Sunday Classics: What comes after Mozart's and Beethoven's minor-key symphonic opening movements?

What comes after the monumental, mysterious opening movement of the Beethoven Ninth Symphony, which we heard last week? At the link, Christian Thielemann conducts the Vienna Philharmonic in what seems to me a grindingly prosaic rendering of the thunderingly dramatic scherzo.

by Ken

I realize I should have been saying more about this amazing music we've been hearing, dipping into the two symphonies apiece for which Mozart and Beethoven composed opening movements in the minor mode. But really, when it comes to an incandescent movement like the opening one of Mozart's great later G minor symphony, No. 40, could I really have said anything more helpful than, say, "Wouldja listen to that?" And ditto when it comes to the opening movements of Beethoven's Fifth and Ninth Symphonies. I mean, we're talking here about two of the monuments of human civilization, and I thought talking should take distant second place to listening.

What we began pursuing in this week's preview is the question I raised last week: Where do you go from there?

My point was, if we accept that writing a minor-mode symphonic first movement is an uncommon and nervy thing to do, and is likely to happen only if a composer has been seized by some gripping musical material that requires it, where does he want to take his audience next?

Consider, for example, the most modest of the four Mozart and Beethoven symphonies we began last week: Mozart's earlier G minor symphony, No. 25. Let's add the second movement to the performances we heard last week of the first.

MOZART: Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K. 183:
i. Allegro con brio
ii. Andante


Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia, recorded Dec. 10, 1954 (mono)


Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1973


YES, WE'RE COMFORTABLY BACK IN THE MAJOR!

As we are as well in the Symphony No. 40, though here it's a considerably more original and imagination-provoking Andante that Mozart spins. (Note that here we're adding a third performance to the two we heard last week. A lot of people prefer Bruno Walter's early-50s mono Mozart symphonies to the gorgeous autumnal stereo series. I thought this week we'd hear both.)

MOZART: Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550:
i. Molto allegro
ii. Andante


New York Philharmonic, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia, recorded Feb. 23, 1953 (mono)


Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded 1959


Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1972

HERE'S THE WHOLE MOZART 40TH SYMPHONY

In the quite lovely prewar recording by Sir Thomas Beecham.

MOZART: Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550:
i. Molto allegro
ii. Andante
iii. Menuetto: Allegretto
iv. Finale: Allegro assai

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Thomas Beecham, cond. EMI, recorded 1937 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

SAY, DOES THE SECOND MOVEMENT OF THE 
BEETHOVEN FIFTH REMIND YOU OF ANYTHING?

Beethoven too followed up his radical C minor opening movement for the Fifth Symphony with a major-key slow movement, a gorgeous theme and variations we might say is ostentatiously "major." In a symphony constructed of miracles, this may be the least noticed of them, but it's surely not the least inspired. And it's always seemed to me that this Beethoven slow movement has its roots in Mozart's.

I thought it would be interesting to continue with the lithe, dramatic Dohnányi performance we began last week, and since we already heard the second movement of Leonard Bernstein's 1977 recording in Friday night's preview (along with his 1961 one), we'll complement it with Sir Georg Solti's more expansive Chicago recording.

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67:
i. Allegro con brio
ii. Andante con moto


Cleveland Orchestra, Christoph von Dohnányi, cond. Telarc, recorded Sept. 20, 1987

Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti, cond. Decca, recorded October 1986

Of course we haven't heard Beethoven's answers to what comes next, which fascinatingly is a return, in blaring-brass mode, to the minor for the scherzo, and finally a return to the most triumphant major imaginable for the grand finale. I don't see how we can proceed without hearing the whole thing. It's a performance we've already heard.

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67:
i. Allegro con brio
ii. Andante con moto
iii. Scherzo: Allegro
iv. Allegro

Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), George Szell, cond. Philips, recorded November 1966

WHICH BRINGS US BACK TO THE BEETHOVEN NINTH

Again, I should probably say something to help establish the scope of the achievement of these two movements. Wouldja listen to that?

I've chosen two live performances from London which could hardly be more different, except that in the end are they really that different?

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125:
i. Allegro ma non troppo, un poco maestoso
ii. Molto vivace

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Klaus Tennstedt, cond. BBC Legends, recorded live in the Royal Albert Hall, Sept. 13, 1985

Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, cond. Testament, recorded live in the Royal Festival Hall, Nov. 15, 1957


AND HERE'S THE COMPLETE BEETHOVEN NINTH!


Leonard Bernstein conducts the Vienna Philharmonic, joined in the choral finale by the Vienna State Opera Chorus and soloists Gwyneth Jones (soprano), Shirley Verrett (mezzo), Plácido Domingo (tenor), and Martti Talvela (bass).

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Sunday Classics: The symphonic Mozart and Beethoven open in minor mode

They look so simple, these eight notes, but they form one of the most striking and readily identifiable motifs in all of music -- the opening of one of Beethoven's two minor-key symphonic first movements.

by Ken

In Friday night's preview we listened to all of the first movements among Mozart's 40 or so symphonies which are in minor keys. That's right, both of them, which happen to be in the same key, G minor.

Partly this was out of abiding affection for the masterpiece among them, the great Symphony No. 40, and partly it was as a springboard to listening to the two first movements among Beethoven's nine symphonies which are in minor keys, Nos. 5 (C minor) and 9 (D minor). It seems clear to me that these movements have something in common, something that sets them apart from all their major-key brethren -- and something that even sort of applies to the littler Mozart G minor Symphony, No. 25.

Let's listen again to the Mozart G minor opening movements.

MOZART: Symphony No. 25 in G minor, K. 183:
i. Allegro con brio

Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia, recorded Dec. 10, 1954 (mono)

Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1973

MOZART: Symphony No. 40 in G minor, K. 550:
i. Molto allegro

Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Bruno Walter, cond. Columbia-CBS-Sony, recorded 1959

Concertgebouw Orchestra (Amsterdam), Josef Krips, cond. Philips, recorded June 1972


I DON'T WANT TO MAKE THIS SOUND MORE
MYSTERIOUS THAN IT ACTUALLY IS

When you take into consideration that the general default position for classical composers is writing in major keys, with the always-available option of dipping into minor ones, it's hardly surprising that minor-key symphonic opening movements generally have a distinctive character. After all, the composer has made a quite deliberate choice to use the minor mode.

Maybe an easy way to illustrate is with music we've already heard. Among Mozart's couple of dozen piano concertos, again only two have minor-key opening movements, and they clearly stand apart from all the rest.

MOZART: Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466:
i. Allegro

András Schiff, piano; Camerata Academica of the Salzburg Mozarteum, Sándor Végh, cond. Decca, recorded c1990

Arthur Rubinstein, piano; RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra, Alfred Wallenstein, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded in New York, Apr. 1, 1961

MOZART: Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K. 491:
i. Allegro

Rudolf Serkin, piano; London Symphony Orchestra, Claudio Abbado, cond. DG, recorded October 1985

Arthur Rubinstein, piano; RCA Victor Symphony Orchestra, Josef Krips, cond. RCA-BMG, recorded Apr. 20, 1958

The obvious thing to say is that these two movements really don't resemble each other all that much. And yet they have something in common, something that sets them apart from all of Mozart's other concerto first movements. They aren't necessarily "better," just different.

We spent a fair amount of time with Concerto No. 20 in the company of its major-key fraternal twin, No. 21 in C, in the May 2010 post "After producing six remarkable piano concertos in one year, Mozart was just getting warmed up." Which provides a segue of sorts into our two Beethoven minor-key first movements, because the first of them, one of the best-known pieces of music ever written, also has a fraternal twin: Beethoven composed his Fifth and Sixth Symphonies in a large overlapping cloud of inspiration -- and we listened to them together in an October 2010 post.


BEETHOVEN'S MINOR-KEY SYMPHONIC
OPENING MOVEMENTS

I would never suggest that Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is "better" than the Pastoral. But there is that first movement, which I believe I described Friday night as "iconic."

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 5 in C minor, Op. 67:
i. Allegro con brio


Vienna Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. DG, recorded live, September 1977

Cleveland Orchestra, Christoph von Dohnányi, cond. Telarc, recorded Sept. 20, 1987

And if the opening movement of the Beethoven Fifth is iconic, what word is there to describe the colossal opening movement of the Ninth?

BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 9 in D minor, Op. 125:
i. Allegro ma non troppo, un poco maestoso


Vienna Philharmonic, Karl Böhm, cond. DG, recorded live, 1980

Tonhalle Orchestra (Zurich), David Zinman, cond. Arte Nova, recorded Dec. 12 and 14, 1998


WHICH RAISES ONE OBVIOUS QUESTION

Where do you go from there?

And in a separate post, probably in two weeks, we're going to come back to these symphonies and see how Mozart and Beethoven answered the question. [UPDATE: No, actually it's next week.]

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