BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Saturday, February 18, 1826
Beethoven writes an undated letter, probably to unpaid assistant Karl Holz, likely about today.
“Keep one, and when you find someone, send the other one. It is impossible for me to leave from here today—even if it costs me something—because of the investigation, haste is necessary.”
“I have experienced a new, severe attack in my lower abdomen since yesterday.”
“Most urgently, yours truly.”
“We shall see each other at noon.”
Brandenburg Letter 2116; Anderson Letter 1422. The investigation referred to is Holz’s surveillance of Nephew Karl and his comings and goings. The first sentence was suggested by Sieghard Brandenburg to refer to the two printings of Tremate, empi tremate, op.116, by Steiner & Co., which comes in for criticism for its flaws in the entry for February 19, 1826, so it likely appears about now, and dovetails well with Beethoven summoning Dr. Anton Braunhofer on February 20 because of the continued problems with his abdomen. The letter is held by the Bonn Beethovenhaus as H.C. Bodmer Collection Br 151, and can be seen here:
https://www.beethoven.de/de/media/view/5030782762483712/scan/0
Unpaid assistant Karl Holz stops by Beethoven’s apartment this afternoon, at around 4 p.m. rather than noon. Beethoven wants him to run an errand [possibly getting the scores from Steiner as referenced in the letter], and Holz says he still has time to do it. He usually is free at around 4:30, but it’s not worth the trouble to hurry.
Holz says that at his office job, they tend to be lenient with him because he works quickly. They let him leave often at 11 o’clock in the morning because he gives lessons.
Beethoven says that Holz should marry. Holz says no and Beethoven asks him why not. “Because, in the end, I would be dependent on a woman; that would be the worst. Women here are creatures of the Devil; the day before yesterday, I heard stories about a woman for whom I would have placed my hand in the fire. That is a woman of 30 years, beautiful even still, and has an old fellow to whom she still slips money.”
Holz asks whether Beethoven hasn’t heard anything more from former unpaid assistant Franz Oliva. [Oliva went to St. Petersburg on a business trip in December of 1820 and never left, marrying and becoming a professor of German literature there. A warrant has been issued for him in Vienna for overstaying his visa.]
Holz urges Beethoven to come with him for the rehearsals of the Mayseder Quartet at Dembscher’s sometime on a Saturday; they can make a festival of it.
Holz mentions that he heard an anecdote about Johann Nepomuk Hummel. A half sheet of fine paper was sent to him to get a sample of his musical notation. He composed a piece and wrote on a quarter of the sheet so narrow that he missed the last bar, cut the other 1/4 sheet from it, and sent only the quarter sheet with writing. Holz gives Beethoven a sample of 2 and one-half bars from the Andante of Hummel’s latest trio, op.83, which will be performed next week by the Schuppanzigh Quartet.
Holz makes fun of a servant’s dialect, writing it out for Beethoven in the conversation book.
Beethoven needs to get his letter to Prince Hatzfeld, the Prussian ambassador, to inquire about arranging for the dedication of the Ninth Symphony to the Prussian king. Holz suggests that he can give it to poet Ignaz Castelli, who works in the same office as Holz, and knows the ambassador.
Holz recollects that before Carl Maria von Weber departed Vienna, to honor him they played Beethoven’s 10th quartet at Ignaz Castelli’s. But Weber found the Adagio to be too long. He didn’t understand it at all, but he was hearing the quartet then for the first time.
Beethoven asks whether Holz can come tomorrow. He has lessons at 9 o’clock in the morning, but therefore could come at 11.
Conversation Book 104, 14v-18v. Beethoven’s 10th quartet, op.74, is here performed live by the Danish String Quartet: