Beethoven's contemporaries

[DavidW]

This is true for everyone.

Ha!

[Florestan]

So, no real data

I read several books dealing with 19th century opera in general and 19th century operatic composers in particular, written by professional music historians, featuring numerous footnotes and long reference lists. Personally I wouldn't call them as lacking any real data --- but I'm perfectly fine with you doing just that.

a lot of conjecture.

Here's another conjecture of mine: I am confident that a thorough examination of the repertoire of the major opera houses in Europe between 1805 (the year Fidelio was premiered) and 1850 (that is, 20 years after Rossini's last opera was premiered) would result in Rossini's performances far outnumbering Beethoven's.

It is of course worth noting that the number of performances does not equate to significance and influence, let alone quality to current audiences.

If by "current audiences"  you mean "current musicology and current music criticism", then you are absolutely right.

Otherwise, it is of course worth noting that what 19th century operatic audiences considered significant and influential and quality-ladden is, with a few notable exceptions, what current operatic audiences still consider significant and influential and quality-ladden.

[Florestan]

Life is too short, listen to what you like.  But... please don't insinuate that Beethoven's contemporaries are "undistinguished" just because they are not your cup of tea.

Amen!

[Todd]

I read several books dealing with 19th century opera in general and 19th century operatic composers in particular, written by professional music historians, featuring numerous footnotes and long reference lists.

Footnotes are good.

Otherwise, it is of course worth noting that what 19th century operatic audiences considered significant and influential and quality-ladden is, with a few notable exceptions, what current operatic audiences still consider significant and influential and quality-ladden.

Except for the works that dropped out of the repertoire.

[Brian]

I guess you better not listen to Xenakis or Carter then if your judgment is based upon memorable melody!

Even Beethoven's melodies are a little eccentric! Although they are often "memorable," it's very rare to find a Beethoven melody as "beautiful" or "singable" or "lyrical" as the best melodies by, say, Brahms or Dvorak. I mean, imagine walking down the street humming the finale of the Second Symphony...or the Fourth Symphony...or the Seventh Symphony... 

Aside from Ode to Joy, what is the "best" melody by Beethoven? The finale of the Sixth? The Prometheus/Eroica tune? The slow movement of the quartet Op. 59 No. 1?

[Todd]

Aside from Ode to Joy, what is the "best" melody by Beethoven? The finale of the Sixth? The Prometheus/Eroica tune? The slow movement of the quartet Op. 59 No. 1?

The Tempo Di Menuetto from 49/2 and the Septet comes immediately to mind.  The first nine string quartets all have great melodies.  I find myself whistling some tunes from them from time to time, starting with the Allegro con brio of 18/1.  The Piano Trios have a few.  I'd have to revisit some of his songs, because some of those have some really good tunes.

[DavidW]

I can always immediately recall the lovely melody in the opening movement of Op 59 #1.

[amw]

Even Beethoven's melodies are a little eccentric! Although they are often "memorable," it's very rare to find a Beethoven melody as "beautiful" or "singable" or "lyrical" as the best melodies by, say, Brahms or Dvorak. I mean, imagine walking down the street humming the finale of the Second Symphony...or the Fourth Symphony...or the Seventh Symphony... 

Aside from Ode to Joy, what is the "best" melody by Beethoven? The finale of the Sixth? The Prometheus/Eroica tune? The slow movement of the quartet Op. 59 No. 1?

Full-fledged melodies were somewhat incompatible with Beethoven's style, so yes he didn't write a lot, but most of them are perfectly good. In addition to those already mentioned I would nominate the slow movements of the quartets op. 74 and 95, both main themes in the first movement of the quartet op. 18 no. 2, the variation theme in the trio op. 97, the first and second movements of the piano sonata op. 28, the minuet in the piano sonata op. 31 no. 3, and basically everything in the rondo of the piano concerto op. 15.

[Jo498]

I don't know how quickly Rossini's popularity faded in the mid-19th century. Very probably his operas were far more popular than Fidelio until the mid-19th century.
But I was not talking about this but about the whole last 200 years and that Fidelio has been a standard repertoire piece for a very long time. Regardless of Rossini being more popular for a few decades it was not a failure but overall it seems one of the most successful operas by "non-opera composers".
The singer Schröder-Devrient supposedly deserves some credit for her Leonore performances since the 1820s, when Beethoven was still alive. I also think that the "problems" with Fidelio are exaggerated by a certain kind of opera fan (because it is an uncommon opera, obviously, but they blithely ignore worse problems of libretto or "logic" in other operas) but this does not seem to matter in practice.

[Jo498]

The Tempo Di Menuetto from 49/2 and the Septet comes immediately to mind.

Unfortunately and unbidden, yes...

It's true that many themes and melodies of Beethoven are more "instrumental", compared to e.g. Mozart or Schubert (but hardly compared to Haydn or others). But they are memorable nevertheless, if not as easily hummable. And there are plenty of easily hummable melodies. Beethoven could write pleasant comical opera style, like the first duet or the "gold aria" in Fidelio; he could do solemn choral parts (like the Prisoners'chorus or the slow section of the 9th finale), he could write "romantic" aria-style lieder, like "Adelaide".
And even in instrumental music he'd write "operatic" pieces like the slow movements of op.18/1 or op.10/3, or Schubert-like cantabile pieces like the 2nd movement of op.90 or the first of op.110.

[Florestan]

I don't know how quickly Rossini's popularity faded in the mid-19th century. Very probably his operas were far more popular than Fidelio until the mid-19th century.
But I was not talking about this but about the whole last 200 years and that Fidelio has been a standard repertoire piece for a very long time. Regardless of Rossini being more popular for a few decades it was not a failure but overall it seems one of the most successful operas by "non-opera composers".

According to Operabase.com, between March 1, 2020 and March 1, 2023 Fidelio had 580+ performances worldwide, while Il Barbiere di Siviglia had 2040+. Looks like in the early 21st century Rossini's popularity in the operatic world is still greater than Beethoven's by a ratio of about 4 to 1. I rest my case for good.

[Daverz]

Unlike the Baroque and Romantic-onward eras, I feel like Beethoven didn't really have any truly great contemporaries (of course I am not including Haydn, Mozart, Schubert or Rossini.) Schumann or Mahler - they had so many other great fellow composers who wrote beautiful music. Beethoven's genius seems even more magnified when I hear his contemporaries. The music's tunes simply aren't memorable. The music does not stay with me. I have heard Hummel's piano concertos, Ries' symphonies and piano concertos and Spohr's symphonies. They don't seem to really hold a candle to Beethoven's works.

What is your view on Beethoven's contemporaries? Which orchestral pieces would you recommend to me to change my view?

I mostly agree with this, though I'd add Weber to your list.  Spohr did wrote some attractive music, particularly concertante works and chamber music.  And I think Ries is a bit underrated, perhaps because he was a pupil of Beethoven, which raised expectations too much. I've really enjoyed what I've heard from him. 

Jerry Dubins had an interesting aside in a review of Spohr's double quartets in Fanfare:

    Spohr's music is fairly typical for its time, which is to say it does its best to pretend that
    Beethoven never happened, while embracing the early Romantic leanings of Reicha, Weber, and
    Onslow.

Reicha is a very interesting case as he could be very eccentric and original.  I wouldn't put him on the level of Beethoven, but I find his music endlessly fascinating. 

EDIT: I forgot about Cherubini, who was probably at his best in his masses, which must have influenced Beethoven.  His string quartets are very good, too.  Of other slightly older composers from this list

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Classical-era_composers

Mehul stands out as one of the more interesting (4 symphonies and some opera overtures).  Of slightly younger composers, the name Cartellieri stands out for some very enjoyable symphonies and concertos.

Of the much younger proto-Romantics, don't forget Kalliwoda.

[lordlance]

I guess you better not listen to Xenakis or Carter then if your judgment is based upon memorable melody!

That seems disingenuous - Lindberg and Aho aren't trying to write like Beethoven or Mozart did with memorable tunes. In that aspect Beethoven's contemporaries fail to me. I am not a baroque guy but as I understand it there's loads of influential composers that's performed by specialist groups like Rameau, Handel, Couperin, Vivaldi, Telemann, Corelli. So it's not like classical where performances of Spohr or Dussek are rare.

As for taste, I would say that it's not like vocal music which I don't get. I very much enjoy the style Mozart and Beethoven wrote in. It's just not terribly memorable so I call it undistinguished. You may well think otherwise. It reminds me of the large following that Raff has. He too writes unmemorable music to my ears.

And yes Rossini or Cherubini may well have written great vocal music in which case, my question might be contemporaries of Beethoven who wrote great orchestral music. Again, in the Romantic era (and I suppose baroque too) there's no shortage of great composers for orchestral music.

Mehul stands out as one of the more interesting (4 symphonies and some opera overtures).  Of slightly younger composers, the name Cartellieri stands out for some very enjoyable symphonies and concertos.

Of the much younger proto-Romantics, don't forget Kalliwoda.

Kalliwoda! I enjoy his Fifth symphony. Dave found a hidden gem.

I haven't tried Mehul. I should try him next.

___

As for Beethoven not being hummable, that's not true for me. I hum all of his symphonies' opening movements or finales. There's something incredible about how they don't seem to stop being fresh despite hearing them for years unlike other composers.

[amw]

And yes Rossini or Cherubini may well have written great vocal music in which case, my question might be contemporaries of Beethoven who wrote great orchestral music. Again, in the Romantic era (and I suppose baroque too) there's no shortage of great composers for orchestral music.

The public orchestral concert did not really exist as a phenomenon until the ~1800s. Prior to Beethoven, composers generally only wrote orchestral music if they were employed to do so as a Kapellmeister or equivalent position, or by commission by a particular patron if they were exceptionally famous. As late as the 1820s orchestral music was still mainly the province of the aristocracy, while the bourgeoisie and petit-bourgeoisie who made up the majority of concert audiences primarily attended the opera on a periodic basis, with orchestral concerts being something put on primarily by famous composers or virtuosos using pick-up bands or the house band of the local nobleman or opera house (e.g., the concerts for which Haydn composed the 'Paris' and 'London' Symphonies, or those organised by a group of Beethoven's patrons to present all of his symphonies).

As such, before the Romantic era, orchestral music largely had an occasional character and was not a particularly serious discipline. Symphonies and overtures often used music derived from operas, ballets or stage plays or were short in length. There are various reasons this changed: the immense popularity of Haydn and Mozart's symphonies and concertos; the view in revolutionary France that the symphony was a more egalitarian public art form than the opera, promoted by figures like Méhul and Gossec; increasing levels of instrumental virtuosity and performance quality; an increasing prestige attached to instrumental music more generally, as a growing petit bourgeoisie across Europe began purchasing pianos and other musical instruments for use in their homes to signify their new social status.

Beethoven was somewhat of an outlier in his preference for symphony over opera, and developed this preference for several reasons: like Mozart he was never able to secure a permanent Kapellmeister position, instead rising to fame as an instrumental virtuoso and child prodigy; to a much greater extent than Mozart, he identified with and celebrated the ideals of the French Revolution, at least early in his life, to the point where his most famous symphony openly quotes at least two revolutionary hymns; finally, he developed a somewhat one-sided rivalry with Rossini (Rossini is not known to have ever commented one way or another on Beethoven's work) partly as a result of widespread public comparing and contrasting of the two as the greatest composers of the age, which led him to profess distaste for most of the popular operatic composers of the day and therefore cemented the idea of the symphony as an equal and opposite competitor to the opera in the minds of the public.

The public orchestral concert as we know it developed largely after Beethoven's death, primarily due to the influence of Mendelssohn. Berlioz, Liszt and Schumann also contributed greatly to the development of orchestral music as a genre. That said, orchestral music did not fully equal or exceed the prestige of opera until the 1860s-1870s, with the symphonies and symphonic poems of Brahms, Bruckner, Dvořák, Tchaikovsky, and their contemporaries. The vast majority of the large number of "great composers of orchestral music" in the Romantic era composed the bulk of their orchestral music after 1870.

There was also a large amount of great orchestral music in the Baroque era but the definition of "orchestra" was quite different. An orchestra generally meant any ensemble larger than a trio or quartet—for example, Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 is for seven players, and there are a number of Vivaldi string concertos for five players. Extra musicians, where available, could double up on the parts, but ensembles we'd recognise as "orchestras" (with players in sections) appear only rarely and become more common towards the middle of the 18th century.

[joachim]

he identified with and celebrated the ideals of the French Revolution, at least early in his life, to the point where his most famous symphony openly quotes at least two revolutionary hymns;

Dear amv, I don't quite understand your sentence: what symphony, and what revolutionary tunes?

[Florestan]

The public orchestral concert did not really exist as a phenomenon until the ~1800s. Prior to Beethoven, composers generally only wrote orchestral music if they were employed to do so as a Kapellmeister or equivalent position, or by commission by a particular patron if they were exceptionally famous. As late as the 1820s orchestral music was still mainly the province of the aristocracy, while the bourgeoisie and petit-bourgeoisie who made up the majority of concert audiences primarily attended the opera on a periodic basis, with orchestral concerts being something put on primarily by famous composers or virtuosos using pick-up bands or the house band of the local nobleman or opera house (e.g., the concerts for which Haydn composed the 'Paris' and 'London' Symphonies, or those organised by a group of Beethoven's patrons to present all of his symphonies).

As such, before the Romantic era, orchestral music largely had an occasional character and was not a particularly serious discipline. Symphonies and overtures often used music derived from operas, ballets or stage plays or were short in length. There are various reasons this changed: the immense popularity of Haydn and Mozart's symphonies and concertos; the view in revolutionary France that the symphony was a more egalitarian public art form than the opera, promoted by figures like Méhul and Gossec; increasing levels of instrumental virtuosity and performance quality; an increasing prestige attached to instrumental music more generally, as a growing petit bourgeoisie across Europe began purchasing pianos and other musical instruments for use in their homes to signify their new social status.

Beethoven was somewhat of an outlier in his preference for symphony over opera, and developed this preference for several reasons: like Mozart he was never able to secure a permanent Kapellmeister position, instead rising to fame as an instrumental virtuoso and child prodigy; to a much greater extent than Mozart, he identified with and celebrated the ideals of the French Revolution, at least early in his life, to the point where his most famous symphony openly quotes at least two revolutionary hymns; finally, he developed a somewhat one-sided rivalry with Rossini (Rossini is not known to have ever commented one way or another on Beethoven's work) partly as a result of widespread public comparing and contrasting of the two as the greatest composers of the age, which led him to profess distaste for most of the popular operatic composers of the day and therefore cemented the idea of the symphony as an equal and opposite competitor to the opera in the minds of the public.

The public orchestral concert as we know it developed largely after Beethoven's death, primarily due to the influence of Mendelssohn. Berlioz, Liszt and Schumann also contributed greatly to the development of orchestral music as a genre. That said, orchestral music did not fully equal or exceed the prestige of opera until the 1860s-1870s, with the symphonies and symphonic poems of Brahms, Bruckner, Dvořák, Tchaikovsky, and their contemporaries. The vast majority of the large number of "great composers of orchestral music" in the Romantic era composed the bulk of their orchestral music after 1870.

There was also a large amount of great orchestral music in the Baroque era but the definition of "orchestra" was quite different. An orchestra generally meant any ensemble larger than a trio or quartet—for example, Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 is for seven players, and there are a number of Vivaldi string concertos for five players. Extra musicians, where available, could double up on the parts, but ensembles we'd recognise as "orchestras" (with players in sections) appear only rarely and become more common towards the middle of the 18th century.

Excellent post.

[Florestan]

Rossini is not known to have ever commented one way or another on Beethoven's work

He was, however, deeply impressed by the squalor in which Beethoven lived and shortly thereafter, while dining with some Viennese aristocrats, he told them that it was intolerable that such a man lived in such dire conditions and suggested they bought Beethoven a proper accommodation. Their unanimous replies perplexed him. "You don't know Beethoven," they told Rossini, "he would sell it the very next day, squander the money and revert to squalor!"

In fact, Rossini did comment on Beethoven's music. In a letter to Ignaz Moscheles he wrote:

I take Beethoven twice a week, Haydn four times, and Mozart every day. You will tell me that Beethoven is a Colossus who often gives you a dig in the ribs, whilst Mozart is always adorable; it is that the latter had the chance of going very young to Italy, at a time when they still sang well.

Despite what some people might be inclined to believe, Rossini was quite appreciative of German music. In his study years he was even known as "Il tedeschino" (The Little German) due to his fondness for the music of Mozart and Haydn. He was also among the first subscribers of a complete Bach edition published in Germany. He summed up very well his position thus:

The Germans have always been the greatest harmonists, and the Italians the greatest melodists. But from the moment that the North produced a Mozart, we of the South were beaten on our own ground, because this man rises above all nations, uniting in himself the charm of Italian melody and all the profundity of German harmony. He is the only musician who had as much knowledge as genius, and as much genius as knowledge.

I believe the rivalry between Beethoven and Rossini originated not with themselves but with some of their followers --- and it's a thing of the distant past anyway. I see no reason why today one cannot enjoy both equally.

[Jo498]

According to Operabase.com, between March 1, 2020 and March 1, 2023 Fidelio had 580+ performances worldwide, while Il Barbiere di Siviglia had 2040+. Looks like in the early 21st century Rossini's popularity in the operatic world is still greater than Beethoven's by a ratio of about 4 to 1. I rest my case for good.

Just that your "case" was not that Barbiere is more popular than Fidelio but that the latter was a "failure". And that's simply not true. It has one of the most popular, most recorded and highly regarded operas since a long time.

[Jo498]

The public orchestral concert did not really exist as a phenomenon until the ~1800s. Prior to Beethoven, composers generally only wrote orchestral music if they were employed to do so as a Kapellmeister or equivalent position, or by commission by a particular patron if they were exceptionally famous. As late as the 1820s orchestral music was still mainly the province of the
[...]

Beethoven was somewhat of an outlier in his preference for symphony over opera, and developed this

But Haydn was already such an outlier; he wrote an opera for London but 13 symphonies for orchestral concerts and the fame from the 1770s and 80s that brought him to London rested almost entirely on instrumental music. So we have two outliers among the most famous composers between 1780 and 1830. Then we have at least four more without significant operas before 1850: Chopin, Liszt, Mendelssohn, Schumann. We also have critics like Hoffmann hailing instrumental music as "the only pure romantic" around 1810.
So I think one has to distinguish between the sociological facts you enumerated and an "avantgarde"? of critics and composers that were highly regarded who wrote hardly any operas well before the second half of the 19th century.

[Florestan]

But Haydn was already such an outlier; he wrote an opera for London but 13 symphonies for orchestral concerts

By the time he made his first trip to London, Haydn had already composed 12 operas, so he was hardly an outlier.

Then we have at least four more without significant operas before 1850: Chopin, Liszt, Mendelssohn, Schumann.

The "significant" marker is irrelevant. Liszt and Schumann both wrote one opera, Mendelssohn one opera and a few Singspiele. Chopin wrote no opera, but then again he wrote no symphony as well, and very little vocal music. He is indeed the one true outlier.