We at The Unheard Beethoven regret to be the bearers of bad news. Our good friend Professor Theodore Albrecht, who has been translating and editing the Conversation Books of Beethoven, which form the basis of our daily column of Beethoven 200 Years Ago Today, has died following a lengthy illness. …
Rossini finally gets to meet Beethoven, accompanying poet Giuseppe Carpani, who has laid the groundwork for the meeting. The date is a certainty within a day either way. The reasoning behind how we established the date for this meeting, which has never before been determined, will be set forth in …
Today’s Wiener Zeitung contains ads for six new Waltzes with trios, together with a grand battle coda for the Carneval celebrations at the Apollo Room, composed by Johann Nepomuk Hummel, as his op.91. Beethoven as a young man had written similar dances for the New Year’s festivities, such as the …
The last major composition that Beethoven worked on before his death was an intended string quintet in C. He only managed to fully score the introduction to the first movement, but left behind substantial sketch and draft material for all four planned movements when he died in March of 1827. …
In January, 2020, a piano dance by Beethoven in the style of a Ländler was found in the Vienna City Library by Dr. Jochen Reutter, editor of the Wiener Urtext edition of Beethoven’s works. The “Classical Cake” podcast linked below includes a discussion with Reutter and a performance of the …
The kind folks at Mozart Circle recently interviewed Mark and Willem about The Unheard Beethoven. Read more about the history of the site, where it’s going and what its founders are up to at the Mozart Circle December 2017 Interview
Our review of Jan Swafford’s biography Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph received critical comments from John E. Klapproth. We asked him to write down his critique in an article, which he kindly agreed to do. Klapproth’s main criticism centers around the identity of the Immortal Beloved; he strongly believes that the …
Our friends at the Beethovenhaus have issued through Henle the long-awaited second edition of the classic Thematic Catalogue of Beethoven’s Works by Georg Kinsky and Hans Halm. The new edition, edited by Kurt Dorfmüller, Norbert Gertsch and Julia Ronge, brings much of the research up to date. The new catalogue …
One of the more challenging segments of the recorded Beethoven is the Italian part-songs written 1801-1802 as part of the composer’s studies with Antonio Salieri. The Kinsky-Halm catalogue (KH) and the catalogue of Willy Hess are a confusing mess of entries, often in seemingly random order, and KH in particular …
We are exceedingly pleased to present the long-lost Beethoven song Hess 137, in a realization by our own Willem, both in synthesized form and with live performers. Through research and a string of happy coincidences, we were able to identify the text of a song that Beethoven had considered offering …
We at The Unheard Beethoven were saddened to hear of the death of Joseph Kerman, who has been a vital force in our work. Without his pioneering efforts in the Kafka Miscellany held by the British Library, and with the studies of the watermarks of Beethoven’s manuscripts, we would know …
Orchestrations of the Piano Sonatas op. 109 – 111 ( www.gerdprengel.de/orchestrations.html ) by Gerd Prengel This summer I was hiking through a beautiful countryside in the area of my hometown Darmstadt while listening to Beethoven’s wonderful Andante from the late piano sonata op. 109. As I was listening, I think it …
We at The Unheard Beethoven are exceedingly pleased to announce several additions to our little Beethoven family, three celebrated Beethoven scholars who have kindly agreed to be contributing authors. * Professor Barry Cooper, University of Manchester. Barry Cooper studied music at University College, Oxford (MA, 1973; DPhil., 1974), where he …
The author of the Canon in C, Hess Anhang 60, who has remained unknown for almost two centuries, has at last been identified as Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel (1690-1749). Several canons can be found in Beethoven’s manuscripts dating from the time when he studied counterpoint with Albrechtsberger in Vienna in 1793-94. …
Recently Professor Barry Cooper, of Manchester University, famous for his reconstruction of the 10th Symphony, discovered amongst the sketches of the Missa Solemnis an unknown hymn by Beethoven. It is an arrangement of the Gregorian Chant ‘Pange lingua’. Professor Cooper was so kind to share this link with us : Pange …