Beethoven's Symphonies: An Artistic Vision by Lewis Lockwood

Author:Lewis Lockwood [Lockwood, Lewis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 2015-05-03T23:00:00+00:00

THE FIRST MOVEMENT

The verve and energy of the first movement grows by gradual steps from the Introduction, then whips forward in 6/8 Vivace, announcing the three-note dactylic figure (twice in each 6/8 measure) that dominates the movement. Significantly, it is first given on the single pitch “E” in a high register in the winds, so it is first heard as a purely rhythmic motif before it emerges as part of a melodic phrase or is even harmonized. After a few measures, the A-major tonic chord is formed as more instruments join, and then the first theme proper appears in the solo flute (see Web Example M).

Opening a first movement with the main theme in high-register woodwinds is new in Beethoven’s symphonic practice, just as the theme itself is of a new character. Beethoven’s earlier uses of 6/8 meter, apart from slow movements, run along two different paths. One is the long-familiar pattern of 6/8 for Rondo finales, inherited from Haydn and Mozart.13 Beethoven followed this model in some early chamber works, and in several of his concerto finales. In all of them he still used the label “Rondo,” abandoning it in later works. The other path was his use of 6/8 in the first movements of the Quartets Op. 18, No. 5 and Op. 59, No. 2.14 But none of them come close to the Seventh in the use of obsessive rhythmic formulas throughout.

While the first movement preserves the basic sectional features of a large sonata-form movement, it shows a number of idiosyncrasies. In choosing to give this movement its decisive rhythmic stamp, Beethoven had to diminish the degree of melodic contrast that in earlier symphonies had distinguished his second group themes from his opening themes. If we think about the contrasting shapes of Beethoven’s first and second themes in the expositions of his earlier symphonies, we are struck by their differences in character, phrase-formation, and orchestration. Not so in the Seventh. Here he finds other ways to gain thematic contrast in every section of the movement. It must spin forward in its Vivace 6/8 meter, brilliantly varied in its smaller units but with nothing like the drastic contrasts in the exposition of the Fifth Symphony and to some degree in all the others.

One of those ways is through unusual harmonic shifts. In the introduction, Beethoven extended the harmonic range by moving from the tonic A major to the distant C major, and in the Vivace there are other sudden and surprising harmonic deviations, plus equally abrupt changes in dynamics and register. His subtlety of planning in the phrase-structure of this movement is fully apparent in the surviving sketches and in his autograph manuscript. About the latter we find a curious and revealing statement by the publisher Johann André, who visited Beethoven while he was writing out the autograph. According to Ferdinand Hiller

André reported that he had seen the score of the A-major Symphony in which there were blank pages, so that what was written before the blank had no connection at all with what was written after the blank.

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