Beethoven

by Suchet, John

  He was about to embark on a musical form considered the purest, and of which in later years he would prove to be master: the string quartet. There was one other form, considered the noblest and most elevated in all music, at which he had tried his hand, made many notes and sketches, but had not yet produced a complete work: the symphony. That was about to change.

  In short, at the age of twenty-six, with a successful tour behind him, compositions to his name, a reputation already unrivalled in Vienna, he had achieved a golden start to what promised to be a long and glittering career.

  What could possibly go wrong? Only the single most disastrous fate that could possibly befall a musician. When it started, how it started, is not known. All we know for certain is that in the summer of 1797 things go quiet. Beethoven attended a concert on 6 April, at which his Piano Quintet in E flat, Op. 16, was given its first performance. In the same month, bizarrely, a nobleman presented him with a horse as a thank you for the dedication of a composition to his wife. Beethoven apparently rode the animal just a few times before forgetting about it. The next positive occurrence is a letter Beethoven wrote, dated 1 October. Between the two dates, nothing.

  There is anecdotal evidence that around this time Beethoven took a long walk, returned home sweating profusely, stripped to his underwear, opened all doors and windows, and stood in a chill draught. This led to the onset of serious illness.3 No more is known. If it is true, it is likely that Beethoven closeted himself away. His old friend Dr Wegeler had left Vienna, and he would have been reluctant to confide in anyone else.

  More credible is an account written many years later by a surgeon who knew Beethoven, that the composer earlier in life – he did not specify when – ‘endured a frightful attack of typhus’, and that this was the cause of the terrible fate that befell him.4

  Beethoven was beginning to lose his hearing.

  1 The concerto we know as ‘No. 1’ was in fact the second he composed, and the one we know as ‘No. 2’ the first, because they were published in that order.

  2 Again, it is not certain which of the two he performed.

  3 The source is thought to be Beethoven’s friend Nikolaus Zmeskall, but it is second hand, unverifiable, and gives the date of 1796, which, given that Beethoven was in Berlin, seems impossible.

  4 ‘Typhus’ in German translates today as ‘typhoid fever’. We cannot be sure what range of complaints the word covered two centuries ago, hence it is impossible to be precise about what illness Beethoven suffered.

  Chapter

  SIX

  My Poor Hearing Haunts Me

  FOR SOME TIME HE TRIED TO hide it. There is no record of Beethoven consulting a doctor for another three years, possibly more. Undoubtedly there would have been more than an element of self-denial involved. It is easy to understand why he would refuse to accept that such an appalling fate had befallen him. Certainly to begin with he is likely to have expected it to clear, to wake up one morning and find it was nothing more than a blockage, and he could get on with his life.

  Getting on with his life is what he did. He composed intensively, producing works of greater complexity than ever before. After a rather fraught creative process, he composed a set of six string quartets. His Piano Sonata in C minor, Op. 13, the ‘Pathétique’, was a huge leap forward from any previous piano sonata, by him or anybody else. And finally, somewhat late in life for a young prodigy, he completed his First Symphony. There were other smaller works too.

  He was active on a social level as well. He met the French Ambassador in Vienna, the Napoleonic General Bernadotte (later to become King of Sweden). He gave a recital with the Italian double-bass virtuoso Domenico Dragonetti, impressed that Dragonetti was able to perform one of his cello sonatas on the double-bass.1 He became closely acquainted with the pianist and composer Johann Baptist Cramer. Also during this time he met and corresponded with friends. There are countless notes to his good friend Nikolaus Zmeskall, some of them written with considerable humour, setting up drinking sessions at local taverns.

  Nowhere, either in his own writing or reported speech, or in the memoirs of any of his friends, is there any mention that he might be having a problem with his hearing. This lends credence to the notion that he was in some sort of denial, or that he genuinely believed it was temporary and would pass. In the early stages of deafness it is not difficult to cover up problems – a slight leaning forward of the head, a quick look at the lips of the person talking, a request to repeat what was said, even joking about losing your hearing, or saying you really must get your ears syringed. Clearly, whatever problem Beethoven might have been having, it was not affecting his musical activities, and that was what mattered most.

  This became very clear in two events in the first few months of 1800, one private, one public. Perhaps surprisingly it is the private event that did more to cement Beethoven’s reputation. It has done more than that: it has entered legend.

  It was customary at that time in Vienna for aristocrats to stage ‘improvisation contests’ in their salons. The way it would work was that two virtuosos, with their supporters, would meet in a salon, and display their skills before an audience. This would involve playing their own compositions, possibly with an ensemble, and then setting tasks for each other. One would play a theme he had invented, which the other could not possibly have heard before, and improvise on it. The other would then go to the piano and try to emulate this. Then this second virtuoso would set a theme of his own invention, and the first player would have to copy that. Often it would involve imitation. If one pianist had a particular style, the other would imitate it. It was an evening’s entertainment in aristocratic Vienna.

  Very soon after his arrival in Vienna, when aristocrats such as Lichnowsky realised what young Beethoven was capable of, they put him up against the local talent, and one by one he saw them off, at the same time steadily enhancing his reputation. Enter Daniel Steibelt, from Berlin, capital of Prussia, a renowned piano virtuoso with a fearsome reputation. Steibelt had stunned salon audiences in Berlin with his extraordinary virtuosity, enhanced by his trademark flourish, the tremolando.2 Now on a tour of European capitals, he had arrived in Vienna to conquer that city’s sophisticated musical cognoscenti. He brought with him something of a dashing reputation. He had been forced to join the Prussian army by his father, but had deserted to pursue a musical career.3

  It seems some of Beethoven’s friends went to hear Steibelt and were stunned at his virtuosity, to such an extent that they feared he might damage Beethoven’s reputation. This is probably why Beethoven, by now sick of these showcase events designed solely for the amusement of aristocrats, agreed to go along to the home of Count von Fries. He decided that he would play his recently published Trio for piano, clarinet and cello, which he had dedicated to Prince Lichnowsky’s mother-in-law.4 Steibelt brought along four musicians to perform his Piano Quintet.

  The company assembled, including no doubt Prince Lichnowsky and his family. Beethoven and his musicians played first. His Trio was perhaps a slightly odd choice, since the piano part does not call for a particularly high degree of virtuosity. The work is in three movements, is fairly straightforward, and the critics welcomed it as being more easily comprehensible than the earlier published Op. 1 Piano Trios. The final movement is a set of variations on a well-known theme from a comic opera which had recently played successfully in Vienna.

  There was polite applause from the salon audience, including Steibelt, who had listened ‘with a certain condescension’, and made a show of complimenting Beethoven. He took his position, with his musicians, in front of the audience, confident his Quintet would put Beethoven’s Trio in the shade and win the day. To make sure, he added some impressive (no doubt prepared) improvisation, and drew gasps from the audience with his audacious tremolandos.

  Beethoven played in a way no salon audience had heard before

  At the end there was no doubt in anyone’s mind who had put on the more impressive display. All eyes tur
ned to Beethoven, who as was usual at these events had the ‘right of reply’. Beethoven remained stubbornly in his seat and refused to play again. Steibelt had carried the day.

  A week later it was decided to repeat the event, to stage a ‘rematch’. Given that Beethoven had been reluctant to attend the earlier evening, we can only assume his blood was up. Steibelt’s condescending behaviour, not to mention his ridiculously showy playing, had got under Beethoven’s skin. He was out for revenge.

  There must have been an air of tension and anticipation in Count Fries’s salon on this second evening. Beethoven’s unpredictable temperament was well known. Everybody knew he had been bested a week earlier, and they would have seen the flare in his eyes and the set of his jaw. This spelled trouble.

  Steibelt went first this time. He performed another of his quintets, which again met with great approval. Then he once again improvised on the piano, in a way that put his previous performance in the shade. It was brilliant. But he made a mistake, a serious mistake. There were gasps from the audience as they realised he had chosen the theme from the final movement of Beethoven’s own Trio, performed at the previous meeting, on which to improvise.

  If the audience was shocked, Beethoven’s friends were appalled. That was nothing to how Beethoven felt. This time he needed no encouragement. He got out of his seat, stormed to the front, and as he passed the music stands snatched up the cello part of Steibelt’s Quintet. He sat roughly on the stool, all thoughts of salon etiquette gone, and made a show of putting the cello part on the piano stand upside-down.

  He glared at the music, playing now to the audience, knowing he had everyone’s attention, aware that the decisive moment in the ‘Contest Beethoven v. Steibelt’ had come. With one finger he hammered out a series of notes from the first bar of Steibelt’s music. He made it sound exactly what it was: crude and unsophisticated. He then began to improvise. And boy, did he improvise. He imitated Steibelt’s playing, he unpicked it and put it back together again, he played some tremolandos, emphasising their absurdity. He played in a way no salon audience had heard before, and that Steibelt could not have believed was humanly possible.

  It is easy to picture that powerful head, hair untamed, clothes inappropriate, fingers moving in a blur, no doubt singing, shouting, quite possibly hurling insults at the Prussian, who was probably sitting, back erect, powdered wig in place, clothes perfectly fitting, fingers curling tighter and tighter, as he realised he was not just being outplayed, he was being humiliated – in front of the most sophisticated musical gathering in the most sophisticated musical city in Europe.

  Steibelt did not sit that way for long. With Beethoven still playing, he rose from his chair and strode out of the salon. He made it clear he never wanted to meet Beethoven again, and that if ever he was invited to perform again in Vienna, he would do so only if Beethoven was not present. In fact he took even more drastic action than that. He abandoned his tour and returned to Berlin to nurse his wounds. Some years later he went to St Petersburg and remained there for the rest of his life. He never returned to Vienna, and never met Beethoven again.

  As for Beethoven, he was now – if there was any doubt before – the undisputed master of the keyboard in Vienna, if not Europe. Even Hummel, greatly admired, could not touch him. And following the drubbing of Steibelt, Beethoven was never again asked to take part in an improvisation contest. His position as Vienna’s supreme piano virtuoso was established once and for all.

  THE PUBLIC EVENT that had a profound impact on Beethoven’s life took place on 2 April 1800, and, if less dramatic than the Steibelt encounter, was of much more importance to Beethoven. It marked his coming of age as a composer, and we should remember that it was as aspiring composer that the young man had come to Vienna; it was as composer that he wanted to make his name, as composer that he wished to earn his place in musical history. Demonstrating his skills at the keyboard was merely the means to that end.

  After much lobbying, and a little bit of bribery (the dedication of the two Piano Sonatas, Op. 14, to his wife), Baron von Braun, manager of the imperial court theatres, allowed Beethoven the use of the Burgtheater for a benefit concert, his first in Vienna. This favour was never granted lightly, since it involved no profit for the theatre – after expenses, all profit accrued to the composer – indeed a couple of years later Beethoven was to fall out with Braun when he refused a second benefit concert (despite further similar bribes).

  His position as Vienna’s supreme piano virtuoso was established once and for all

  A benefit concert was hard work. It was customary for the beneficiary to decide the programme, naturally, but also calculate ticket prices, and even sell them from his own home. It was his job to hire musicians, arrange rehearsals, have posters and flyers printed and arrange for their distribution. As near to a full house as possible was imperative. It was unusual for a benefit concert to provide much profit, even with a full house, but it was a way of attracting the critics’ attention, and – it was hoped – approval. Reputations could be made, and the reverse. All in all, a benefit concert – and this would not be Beethoven’s last – was a calculated risk, but on balance worth taking.

  Interestingly Beethoven, aged twenty-nine and with his reputation as the city’s supreme piano virtuoso unassailably established, still lacked the confidence to stage a concert of his works alone. And so, as well as his newly completed Septet, First Symphony, and piano concerto (it’s not known which of the two), he programmed a Mozart symphony, and two pieces from Haydn’s oratorio The Creation. For good measure he threw in what he knew he was best at, a guaranteed audience pleaser: ‘Herr Ludwig van Beethoven will improvise on the pianoforte.’ A long concert, but not unusually so for the time, which was programmed to start at 6.30 p.m.

  It was not a success, or at the best had a mixed result. Again, not for the last time in his career, there were disagreements over who was to conduct, with Beethoven favouring one, but the orchestra refusing to play under him and preferring another. There was also clearly not enough rehearsal, since in the piano concerto, according to the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung, ‘the players did not bother to pay any attention to the soloist, and in the symphony they became so lax that no effort on the part of the conductor could drag any fire out of them, particularly the wind instruments’.5

  Consolation of a sort was that the newspaper’s critic thought the piano concerto had ‘a great deal of taste and feeling’, and that the symphony contained ‘considerable art, novelty, and a wealth of ideas’. We do not know what the critic thought of the Septet, but according to Czerny it became so popular so fast that Beethoven could not bear to hear it!

  Far from being discouraged, Beethoven threw himself into more composing. He embarked on another symphony (his Second), setting that aside to work on a commission for a ballet, Die Geschöpfe des Prometheus (The Creatures of Prometheus).6 He also composed more piano sonatas and a violin sonata.

  But there was no escaping the cloud hanging over him, the dreadful affliction that was beginning to affect every aspect of his life, which instead of improving or magically disappearing, was worsening. What should he do? What could be done?

  SUDDENLY, unexpectedly, Beethoven’ closest friend from his Bonn days, his childhood – even closer than Wegeler – Stephan von Breuning, arrived in Vienna. It was a sad development that brought him. Elector Maximilian Franz, who had made it possible for Beethoven to come to Vienna, was in ailing health, and the Teutonic Order considered it prudent to appoint a successor, should the worst happen. This meant convening a Grand Chapter in Vienna. Stephan, now a qualified lawyer working for the Order, came to Vienna to attend the meeting. In the event he took a job at the War Ministry in Vienna and remained in the city for the rest of his life. He will feature many more times in these pages, as Beethoven’s closest, and albeit with severe disruptions, most constant friend.

  Although I can offer no proof of this, I believe it was Stephan’s arrival in Vienna that unlocked Beethoven’s
denial of his deafness. At last there was someone he could confide in, and trust. If he told Stephan to say nothing to anyone, he could rely on Stephan to comply. I imagine the two old friends sitting up late into the night as Beethoven brings Stephan up to date on his musical activities, the concerts, salon recitals, the relative merits, pianistic and otherwise, of his young female pupils, and then pours his heart out over his encroaching deafness. I imagine Stephan’s horror, no doubt diplomatically concealed, and even discreet attempts to ascertain how bad the problem was by speaking ever more quietly. He would soon have realised that it was serious.

  We know the two men were overjoyed to meet up again, and spent a lot of time together. In a letter dated 29 June 1801, Beethoven writes:

  Steffen7 Breuning is now in Vienna and we meet almost every day. It does me good to revive the old feelings of friendship. He really has become an excellent, splendid fellow, who is well informed and who, like all of us more or less, has his heart in the right place.

  Ah yes, that letter. It can lay claim to being the most important letter Beethoven wrote among the thousands of letters and notes he wrote in his entire life, because as far as we know it was the first time Beethoven set down on paper that he was having a problem with his hearing.

  It was written to Dr Franz Wegeler. No surprise, then, that he chose to reveal this intimate detail to an old childhood friend who was now a qualified doctor. To begin with he beats about the bush a bit, writing about how much he would love to see Father Rhine again, talking about his earnings from composition, and concerts he has given and hopes to give. Then, out of the blue, without so much as a new paragraph, this:

  But that jealous demon, my wretched health, has put a nasty spoke in my wheel, and it amounts to this, that for the last three years my hearing has become weaker and weaker.