Beethoven Symphony No. 9, Part 2

When the great pianist and composer Frederic Chopin decided to write a piano sonata in 1837, fashions had turned against the genre itself. Perhaps it was a feeling that Beethoven had essentially "finished" the genre, or perhaps it was a sense that a non-Germanic composer couldn't ...  Show more

As I've often said, I love doing Patreon-sponsored episodes in part because they allow me to discover music I might never have encountered otherwise. Today's episode is one of those, because the truth is that before I made it, I had heard of Finzi, but that was about it. I knew n ...  Show more

The final episode of our Beethoven 250 series features a 1947 recording of the Symphony #9 by the Vienna Philharmonic conducted by Herbert von Karajan with Elizabeth Schwarzkopf, Elizabeth Hongen, Julius Patzak and Hans Hotter. 

In the first movement of his famous symphony, Beethoven sets up a battle between hope and despair. The dark side of that spectrum is represented by the anguished opening notes of the first movement: DUN DUN DUNNN. Over the course of the next three movements, Beethoven keeps tryin ...  Show more

This recording is the 2nd movement of Beethoven's popular Sonata Pathetique Op. 13 No. 8. The second movement is Adagio cantabile. "Cantabile" indicates that this movement should be played like a song, or something that has a distinct melody that one could sing along with. This p ...  Show more