Beethoven's "Hammerklavier"

[ReinerTorheit]

Originally Posted by Philidor

Or must there be permanent IQ war? The thickos will always win.

"Never argue with an idiot. The idiot first drags you down to his own idiotic level, and there he beats you with a lifetime's experience of idiocy."

[Felix]

Must I come down from my Olympian heights to this kind of bickering and ad personam insults?

Philidor said there was a 1% chance of my being unpleasant, but I hope that 'adieux' was the final one. It will, as you say, liberate you to appreciate the Hammerklavier in your own way. So I am really not attacking you but wishing you well in your private enjoyment of this monumental piece.

Yours,
Felix

[Quijote]

Originally Posted by Felix

Must I come down from my Olympian heights to this kind of bickering and ad personam insults?

Philidor said there was a 1% chance of my being unpleasant, but I hope that 'adieux' was the final one. It will, as you say, liberate you to appreciate the Hammerklavier in your own way. So I am really not attacking you but wishing you well in your private enjoyment of this monumental piece.

Yours,
Felix

You're quite right, Félix. I did try to make amends to Nooseum, but it never worked out (I offered a private PM conferring "rep" and an apology). How's the weather up there in Olympia, by the way? I've never quite managed to get there, unfortunately.
My final 'adieux' to Nooseum was of course to him/her alone. I could never say such a thing to the 'Hammerklavier'. Perhaps one day you and I shall have exchanges on our various ways of 'seeing/hearing' this astonishing work.

[Noseeum]

Originally Posted by Felix

Must I come down from my Olympian heights to this kind of bickering and ad personam insults?

Philidor said there was a 1% chance of my being unpleasant, but I hope that 'adieux' was the final one. It will, as you say, liberate you to appreciate the Hammerklavier in your own way. So I am really not attacking you but wishing you well in your private enjoyment of this monumental piece.

Yours,
Felix

Water under the bridge and over the dam. I received no PM from the gent, but here is a new 'rep' (whatever those thing are). I expect no more two-way conversations between us, so the bickering potential is not high.

[Quijote]

As I am no longer on speaking terms with the above person, I must assure Félix that I did indeed confer "rep" and an apology (one should check one's Control Panel/CP).

[Quijote]

Noseuum, not Nooseum. My mistake.

[Quijote]

Shall we move on? I'm game, so to speak.

[Quijote]

Alright then. The 'Hammerklavier' has decided to take a back seat for the moment. It'll be back.

[Quijote]

Not the Hammerklavier, I know, but I recently received the Diabelli Variations / Andreas Staier / after a fortepiano by Conrad Graf.
A very interesting CD, I must say. The first 11 tracks feature the variations composed (on Diabelli's request) by Carl Czerny, Hummel, Kalkbrenner, Liszt (aged 11), Moscheles, FXW Mozart, Schubert et al.
For the Beethoven set, the Graf has some 'exotic' pedals which Staier uses selectively, especially the janissary and bassoon stops, with some quite unexpected results.
Here's a link to an article about this CD:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2012...ew?INTCMP=SRCH

[James C. Fretz]

Originally Posted by Tarantella

I've had to rise from my slumbers because I have this amazing sonata on my I-Pod (Pollini) and how in the name of God is anybody meant to prepare for sleep under such circumstances? .........I feel a curious mixture of ecstasy and pain when listening to the "Hammerklavier", for some inexplicable reason. Depression is never far away, but one never loses the sense of wonder with Beethoven - particularly when he's in this kind of form - never, ever.

I own a wonderful cd set of Pollini performing the last piano sonatas in which his performance of the Op. 106 is quite breathtaking. For me, the sense of struggle and, yes, pain is very much akin to the Grosse Fuge: neither are to be blithely regarded. But, then, the musical world Beethoven would enter toward the end of his life was filled with the sort of neurotic angst, anger.......and resignation which truly elevated his art to an entirely rarefied level.

There are some similarities which can be drawn between music of LvB and Mahler in that regard.

“für dich leben! für dich sterben! Almschi” appended to the Tenth Symphony, the final movement of which never fails to put a knot in my throat and a tear in my eye. Of the two, Beethoven always seemed the defiant, unrepentant one.