BEETHOVEN 200 YEARS AGO TODAY: Wednesday, January 5, 1825

Prince Nikolai Galitzin writes to Beethoven today from St. Petersburg. In response to Beethoven’s letter of December 18, he has ordered “the sum of 50 ducats in Hamburg marks” as the fee for the first quartet that was composed on his commission (op.127). He asks that the score be sent “through the State Chancellery or by post to Stieglitz & Co. in Petersburg.” He also “expressly confirms that he does not want to prevent Beethoven from having these quartets published.”

Brandenburg Letter 1920a. Its present whereabouts and exact text are unknown. Ludwig Nohl mentions the letter in his article on Galitzin’s letters in Mosaik (Leipzig 1882) at 295. At the time, it was part of the Fischhof manuscript at the Berlin library, in a group of about 20 letters. These letters were arranged chronologically, and this letter was most likely Nr.17 of the group, but is now missing. Galitzin arranged for the funds to be sent to the Heniksten bank in Vienna. Beethoven does not deliver the score of op.127 until March of 1825, so the quartet was likely still not quite completed yet at this point, though work is also underway on the second quartet, which will be op.132.

The Leipzig Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung issued today contains a brief review of a “Morceaux choisis [Selected Pieces] de Louis van Beethoven, arr. à grand Orchestre” by Ignaz von Seyfried, and published in Leipzig by H.A. Probst. The anonymous reviewer is not terribly impressed. While listeners want something different all the time, but “good and excellent works cannot be produced as easily and numerously as potatoes, so there is no end to the arranging of such works,” whether from other instruments for the pianoforte, or from the pianoforte for other instruments. Herr v. Seyfried has already proven that he understands this perfectly, as shown by his arrangements of Mozart’s major piano pieces for orchestra. Several of these movements sound as if they were originally written for the orchestra. The piece here are just as skillfully and diligently worked on as were those of Mozart. Since they were excellent in the original, they come off just as beautifully after they have been thus processed. They are therefore highly recommended for good orchestras, especially for interludes in concerts or in plays. The first volume contains three pieces, and there are two in the second.

The reviewer does not identify the five Beethoven works thus translated for orchestra by Seyfried, but they are listed in KH2 under arrangements of the piano sonatas op.2 as follows:

  1. Violin sonata op.12/3, third movement
  2. Piano sonata op.2/3, second movement
  3. Violin sonata op.12/2, second movement
  4. Piano sonata op.2/2, second movement
  5. Violin sonata op.12/2, third movement.

In today’s Wiener Zeitung (Nr.5) at 20, there is a short advertisement from the Pietro Mechetti firm for the Three Polonaises for pianoforte, op.85, by Beethoven’s pupil Carl Czerny, newly published by Mechetti and C. Lichtl in Pest. They are available as a set of three, or each individually. “These light polonaises are suitable as pleasant entertainment pieces for every class of players.”

Cappi & Co. advertises on the same page dance music for Carneval 1825. On the list are German Dances and Ecossaises for piano by Franz Schubert, op.33. These little dances (16 Deutscher and 2 Ecossaises) are today catalogued as D.783. The German dances by Schubert can be heard here: