BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Friday, December 17, 1824
Beethoven follows up on Brother Johann’s letter approving of the sale of various works he owns to the publisher B. Schott’s Sons in Mainz. Ludwig writes today to Schott: “I inform you that it will probably take another 8 days before I can hand in the works. Archduke R. left here only yesterday and I had to spend some time with him. I am loved and highly regarded only by him–one cannot live on that, and the call from several quarters ‘he who has a lamp, fills it with oil,’ finds no place here. [A quotation from Plutarch’s Life of Pericles, Chapter 16.] Since the score has to be engraved correctly, I have to look it over several more times, because I lack a skilled copyist. The one I had has been in the grave for a year and a half. I could rely on him, but such a person always must be trained first.” [Beethoven means copyist Wenzel Schlemmer, who died August 6, 1823.]
“By the way, don’t think anything bad about me. I have never done anything wrong. I will enclose the certificate of ownership as proof when I hand over the works. Don’t you think it easily possible that the publisher in Vienna who tried to pull me away from you, would not also resort to such means to make you suspicious of me? At least he has already made attempts to prevent my making other connections, so one could readily believe something like that.” [Beethoven does not provide the declaration for ownership until January 22, 1825, shortly before the engraving copies are submitted.]
“I received just yesterday a letter from my brother, in which he promised to give you the works indicated. [Opferlied, op.121b; Bundeslied, op.122; Consecration of the House, op.124; Six Bagatelles, op.126; and Der Kuss, op.128, for which Schott had agreed to pay a total of 130 ducats.] I am pleased that these works in particular will be yours. [Beethoven had become disenchanted with Leipzig publisher Heinrich Albert Probst, to whom he had promised these works, especially since Probst was only willing to pay 100 ducats.] As soon as my brother arrives, which will be soon, I will write you with more details. The works are all written and can be printed immediately. I should hope they can be engraved soon.”
“As far as the quartet [op.127] is concerned, there is only something left to write in the last movement. Otherwise, it is finished and can be sent off immediately after that. [The quartet will not be finished until next February; it is unclear whether the first three movements were in fact completed by this time, but Beethoven often fudged his representations to publishers on such matters.] My brother is quite happy with the method you have suggested for receiving the fee. As always, your friend Beethoven.”
Brandenburg Letter 1913; Anderson Letter 1325. The letter is held in the Mainz City Library (Hs III 71), Nr.6). The letter bears the postmark “WIEN” and has Schott’s registration mark, “Beethoven in Vienna the 17th Dec 1824.”
[Beginning today, for the next couple days Beethoven continues to use Conversation Book 78 and also begins using Conversation Book 79. The latter book is rather strange. The last 13 leaves are numbered in reverse order, and are written sideways on the page. The first 15 leaves are written in normal fashion. The chronological order starts with the last leaf and goes backwards to leaf 21. It then goes back to the beginning of the book, and then jumps around several times, suggesting that the pages got jumbled at some point before it was bound in its current form. We have followed the chronological reconstruction of the German editors, as revised by Prof. Theodore Albrecht.]
Beethoven makes a note in his conversation book to check on whether there is any answer from Count Apponyi (1782-1852), the Austrian Ambassador Extraordinary in Rome. [He may have asked Apponyi to check into whether there was interest in the Vatican subscribing to the Missa Solemnis.] He also notes he needs blotting paper, indicating he is continuing to make copious corrections in the scores that are being copied.
Nephew Karl has purchased tickets to an Akademie concert in the coming days [possibly the concert of the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde on December 19, or the Akademie of the Tonkünslter-Societät on December 22 and 23.] The tickets were all open free-choice seating rather than reserved seating.
Karl notes that sugar costs 1 florin 24 kreutzers per pound.
Conversation Book 78, 3r-3v.
Later today, in a coffee house, Ludwig and Karl are reading newspapers. Ludwig makes a note that porcelain wares from the Imperial Porcelain Factory are available at factory prices in Singerstrasse 896. [This note is written sideways by Beethoven, possibly as a contemplated space-saving measure. Nephew Karl and others follow suit for several days in Conversation Book 79, and then the experiment is abandoned.]
Karl reads about the flooding in St. Petersburg. The water is eight to fourteen feet above normal, and the Czar’s Winter Palace is surrounded by water. Ludwig muses as to whether Prince Nikolai Galitzin, who has commissioned three quartets from Beethoven, has taken any losses. Karl has no idea.
Beethoven and Karl discuss the release of the charitable production, the Musikalisches Angebinde zum neuen Jahre, self-published by disabled actor Carl Friedrich Müller. [Ludwig had contributed the Waltz in D, WoO 84, to this year’s collection of forty little dances for piano.] Müller had the Waltzes engraved at his own expense, and all the music dealers have subscribed to it, each for 20 copies. Müller gets 3 florins for every copy. [This is also the retail price for the album, so the music dealers are also charitably taking no profits for selling it, though they do advertise it in the newspapers.] Uncle Ludwig asks Karl whether Müller is related to the famous actor Johann Heinrich Müller (1738-1815). Karl says yes, Carl Friedrich is his grandson.
Karl drafts an advertisement for a new housekeeper: “Seeking a widow of moral character, who is well acquainted with the art of cooking, and who has already managed a household, for a salary of 300 florins per year. Inquire for further details at Johannesgasse No.969, on the 4th floor [5th floor, American,] door to the right.” Uncle Ludwig doesn’t want to put the advertisement in the newspaper just yet.
Aloys Mayrginter, Manager of the Office for Servant Personnel at the High Police Administration, sees the Beethovens and approaches. [Karl probably advises him that they will soon be placing an advertisement for a housekeeper, which will be submitted to Mayrginter’s office for approval before it can be published.] Mayrginter writes in the conversation book complaining about the lack of food still available there, suggesting it may be fairly late in the afternoon. “It will be difficult to get anything more that’s warm–beef roast, bratwurst, ham, mustard.” He identifies himself as a police commissioner, living in the Rossau.
Ludwig brings up a curious case of a sick person who had been taken from Hungary to the Vienna Military Hospital, in a cataleptic state as a result of a severe fright. Mayrginter says it is “perhaps one of the most remarkable in the world of medicine and that the person is an insoluble riddle for mankind.”
“Now, Herr van Beethoven, please accept the unbounded respect from a sincere music lover and intimate friend of [pianist Johann] Horsalka, who hopes to become a composer.”
Conversation Book 79, 27v-26v
The weather turns quite bad in the late afternoon, with heavy snows, and the Beethovens probably do not go out again. Wiener Zeitung Nr.291 for Monday December 20, 1824 at 1243