoven" showed the putative copyists writing down the notes LvB read out seemingly on his deathbed. Hmmm...the SQ #"15" was actually 13th in order of composition so he had to summon up enough strength to compose the final movements of this Quartet plus four more and revise the ending of the Opus 130 SQ. The phrase "Heiliger Dankgesang" reflected LvB's gratitude for his recovery from a disease that he thought might have been fatal, so he was therefore actually in good health, at least for him.
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