BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Sunday, October 3, 1824

Beethoven, wishing to gratify his visitor Johann Andreas Stumpff, to whom he has clearly taken a liking, considers how to get a piano in sufficient working order so that he can play for Stumpff as requested.

In the early morning, Beethoven writes a short note to Stumpff, who is still staying in Baden. “My dear friend, it would be very loving of you if you were to go to the gentleman Stein the piano maker. He lives on the Landstrasse, and if you would be enough kind to advise him as to what should be done with my Broadwood instrument. I greet you warmly and ask you not to forget me in England, as well as to remember the 600 pound tortoise from the King of England for my Battle Symphony. [Beethoven wanted Stumpff on his return to try to get the King to award 600 pounds for the dedication of Wellington’s Victory, op.91, to him nearly a decade earlier.]

Brandenburg Letter 1890; Anderson Letter 1314. The whereabouts of the letter are unknown, but it was transcribed by Thayer, TDR V at 133. From the tenor of the letter, it appears Beethoven may not expect to see Stumpff again before he leaves Vienna. Since Stumpff at one time worked for Broadwood, Beethoven anticipated his input regarding the condition of the piano would be worth having available to Stein.

Stumpff, wanting to hasten the moment he can hear Beethoven play, promptly visits Matthäus Stein. ” I immediately went to Mr. Stein, piano maker, and told him my wish and asked him to help me to get the piano into playable condition.” Stein agrees to do so, and he and his technicians come to Baden to work on the Broadwood piano, while Beethoven is in Vienna, apparently intending to surprise the composer.

Beethoven, knowing nothing of this but under the impression Stein would have to take the piano away to work on it, Beethoven probably at the same time writes an undated note to a local piano maker, Augustin Riedl in Baden. “Would you be so kind as to come over to me so that I can talk to you about not being able to use the instrument you put there?”

Brandenburg Letter 1888; Anderson Letter 594. The original is in a private collection. Beethoven seems to have meant to ask Riedl for a loaner instrument that he could play for Stumpff, in place of the badly damaged Broadwood piano at his apartment.

Beethoven then heads to Vienna this morning with Nephew Karl and housekeeper Barbara Holzmann. Once there, Ludwig has mid-day dinner with his longtime friend Joseph Carl Bernard, editor of the Wiener Zeitung and author of the text of the planned oratorio Der Sieg des Kreuzes, which Beethoven has been putting off for years. Beethoven was no longer as close to Bernard as he once had been, with their relationship cooling off over the last four years. The long-delayed oratorio libretto was probably part of that, and editor Theodore Albrecht suggests that Bernard’s various crude opinions about Protestants, Jews and women authors may have also rubbed Beethoven the wrong way.

As usual, Bernard launches into a rant against his former partner at the Wiener Zeitung, Johann Schickh. They had a falling out and Schickh now edits the cultural newspaper the Wiener Zeitschrift. “Since this Zeitschrift was abandoned to him, he, with his natural stupidity, has the greatest ability for denial. In any case, he cannot write a single line that is well constructed and correctly written. I frequently had to correct every little thing.”

“Otherwise, it doesn’t come from him himself, because he usually repeats whatever he has heard most recently. Not a single person in Vienna who can write is associated with him, and he gets nothing for his paper from local writers.”

Bernard mentions that he also helped out Schickh’s nephew, Joseph Kilian Schickh, an aspiring playwright. “When I recommended him to Hensler [manager of the Theatre in the Josephstadt], he had absolutely no means of support. Hensler employed him on my word. In my presence, Hensler assured him 900 florins and half the income from a benefit performance.”

Bernard’s remarks range wide; as a newspaper editor he was up to date on the latest information from abroad. “America is the thorn in the side for the European aristocrats. The President of North America [James Monroe, who had in 1823 issued the Monroe Doctrine to prevent European nations from trying to reconquer newly-independent countries in the Americas], for instance, gets a salary of only 12 Thaler. They have extraordinarily few officials and almost no regular military.” [The salary of the President of the United States was set at $25,000 from 1789 to 1872, so Bernard is clearly misinformed on that point. However, the standing army was quite small, comprised of roughly 7,000 soldiers.]

“The Count of Artois, brother of the deceased king [of France] and father of the Duke of Angouleme, is King under the name Charles the Tenth.” Beethoven asks whether that is Louis-Philippe, since Louis XVIII had no children, but Bernard clarifies that he is rather the Duke of Orleans. [Louis Philippe would become King on Charles X’s deposition in 1830.] Bernard jokes that the Bourbons used either small new silk cloths or freshly killed doves in place of toilet paper.

Bernard and Beethoven both complain about taxes. “One doesn’t have much more to give. In a few years, with the high taxes and the reduced prices of the fruits of their labors, everything will be ruined.” Bernard mentions that his friend Karl Peters [who had temporarily been Nephew Karl’s co-guardian] talks about how the Bohemian nobility gather up the spoils there and then live in their accustomed style in Vienna for four months out of the year. Beethoven asks why they do that. “Because they believe themselves born as Lords. And so they say, die in the service of the Lord.”

On the other hand, the late emperor Joseph II wanted to treat his subjects as human beings. [Beethoven had written a cantata in 1790 in honor of Joseph II upon his death, WoO 87.] “He always rode in a small carriage.”

Bernard takes the opportunity talking about royalty to observe that in the text of the Ninth Symphony, Beethoven used the text “Alle Menschen werden Brüder” [All men will be brothers] rather than Schiller’s original text, “Bettler werden Fürsten Brüder” [Beggars will be princes’ brothers. Beethoven was probably annoyed at this comment.]

They also discuss the tutor for Archduke Karl’s sons, Johann Bihler. Also mentioned is Karl August Malchus (1770-1840), who was a finance minister first for King Jerome of Westphalia (Napoleon’s brother) and then later for King Wilhelm of Württemberg for about a year. “He has now published books about finance that are highly valued….He presently lives in Heidelberg….A superb mind.” [Beethoven had known Malchus back when he lived in Bonn.]

Bernard takes the opportunity to point out to Beethoven Frau Wilhelmina von Chézy, who had written the disastrous libretto for Weber’s opera Euryanthe last year.

They talk a bit about Nephew Karl’s studies, and Bernard says he recommended a variety of texts in philosophy, poetry, German literature and drama, which he describes as “the foremost works in these specialities.” There is also a good text on logic by Ludwig Heinrich von Jakob that he recommends.

Beethoven takes his leave of this rather one-sided conversation and heads back to his apartment in the Ungargasse, with a stack of back issues of the Intelligenzblatt supplement to the Wiener Zeitung. [It is possible that he asked Bernard to bring them with him to dinner.] Among them, he finds an advertisement for pre-cut wood by the log or by the cord, including delivery and all expenses. He also notes a book on fisheries, including the preparation of fish, which is forthcoming next year.

Looking at the advertisements for apartments, Beethoven starts daydreaming about buying a house, perhaps in Vösslau, where he could get away in the winter. “Get far away from the people. Behind the Vösslau Garden, erect a little peasant house only to live to the End of Time.” Or perhaps a little house in Haidtech [Beethoven writes “Haiden”] with its view of the Wiener-Neustadt Canal.

As he daydreams, Beethoven falls asleep. He is awakened in the late afternoon by Nephew Karl. He would like to go to the Burgtheater this evening, which is presenting Schiller’s Die Braut von Messina [The Bride of Messina, an 1803 play that combined ancient and modern theatrical techniques] at 6:30 p.m. Karl and Ludwig presumably go to the theater, and while there, Ludwig loses something. Afterwards, they return home.

Conversation Book 76, 11r-20v, 26r.

While Beethoven is in Vienna today, Stumpff and Stein have been busy back in Baden with Beethoven’s Broadwood piano. Stumpff, himself a harp maker, writes that Stein, “with some of his workers and with my help, soon put the piano in a playable condition again. Beethoven had been away with his brother for a few days on family matters, and that was what we wanted, as we were able to achieve our goal without hindrance.” TDR V, 128. Beethoven’s maid is still in Baden. She appears to have let them enter to do their work and then slip away. Before he goes, Stumpff asks her whether Beethoven needs anything from Vienna, since he is going there himself. [Stumpff may have believed that Ludwig had gone to visit Johann at his estate, rather than going in to Vienna.]