BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Friday, August 5, 1825 (approximately)

The Harmonicon for August 1825 Nr.XXXII, at 136-137 includes a brief review of Beethoven’s First Symphony, arranged for piano quartet with flute, violin and violoncello by Johann Nepomuk Hummel, published by Chappell & Co. in London. “This is the first number of a work which the spirited proprietor of the edition of Mozart’s Symphonies, arranged by Hummel, has just commenced publishing. We hope that his present undertaking may, in every way, prove as successful as that which he has recently completed. The Symphony in C, now printed, is No. 1 of the quarto edition in score, and as it is amongst the earliest, so it is one of the most popular of Beethoven’s grand orchestral compositions. In all the arrangements by Hummel that have passed under our notice, it has appeared to us that he might have rendered them more practicable to the great majority of amateurs, by thinning some of the passages where a multiplicity of notes demand a larger and more powerful hand than most female performers possess. In the present symphony, we do not perceive so much of this disposition to retain the less essential notes—octaves, for instance—as we observed formerly; yet the zeal of the editor to do justice to the composer has induced him to adapt several passages in a manner that will call the whole means of many performers into very active service. But, at the same time, it must be acknowledged, that what is lost in facility is gained in effect.”

Another short review is given at 139 to a Collection of Select German National Melodies, Arranged with Accompaniment of Piano Forte, or Guitar, by Mollwo and Derwort of London, nos. 1-7. “The three first of the German melodies are rather pretty, but possess no feature of nationality. In cases of this kind, either the names of the composers, or the original titles of the airs, should be affixed; or else they should be declared to be unknown. This would avoid any suspicion of their not being genuine. The fourth number, by [Friedrich Heinrich] Himmel, has more of character in it, but the English words are wretchedly set to it; doubtless by some stranger to the language. The fifth, by Weigl, is a graceful duettino. The sixth, by the same, is very common. The seventh, by Beethoven, a melody of sixteen bars, is exceedingly simple, but not devoid of a certain kind of beauty.” [We have been unable to determine what this Beethoven melody might be; this publication is not listed in Kinsky-Halm 2nd ed.]

J. Riedl’s art shop advertises in today’s Wiener Zeitung (Nr.177) at 752 Beethoven’s former pupil Ferdinand Ries’ set of Seven Brilliant Variations on Mozart’s Famous Aria Non più andrai, in B-flat, op.51, written in 1807 and first published in London in 1814. This aria is from Marriage of Figaro.