Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 by Various

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No person possessed so strong an influence upon the oft-times stubborn
and wilful boy as the Frau von Breuning. She best knew how to bring him
back to the performance of his duty, when neglectful of his pupils; and
when she, with gentle force, had made him cross the square to the house
of the Austrian ambassador, Count Westfall, to give the promised lesson,
and saw him, after hesitating for a time at the door, suddenly fly
back, unable to overcome his dislike to lesson-giving, she would bear
patiently with him, merely shrugging her shoulders and remarking,
"To-day he has his _raptus_ again!" The poverty at home and his love for
his mother alone enabled him ever to master this aversion.

To the Breunings, then, we are indebted for that love of Plutarch,
Homer, Shakspeare, Goethe, and whatever gives us noble pictures of that
greatness of character which we term "heroic," that enabled the future
composer to stir up within us all the finest and noblest emotions,
as with the wand of a magician. The boy had an inborn love of the
beautiful, the tender, the majestic, the sublime, in nature, in art, and
in literature,--together with a strong sense of the humorous and even
comic. With the Breunings all these qualities were cultivated and in
the right direction. To them the musical world owes a vast debt of
gratitude.

Beethoven was no exception to the rule, that only a great man can be a
great artist. True, in his later years his correspondence shows at
times an ignorance of the rules of grammar and orthography; but it also
proves, what may be determined from a thousand other indications, that
he was a deep thinker, and that he had a mind of no small degree of
cultivation, as it certainly was one of great intellectual power. Had he
devoted his life to any other profession than music,--to law, theology,
science, or letters,--he would have attained high eminence, and
enrolled himself among the great.

But we have anticipated a little, and now turn back to an event which
occurred soon after he had completed his thirteenth year, and which
proved in its consequences of the highest moment to him,--the death
of the Elector, which took place on the 15th of April, 1784. He was
succeeded by Maximilian Francis, Bishop of Muenster, Grand Master of
the Teutonic Order, a son of the Emperor Francis and Maria Theresa of
Austria.

A word upon this family of imperial musicians may, perhaps, be pardoned.
It was Charles VI., the father of Maria Theresa, a composer of canons
and music for the harpsichord, who, upon being complimented by his
Kapellmeister as being well able to officiate as a music-director, dryly
observed, "Upon the whole, however, I like my present position better!"
His daughter sang an air upon the stage of the Court Theatre in her
fifth year; and in 1739, just before her accession to the imperial
dignity, being in Florence, she sang a duet with Senesino--of Handelian
memory--with such grace and splendor of voice, that the tears rolled
down the old man's cheeks. In all her wars and amid all the cares of
state, Maria Theresa never ceased to cherish music. Her children were
put under the best instructors, and made thorough musicians;--Joseph,
whom Mozart so loved, though the victim of his shabby treatment; Maria
Antoinette, the patron of Gluck and the head of his party in Paris; Max
Franz, with whom we now have to do,--and so forth.

Upon learning the death of Max Frederick, his successor hastened to Bonn
to assume the Archiepiscopal and Electoral dignities, with which he
was formally invested in the spring of 1785. In the train of the new
Elector, who was still in the prime of life, was the Austrian Count
Waldstein, his favorite and constant companion. Waldstein, like his
master, was more than an amateur,--he was a fine practical musician. The
promising pupil of Neefe was soon brought to his notice, and his talents
and attainments excited in him an extraordinary interest. Coming from
Vienna, where Mozart and Haydn were in the full tide of their success,
where Gluck's operas were heard with rapture, and where in the second
rank of musicians and composers were such names as Salieri, Righini,
Anfossi, and Martini, Waldstein could well judge of the promise of the
boy. He foresaw at once his future greatness, and gave him his favor
and protection. He, in some degree, at least, relieved him from the dry
rules of Neefe, and taught him the art of varying a theme _extempore_
and carrying it out to its highest development. He had patience and
forbearance with the boy's failings and foibles, and, to relieve his
necessities, gave him money, sometimes as gifts of his own, sometimes as
gratifications from the Elector.

As soon as Maximilian was installed in his new dignity, Waldstein
procured for Ludwig the appointment of assistant court organist;--not
that Neefe needed him, but that he needed the small salary attached to
the place. From this time to the downfall of the Electorate, his name
follows that of Neefe in the annual Court Calendar.

Wegeler and others have preserved a variety of anecdotes which
illustrate the skill and peculiarities of the young organist at this
period, but we have not space for them;--moreover, our object is rather
to convey some distinct idea of the training which made him what every
lover of music knows he afterward became.

Maximilian Francis was as affable and generous as he was passionately
fond of music. A newspaper of the day records, that he used to walk
about the streets of Bonn like any other citizen, and early became very
popular with all classes. He often took part in the concerts at the
palace, as upon a certain occasion when "Duke Albert played violin, the
Elector viola, and Countess Belderbusch piano-forte," in a trio. He
enlarged his orchestra, and, through his relations with the courts at
Vienna, Paris, and other capitals, kept it well supplied with all the
new publications of the principal composers of the day,--Mozart, Haydn,
Gluck, Pleyel, and others.

No better school, therefore, for a young musician could there well have
been than that in which Beethoven was now placed. While Neefe took care
that he continued his study of the great classic models of organ
and piano-forte composition, he was constantly hearing the best
ecclesiastical, orchestral, and chamber music, forming his taste upon
the best models, and acquiring a knowledge of what the greatest masters
had accomplished in their several directions. But as time passed on, he
felt the necessity of a still larger field of observation, and, in the
autumn of 1786, Neefe's wish that his pupil might travel was fulfilled.
He obtained--mainly, it is probable, from the Elector, through the good
offices of Waldstein--the means of making the journey to Vienna,
then the musical capital of the world, to place himself under the
instructions of Mozart, then the master of all living masters. Few
records have fallen under our notice, which throw light upon this visit.
Seyfried, and Holmes, after him, relate the surprise of Mozart at
hearing the boy, now just sixteen years of age, treat an intricate fugue
theme, which he gave him, and his prophecy, that "that young man would
some day make himself heard of in the world!"

It is said that Beethoven in after life complained of never having heard
his master play. The complaint must have been, that Mozart never played
to him in private; for it is absurd to suppose that he attended none
of the splendid series of concerts which his master gave during that
winter.

The mysterious brevity of this first visit of Beethoven to Vienna we
find fully explained in a letter, of which we give a more literal than
elegant translation. It is the earliest specimen of the composer's
correspondence which has come under our notice, and was addressed to a
certain Dr. Schade, an advocate of Augsburg, where the young man seems
to have tarried some days upon his journey.

"Bonn, September 15, 1787.

"HONORED AND MOST VALUED FRIEND!

"What you must think of me I can easily conceive; nor can I deny that
you have well-grounded reasons for looking upon me in an unfavorable
light; but I will not ask you to excuse me, until I have made known the
grounds upon which I dare hope my apologies will find acceptance. I must
confess, that, from the moment of leaving Augsburg, my happiness, and
with it my health, began to leave me; the nearer I drew toward my native
city, the more numerous were the letters of my father, which met me,
urging me onward, as the condition of my mother's health was critical.
I hastened forward, therefore, with all possible expedition, for I was
myself much indisposed; but the longing I felt to see my sick mother
once more made all hindrances of little account, and aided me in
overcoming all obstacles.

"I found her still alive, but in a most pitiable condition. She was in
a consumption, and finally, about seven weeks since, after enduring the
extremes of pain and suffering, died. She was to me such a good and
loving mother,--my best of friends!

"Oh, who would be so happy as I, could I still speak the sweet name,
'Mother,' and have her hear it! And to whom _can_ I now speak? To the
dumb, but lifelike pictures which my imagination calls up.

"During the whole time since I reached home, few have been my hours of
enjoyment. All this time I have been afflicted with asthma, and the fear
is forced upon me that it may end in consumption. Moreover, the state
of melancholy in which I now am is almost as great a misfortune as my
sickness itself.

"Imagine yourself in my position for a moment, and I doubt not that I
shall receive your forgiveness for my long silence. As to the three
Carolins which you had the extraordinary kindness and friendship to lend
me in Augsburg, I must beg your indulgence still for a time. My journey
has cost me a good deal, and I have no compensation--not even the
slightest--to hope in return. Fortune is not propitious to me here in
Bonn.

"You will forgive me for detaining you so long with my babble; it is all
necessary to my apology. I pray you not to refuse me the continuance of
your valuable friendship, since there is nothing I so much desire as to
make myself in some degree worthy of it. I am, with all respect, your
most obedient servant and friend,

"L. v. BEETHOVEN,

"Court Organist to the Elector of Cologne."

We know also from other sources the extreme poverty in which the
Beethoven family was at this period sunk. In its extremity, at the time
when the mother died, Franz Ries, the violinist, came to its assistance,
and his kindness was not forgotten by Ludwig. When Ferdinand, the son
of this Ries, reached Vienna in the autumn of 1800, and presented his
father's letter, Beethoven said,--"I cannot answer your father yet; but
write and tell him that I have not forgotten the death of my mother.
That will fully satisfy him."

Young Beethoven, therefore, had little time for illness. His father
barely supported himself, and the sustenance of his two little brothers,
respectively twelve and thirteen years of age, devolved upon him. He
was, however, equal to his situation. He played his organ still,--the
instrument which was then above all others to his taste; he entered
the Orchestra as player upon the viola; received the appointment of
chamber-musician--pianist--to the Elector; and besides all this,
engaged in the detested labor of teaching. It proves no small energy
of character, that the motherless youth of seventeen, "afflicted with
asthma," which he was "fearful might end in consumption," struggling
against a "state of melancholy, almost as great a misfortune as sickness
itself," succeeded in overcoming all, and securing the welfare of
himself, his father, and his brothers. When he left Bonn finally, five
years later, Carl, then eighteen, could support himself by teaching
music, and Johann was apprenticed to the court apothecary; while the
father appears to have had a comfortable subsistence provided for
him,--although no longer an active member of the Electoral Chapel,--for
the few weeks which, as it happened, remained of his life.

The scattered notices which are preserved of Beethoven, during this
period, are difficult to arrange in a chronological order. We read of a
joke played at the expense of Heller, the principal tenor singer of the
Chapel, in which that singer, who prided himself upon his firmness in
pitch, was completely bewildered by a skilful modulation of the boy
upon the piano-forte, and forced to stop;--of the music to a chivalrous
ballad, performed by the noblemen attached to the court, of which for a
long time Count Waldstein was the reputed author, but which in fact was
the work of his _protege;_--and there are other anecdotes, probably
familiar to most readers, showing the great skill and science which he
already exhibited in his performance of chamber music in the presence of
the Elector.

We see him intimate as ever in the Breuning family, mingling familiarly
with the best society of Bonn, which he met at their house,--and even
desperately in love! First it is with Frauelein Jeannette d'Honrath, of
Cologne, a beautiful and lively blonde, of pleasing manners, sweet and
gentle disposition, an ardent lover of music, and an agreeable singer,
who often came to Bonn and spent weeks with the Breunings. She seems to
have played the coquette a little, both with our young artist and his
friend Stephen. It is not difficult to imagine the effect upon the
sensitive and impulsive Ludwig, when the beautiful girl, nodding to him
in token of its application, sang in tender accents the then popular
song,--

"Mich heute noch von dir zu trennen,
Und dieses nicht verhindern koennen,
Ist zu empfindlich fuer mein Herz."

She saw fit, however, to marry an Austrian, Carl Greth, a future
commandant at Temeswar, and her youthful lover was left to console
himself by transferring his affections to another beauty, Frauelein W.

We behold him in the same select circle, cultivating his talent for
improvising upon the piano-forte, by depicting in music the characters
of friends and acquaintances, and generally in such a manner that the
company had no difficulty in guessing the person intended. On one
of these occasions, Franz Ries was persuaded to take his violin and
improvise an accompaniment to his friend's improvisation, which he did
so successfully, that, long afterwards, he more than once ventured to
attempt the same in public, with his son Ferdinand.

Professor Wurzer, of Marburg, who well knew Beethoven in his youth,
gives us a glimpse of him sitting at the organ. On a pleasant summer
afternoon, when the artist was about twenty years of age, he, with some
companions, strolled out to Godesberg. Here they met Wurzer, who, in the
course of the conversation, mentioned that the church of the convent of
Marienforst--behind the village of Godesberg--had been repaired, and
that a new organ had been procured, or perhaps that the old one had been
put in order and perfected. Beethoven must needs try it. The key was
procured from the prior, and the friends gave him themes to vary and
work out, which he did with such skill and beauty, that at length the
peasants engaged below in cleaning the church, one after another,
dropped their brooms and brushes, forgetting everything else in their
wonder and delight.

In 1790, an addition was made to the Orchestra, most important in its
influence upon the artistic progress of Beethoven, as he was thus
brought into daily intercourse with two young musicians, already
distinguished virtuosos upon their respective instruments. The Elector
made frequent visits to other cities of his diocese, often taking a part
or the whole of his Chapel with him. Upon his return that summer from
Muenster, he brought with him the two virtuosos in question. Andreas
Romberg, the violinist, and now celebrated composer, and his cousin
Bernhard, the greatest violoncellist of his age. With these two
young men Beethoven was often called to the palace for the private
entertainment of Maximilian. Very probably, upon one of these occasions,
was performed that trio not published until since the death of its
composer--"the second movement of which," says Schindler, "may be looked
upon as the embryo of all Beethoven's scherzos," while "the third is, in
idea and form, of the school of Mozart,--a proof how early he made that
master his idol." We know that it was composed at this period, and that
its author considered it his highest attempt then in free composition.

A few words must be given to the Electoral Orchestra, that school in
which Beethoven laid the foundation of his prodigious knowledge of
instrumental and orchestral effects, as in the chamber-music at the
palace he learned the unrivalled skill which distinguishes his efforts
in that branch of the art.

The Kapellmeister, in 1792, was Andrea Lucchesi, a native of Motta, in
the Venetian territory, a fertile and accomplished composer in most
styles. The concert-master was Joseph Reicha, a virtuoso upon the
violoncello, a very fine conductor, and no mean composer. The violins
were sixteen in number; among them were Franz Ries, Neefe,
Anton Reicha,--afterward the celebrated director of the Paris
Conservatoire,--and Andreas Romberg; violas four, among them Ludwig
van Beethoven; violoncellists three, among them Bernhard Romberg;
contrabassists also three. There were two oboes, two flutes,--one of
them played by another Anton Reicha,--two clarinets, two horns,--one by
Simrock, a celebrated player, and founder of the music-publishing house
of that name still existing in Bonn,--three bassoons, four trumpets, and
the usual tympani.

Fourteen of the forty-three musicians were soloists upon their several
instruments; some half a dozen of them were already known as composers.
Four years, at the least, of service in such an orchestra may well be
considered of all schools the best in which Beethoven could have been
placed. Let his works decide.

Our article shall close with some pictures photographed in the sunshine
which gilded the closing years of Beethoven's Bonn life. They illustrate
the character of the man and of the people with whom he lived and moved.

In 1791, in that beautiful season of the year in Central Europe, when
the heats of summer are past and the autumn rains not yet set in, the
Elector journeyed to Mergentheim, to hold, in his capacity of Grand
Master, a convocation of the Teutonic Order. The leading singers of
his Chapel, and some twenty members of the Orchestra, under Ries as
director, followed in two large barges. Before, starting upon the
expedition, the company assembled and elected a king. The dignity was
conferred upon Joseph Lux, the bass singer and comic actor, who, in
distributing the offices of his court, appointed Ludwig van Beethoven
and Bernhard Romberg scullions!

A glorious time and a merry they had of it, following slowly the
windings of the Rhine and the Main, now impelled by the wind, now drawn
by horses, against the swift current, in this loveliest time of the
year.

In those days, when steamboats were not, such a voyage was slow, and not
seldom in a high degree tedious. With such a company the want of speed
was a consideration of no importance, and the memory of this journey was
in after years among Beethoven's brightest. Those who know the Rhine and
the Main can easily conceive that this should be so. The route embraced
the whole extent of the famous highlands of the former river, from
the Drachenfels and Rolandseek to the heights of the Niederwald above
Ruedesheim, and that lovely section of the latter which divides the hills
of the Odenwald from those of Spessart. The voyagers passed a thousand
points of local and historic interest. The old castles--among them
Stolzenfels and the Brothers--looked down upon them from their rocky
heights, as long afterwards upon the American, Paul Flemming, when he
journeyed, sick at heart, along the Rhine, toward ancient Heidelberg.
Quaint old cities--Andernach, with "the Christ," Coblentz, home of
Beethoven's mother, Boppard, Bacharach, Bingen--welcomed them; Mainz,
the Electoral city, and Frankfurt, seat of the Empire. And still beyond,
on the banks of the Main, Offenbach, Hanau, Aschaffenburg, and so onward
to Wertheim, where they left the Main and ascended the small river
Tauber to their place of destination.

Among the places at which they landed and made merry upon the journey
was the Niederwald. Here King Lux advanced Beethoven to a more honorable
position in his court, and gave him a diploma, dated from the heights
above Ruedesheim, attesting his appointment to the new dignity. To this
important document was attached, by threads ravelled from a boat-sail,
a huge seal of pitch, pressed into a small box-cover, which gave
the instrument a right imposing look,--like the Golden Bull in the
Roemer-Saal at Frankfurt. This diploma from His Comic Majesty Beethoven
carried with him to Vienna, where Wegeler saw it several years afterward
carefully preserved.

At Aschaffenburg, the summer residence of the Electors of Mainz, Ries,
Simrock, and the two Rombergs took Beethoven with them to call upon the
great pianist, Sterkel. The master received the young men kindly, and
gratified them with a specimen of his powers. His style was in the
highest degree graceful and pleasing,--as Father Ries described it to
Wegeler, "somewhat lady-like." While he played, Beethoven stood by,
listening with the most eager attention, doubtless silently comparing
the effects produced by the player with those belonging to his own
style, which was rather rough and hard, owing to his constant practice
upon the organ. It is said that this was his first opportunity of
hearing any distinguished virtuoso upon the piano-forte,--a mistake,
we think, for he must have heard Mozart in Vienna, as before remarked.
Still, the delicacy of Sterkel's style may well have been a new
revelation to him of the powers of the instrument. Upon leaving the
piano-forte, the master invited his young visitor to take his place.
Beethoven was naturally diffident, and was not to be prevailed with,
until Sterkel intimated a doubt whether he could play his own very
difficult variations upon the air, "Vieni, Amore," which had then just
been published. Thus touched in a tender spot, the young author sat down
and played such as he could remember,--no copy being at hand,--and
then improvised several others, equally, if not more difficult, to the
surprise both of Sterkel and his friends. "What raised our surprise to
real astonishment," said Ries, as he related the story, "was, that the
impromptu variations were in precisely that graceful, pleasing style
which he had just heard for the first time."

Upon reaching Mergentheim, music, and ever music, became the order of
the day for King Lux and his merry subjects. Most fortunately for the
admirers of Beethoven, we have a minute account of two days (October 11
and 12) spent there, by a competent and trustworthy musical critic of
that period,--a man not the less welcome to us for possessing something
of the flunkeyism of old Diarist Pepys and Corsica Boswell. We shall
quote somewhat at length from his letter, since it has hitherto come
under the notice of none of the biographers, and yet gives us so lively
a picture of young Beethoven and his friends.

"On the very first day," writes Junker, "I heard the small band which
plays at dinner, during the stay of the Elector at Mergentheim. The
instruments are two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, and two horns.
These eight performers may well be called masters in their art. One can
rarely hear music of the kind, distinguished by such perfect unity
of effect and such sympathy with each other in the performers, and
especially in which so high a degree of exactness and perfection of
style is reached. This band appeared to me to differ from all others
I have heard in this,--that it plays music of a higher order; on this
occasion, for instance, it gave an arrangement of Mozart's overture to
'Don Juan.'"

It would be interesting to know what, if any, of the works of Beethoven
for wind-instruments belong to this period of his life.

"Soon after the dinner-music," continues our writer, "the play began. It
was the opera, 'King Theodor,' music by Paisiello. The part of _Theodor_
was sung by Herr Nuedler, a powerful singer in tragic scenes, and a good
actor. _Achmet_ was given by Herr Spitzeder,--a good bass singer, but
with too little action, and not always quite true,--in short, too cold.
The inn-keeper was Herr Lux, a very good bass, and the best actor,--a
man created for the comic. The part of _Lizette_ was taken by Demoiselle
Willmann. She sings in excellent taste, has very great power of
expression, and a lively, captivating action. Herr Maendel, in
_Sandrino,_ proved himself also a very fine and pleasing singer. The
orchestra was surpassingly good,--especially in its _piano_ and _forte_,
and its careful _crescendo._ Herr Ries, that remarkable reader of
scores, that great player, directed with his violin. He is a man who may
well be placed beside Cannabich, and by his powerful and certain tones
he gave life and soul to the whole....

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