Beethoven's Expanding Path

[goldentone]

In my early days of becoming acquainted with classical music, I listened to Beethoven's ninth symphony just a little bit and then I never got back to it.  Until now.

During the past week I listened to some of it on Youtube.  Tonight I bought it and have been listening through it.  Well, of course it is just grand.

The direction Beethoven was going appears to be the same one that Mahler embraced:  longer duration, the precedent of singing, and just overall complexity.  More than 60 years passed from the time Beethoven finished the ninth until Mahler began his first.  Similarly, the final movement of Beethoven's last piano sonata was revolutionary in its prophetic glance of jazz, which also didn't emerge until years later.

The leaps forward that Beethoven made are exponential.  He singlehandedly birthed the Romantic period, expanded the scope of the symphony in the ninth, and divulged some jazz for us.  Is it not amazing when we compare the practically instantaneous leaps Beethoven pulled out of his hat with the time it took for the musical world to assimilate and incoporate those ideas?

If Beethoven would have lived just 10 more years, where would he have taken us?

[mcgillcomposer]

To infinity and beyond...   

But seriously, it is incomprehensible to me where Beethoven would have taken us - his late sonatas and quartets are so complicated formally - but they work. This music is already very difficult to understand, if not impossible...which makes me even more uncertain of where he would have taken music. I mean, one would really have to be on his level to even imagine where the next few years would have brought him - and I highly doubt that there is anyone on this forum (let alone alive) who is on that level.

...interesting thread topic though

[pianowolfi]

If Beethoven would have lived just 10 more years, where would he have taken us?

I actually sometimes think that if Beethoven had lived for 10 more years the world history would have become different. That's how strong I consider him to be.

[faustsaccomplice]

goldenstone,

in what ways do you think beethoven influenced jazz? 

[mcgillcomposer]

goldenstone,

in what ways do you think beethoven influenced jazz? 

I was wondering the same thing...

[goldentone]

goldenstone,

in what ways do you think beethoven influenced jazz?

I was wondering the same thing...

I don't know if Beethoven had any influence on jazz directly, but I do believe he of his own greatness discovered it, or entered into it.  A voice crying in the wilderness, as it were.  Even so, he may have created it but it did not register until the time jazz began to form.

[goldentone]

I found this interesting article on Beethoven's ninth:

http://www.slate.com/id/2084948/

[arensky]

goldenstone,

in what ways do you think beethoven influenced jazz? 

I think he means predicted or foreshadowed and he's referring to the "boogie woogie" variations of the Arietta from Op.111,  pp. 10-13 or so of the PS edition.

The last few bars of the Rondo Capricio "Rage over a Lost Penny" Op.129 also anticipate jazz harmony. But these are just startling coincidences. Beethoven didn't invent jazz any more than Ravel did. While Ravel influenced many notable jazz musicians (Duke Ellington and Bill Evans spring to mind) I don't think Beethoven has had any considerable influence on jazz.

[faustsaccomplice]

it sounds like a stretch to me...

just my opinion

[goldentone]

Well, what do you call music that has both jazz rhythm and jazz chords? 

Thanks for the responses. 

[indutrial]

I think he means predicted or foreshadowed and he's referring to the "boogie woogie" variations of the Arietta from Op.111,  pp. 10-13 or so of the PS edition.

The last few bars of the Rondo Capricio "Rage over a Lost Penny" Op.129 also anticipate jazz harmony. But these are just startling coincidences. Beethoven didn't invent jazz any more than Ravel did. While Ravel influenced many notable jazz musicians (Duke Ellington and Bill Evans spring to mind) I don't think Beethoven has had any considerable influence on jazz.

Elements of music as a whole influenced the music that evolved into jazz. I wouldn't give Beethoven credit for creating the Mississippi Blues that inspired figures like Buddy Bolden, which was born out of African American folk culture. However, his presence, along with all of the composers and pianists before and after him definitely had an influence on the more structured side of jazz, like the elements that evolved into ragtime music and the expanded harmonies of the late 1800s that informed many jazz composers. I don't see any direct influences (i.e. compositions that were structured and modelled after Beethoven works), but jazz is undeniably linked to the aggregate ideas of Western music.