h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I recently completed a set of lectures on tape covering Bethoven's nine symphonies. The lecturer, a composer and professor of music, stated that LVB was the first to treat timpani musically, rather than "something to bang on".

P.S. He also added a bit of trivia - What is the only Beethoven Symphony to use a bass drum?

That's cool, we should all be grateful to Mozart!

So what's the answer? I have no idea, 5?

Its been so long I forgot But Wikipedia remembered - the 9th Symphony (also has a big four part choir, I've heard):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._9_(Beethoven)#Orchestration

Mmm, Mozart - didn't use a bass drum?

Sorry, I think I meant Beethoven not Mozart?

But Mozart did use a bass drum...in his Requiem I believe?

9th Symphony has everything right?

I've heard music professors call Beethoven's 9th Symphony one of the three most influential compositions in Western Music. Another is Monteverdi's "Orfeo" (1607 - established opera as a modern form). And the third is Stravinsky's "Rite of Spring" a ballet whose premier in 1913 caused a riot in the Paris opera house, and got the 20th century off to a (literal) bang.

Also, more time passed between Beethoven's 8th and 9th symphonies than it took him to write all the first eight. So he apparently gave it a LOT of thought.

I confess to only having properly listened to one of the three pieces you mentioned.

Off to find some CDs I suppose!

The 9th is always viewed as a big step forward in the development of the Symphony. And although I can agree in technical terms, I don't like it a work. The first three movements are okay, but I really dislike the fourth. I like the 'innovative' parts of it with the choir, but he could have got the musical message over in half the time. As such by the time the choir come in I'm bored and not really listening, which is a shame.

Beethoven 8, on the other hand, I . Completely. And pretty much everything else he ever wrote. Piano Concerto 4 makes me melt. The slow movement can take me to tears.


Ooh, in other trivia terms, Beethoven was not only the first to really use the timpani, but the tringle and piccolo too. Beetthoven rocks. Even if he was an embittered a***hole in real life.

"development of the Symphony."

I mean the Symphony as a concept, not the development of that particular piece of music itself.

I recall a music prof listing the historical periods of classical music: Medieval, Baroque, Classical, Beethoven, Romantic, 20th Century, ...

Beethoven did cross the barrier between Classical and Romantic, to be sure, but then, so did a lot of people. He just happens to be one of the better ones.