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Beyond Beethoven Works for natural horn & fortepiano Ferdinand Ries (1784–1838) Grande Sonate in F major, Op. 34 Anneke Sco natural horn 1. Largheo – Allegro moderato [13:20] 2. Andante [2:57] Steven Devine fortepiano 3. Rondo: Allegro [7:44] Lucien Joseph Raoux cor solo, c.1810 Friedrich Eugen Thürner (1785–1827) Johann Peter Fritz Viennese fortepiano, 1815 (Richard Burne collecon) Grande Sonate in E major, Op. 29 4. Allegro [12:14] 5. Largo molto [3:20] 6. Rondo: Allegro moderato [7:03] Friedrich Starke (1774–1835) Adagio und Rondo, Op. 105 7. Poco Adagio [3:35] 8. Rondo poco Allegro [9:04] Hendrik Coenraad Steup (1778–1827) Sonate in E flat major, Op. 11 9. Allegro brillante [8:21] 10. “Les Adieux”: Andante espressivo [5:17] 11. Rondo Allegro [4:48] About Anneke Sco & Steven Devine: Total playing me [77:51] ‘[Anneke Sco] produces some wonderfully plangent tone colours [...] Her playing, and that of Steven Devine, has a natural musicality that is parcularly noceable in the way they both apply an easy flexibility to the flow of the music.’ Early Music Review Beyond Beethoven performance. Despite this ‘rushed job’, or perhaps, given Beethoven’s ability to If horn players learn one piece on the natural extemporise, as a result of this element of horn it is invariably Beethoven’s Sonata in spontaneity, the premiere was successful F major, Op. 17 for piano and horn. This and the two musicians went on to perform work was premiered in 1800, at a me when this work a number of mes. the fame of the horn soloist, Giovanni Punto (1746–1803), far outshone that of Beethoven had rushed into the world the first the composer, with one reviewer of an complete sonata for piano and horn, but this early performance asking ‘Who is this was not going to be the sole specimen for Herr Bethover [sic]?’. Not foreseeing the long; many composers followed suit. significance this short work was to have Regreably, this sizeable outpouring of for future generaons of horn players, new repertoire that grew during the first Beethoven appears to have only just three decades of the nineteenth century begun composing the day before its has been somewhat neglected by more first performance. This was not wholly recent horn players. There are several unusual for him, as Ferdinand Ries recounts: reasons for the Beethoven Sonata to have enjoyed popularity: for horn players Beethoven almost always postponed the coming to the natural horn for the first composion of the majority of his works me it has the advantage of being extremely due by a certain date unl the very last well known, it is the key of F, the modern moment. He had, for instance, promised horn’s home key – a tonality which is familiar Ponto [sic], the famous horn player, that and far less challenging than the remoter he would compose a sonata for piano tonalies of other crooks – and, of course, and horn and would play it with him at a concert given by Ponto. The concert with despite the atudes of Beethoven’s the sonata was announced, but the audience in 1800 (‘Who is this Herr sonata was not yet started. On the day Bethover?’), it is tempng to patronise before the performance Beethoven began audiences by assuming their tastes are the work and had it ready for the concert. dictated by their familiarity with the names of the composers in their programme. Beethoven, a highly regarded improviser, may have sll been in the process of The composions performed on Beyond compleng the composion during its first Beethoven represent a small selecon of this explosion in composions for piano and horn with Johann Georg Albrechtsberger (1736– Given the uncertainty as to exactly when It is to be presumed that Ries also conceived duo. The four works have been chosen 1809) and piano with Beethoven, also serving Ries arrived in Vienna it is hard to be sure the sonata with one or other of the Schuncke partly due to the connecons between the as Beethoven’s secretary and copyist. that his famous account of Beethoven brothers in mind. composers and Beethoven and his Op. 17 Beethoven secured a number of useful composing his Op. 17 sonata at the last Sonata and partly to demonstrate how appointments for Ries including temporary minute was drawn from Ries’s first-hand Carl Czerny (1791–1857), a fellow student of Beethoven’s peers exploited the variety roles as pianist to Count Johann Georg von experience, but undoubtedly Ries would Beethoven, was to applaud Ries as a and versality of the natural horn, Browne in 1802 and Prince Lichnowsky in have been very much aware of this ‘disnguished’ writer for the horn, going on dispelling enduring modern myths about 1805. Ries repaid Beethoven’s generosity by groundbreaking work. Ries’s own Grande to describe the instrument as ‘especially the instrument offering ‘limited opons’, becoming a significant interpreter and Sonate in F major, Op. 34 was composed adapted for calm sustained notes, for tender opons that lead composers to be advocate of Beethoven’s piano works. in 1811 whilst Ries was in Kassel, the newly or melancholy ideas, or for an expression of ‘rather conservave and somemes formed seat of the King of Westphalia, energy and grandeur, in powerful, single embarrassed’ (David Smith, interview The ramificaons of Bonn being under French Jérôme Bonaparte. A few years earlier blasts.’ Czerny’s descripon feels highly with Richard Watkins, 14 March 2019, rule meant that in 1805 Ries was liable for Beethoven and Ries had had a minor appropriate as a descripon of the Ries www.prestomusic.com). conscripon in the French army, and so he falling out regarding the Kapellmeister Sonata in general. In many ways the Ries set off to join his regiment in Koblenz job at this court; Beethoven had inially could be seen as the sonata Beethoven may Pianist, cellist and composer Ferdinand Ries travelling via Prague, Dresden and Leipzig. been offered the post and was minded to have wrien had he given the composional was born in Beethoven’s home town of Having lost an eye in a childhood injury he accept it, only deciding against it when process more me. This can be seen most Bonn on the 28 November 1784. His father, was rejected for service and at this juncture his aristocrac patrons in Vienna offered clearly in the atmospheric ‘Andante’: could Franz Anton Ries, was a violinist who had began a peripatec career moving from him a pension to remain. Ries was later the rumbling bass notes in the piano be a had a notable career in Vienna before Koblenz to Paris (1806–1808), Vienna (1808), offered the post which led to Beethoven reference to the rumbling double basses in seling in Bonn where he had been one and Bonn (1809–1811), followed by travels suspecng, erroneously, subterfuge on the ‘Marcia funebre’ of Beethoven’s ‘Eroica’ of Beethoven’s early teachers. Ferdinand through Kassel, Hamburg, Copenhagen and the part of his old student. Ries ulmately Symphony? Ries had a strong connecon Ries inially studied violin and piano with Stockholm, arriving in St Petersburg just as lost the opportunity and perhaps his visit with this work and the horn players involved, his father, taking cello lessons from Bernhard Napoleon marched on Russia. In 1813 Ries to Kassel in 1811 was an aempt to having allowed himself to be ridiculed in Romberg (1767–1841) from the age of five. seled in London where he became a mainstay achieve some form of employment at his recollecons of the first rehearsal of The French seizure of Bonn in 1794, which of the city’s musical life, performing to the court there. this symphony when he, mistakingly, dissolved the electoral court, meant that great acclaim and acquiring significant roles berated the second horn player for his the normal pathways of employment for such as directorship of the influenal Whilst in Kassel Ries composed two significant inability to count bars’ rests: young musicians had been closed down. London Philharmonic Society. It was not works for horn, the Grand Sonata Op. 34 During the first rehearsal of this symphony, Aer a short period of composion study unl 1824 that Ries, with his Brish wife and a Concerto for two horns which was which went appallingly, the horn player did premiered on the 23 February 1811 by the in 1801 with Peter Winter (1754–1825) in and children, returned to his nave land, come in correctly. I was standing next to Munich, Ries departed Bonn for Vienna. firstly seling in Bad Godesberg then in brothers Goried and Michael Schuncke Beethoven and believing the entry wrong Once in Vienna Ries studied composion Frankfurt am Main. (1777–1861 and 1778–1821 respecvely). said: “That damned horn player! Can't he count? – It sounds terrible!” I believe I In 1804 Thürner travelled to Vienna, where became a travelling musician; first he headed his Op.29? The composion was premiered in was very close indeed to having my ears he was deeply influenced by Beethoven and to northern Germany (Bad Doberan and the a concert given on 18 October 1812 by boxed – Beethoven was a long me in his composional style. Aer this sojourn island of Rügen), then travelled west through Friedrich Ernst Fesca. The Allgemeine forgiving me. Thürner had been honour-bound to enter Eastern Friesland to Amsterdam where he Musikalische Zeitung reviewed both this the services of Empress Marie Fedorovna, spent several months. He then headed to performance as well as the Sonata’s Oboist, pianist and composer Friedrich Eugen who had supported his studies.