08 December 2008
10 November 2008
how i spent my weekend...
this is only half of the giant project i dominated this weekend:
The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
with special attention paid to Symphony No. 8, Op. 93
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in mid-December, 1770 in a town called Bonn, located about fifteen miles upriver of Cologne. The exact date of his birth is unknown, but he was baptized on December 17th, and it was customary in the Catholic practice at the time to baptize a child within twenty-four hours of his birth. He was the eldest, although not firstborn, son of Johann and Maria Magdalena van Beethoven.[1] Maria Magdalena had given birth to two children who both died in infancy before Ludwig was born. The second-born was baptized and buried in April 1769, also with the name Ludwig. Two siblings survived after Ludwig, and later Maria Magdalena gave birth to another two children who both died in infancy. Johann van Beethoven was a known drunk and a cruel and abusive father and husband, which no doubt contributed to the reasons that four of their seven children died in infancy.[2]
The elder Ludwig van Beethoven, Johann’s father, sponsored young Ludwig’s baptism. He had moved to Bonn in 1733 to take a prominent position as a court musician, Kapellmeister, and he was much admired and respected as Bonn’s most eminent musician. He died on Christmas Eve in 1773, when little Ludwig was just old enough to be able to form some memories of him.[3]
Music was the true language of Ludwig van Beethoven, it came to him “more readily than words.”[4] It was his escape from the cold home he lived in, with an alcoholic father and a neglectful mother who allowed him to run about unwashed and in dirty clothes.[5] He would sit at the harpsichord as young as age four, crying, unable to stop repeating his exercises.[6] Johann, being a poorly paid court singer, was critical of Ludwig’s musical gifts for improvisation and freed variation as a child, telling him to stop and that he wasn’t “to do that yet.” However, Johann did recognize his son’s talent and in 1778, when Ludwig was seven, he took him to Cologne to have him give a recital. He presented his son as being six years old, to make him appear as more of a prodigy. Johann was greatly disappointed and even more critical of his son after the recital drew very little attention and no press at all.[7]
Thinking that their son was maybe not a child prodigy in the rank of Mozart, Maria Magdalena and Johann decided to pay some attention to their eldest son’s general education. They enrolled Ludwig in a Latin grade school, where his unkempt appearance led his classmates to believe that he actually had no mother. He was not a very gifted student nor was he very social. He had trouble with more than just the basics of writing and arithmetic, and he has no evident desire to make friends. Some evidence suggests he may have been slightly dyslexic, often inverting numbers in his scores and letters. However, he surely exhibited genius in his quest to solve complex problems of counterpoint.[8] Morris discusses the relationship of his learning disability to his genius stating:
“He had, besides, a mastery of musical architecture that was as instinctual as it was innovative. Again, the possibility of dyslexia arises. Some orthographically challenged people have an almost cubist ability to visualize planes and dimensions from many different angels at once. Beethoven’s sound structures are full of disproportionate rooms and inner voids, with surprise changes of level, and windows full of sky; but they always balance out as total buildings, no matter how large their size.”[9]
He began composing sometime around the age of ten, not having had any formal training in composition. Somehow, he managed to write correctly without knowing how to do so. Soon after, he was withdrawn from school and thirty-three-year-old Christian Gottlob Neefe took him on as a student. Neefe was a court organist, trained in law as well as music. Having studied in Leipzig, he was able to teach Beethoven using the pedagogical tradition of Johann Sebastian Bach.[10]
Beethoven’s first publication in 1782 was under the influence of Neefe. It was a set of piano variations of a theme by Dressler. Having been an assignment from his teacher, the variations did not foreshadow much of the composer that he would become, except for in the final variation in which he suddenly takes off in a foreign key, something of which Neefe was not very encouraging.[11]
Despite his extremely formulaic style of teaching, Neefe saw the potential that Beethoven held, yet worried that the confines of Bonn would not allow him to fulfill his destiny as a composer. He published an anonymous article in 1783 commenting on his skill and genius, stating that if he had the opportunity to travel he could become “a second Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart”.[12]
Beethoven did travel to Holland with his mother in the fall of that same year where he played his first paid engagement. It was at a royal concert in The Hague. Also he was paid more than any other performer, he complained that the Dutch were penny-pinchers and that he would “never go to Holland again.”[13]
At age thirteen, when financial instability burdened his family after the death of his father’s palace patron, Ludwig had to apply for a court post to earn some money for his family. He was hired as the Assistant Court Organist, with no fixed salary. However, when the Elector, Maximilian Friedrich, died two months later, he was hired by the new Elector and was officially put on the court payroll earning 150 florins per year. His teacher’s salary had been cut from 400 to 200 florins per year, and when Ludwig got a 50-florin pay raise six months later, it put the mentor and protégé at the same salary. It became more and more difficult for Beethoven to learn from Neefe, as Neefe tried to tone town Beethoven’s wild musical ideas and Beethoven became resentful.[14]
During that time, Beethoven experimented his wild musical ideas with the court orchestra, exploring the sound of combining a high-pitched flute note with a low bassoon or hearing how a section of violins sounds playing a piece of all fingered notes without a single open string. He had a compositional dry spell and published almost nothing over the next few years. Still, he kept busy performing at mass every morning as well as piano solos or concertos in court.[15]
In 1787, having heard of Ludwig’s great talent and potential, the Elector sponsored Beethoven to travel to Vienna with the hope of being able to study with Mozart and return to Cologne as Kapellmeister, the same position his grandfather had held. So, in the spring of that year, Beethoven traveled the nine hundred miles to Vienna. Upon hearing him improvise a theme, Mozart was impressed with Beethoven, remarking to some friends that “some day he will give the world something to talk about.”[16]
However, after a very short time in Vienna, Beethoven received word that his mother had fallen critically ill and he rushed back to Bonn without having had much of a chance to study with the great Mozart. He arrived in Bonn while his mother was still alive, but in a very critical condition. She died July 17, 1787. Dealing with the grief of his mother’s death and the disappointment of a fruitless trip to Vienna, Ludwig van Beethoven became very depressed.[17]
He was hired shortly thereafter by Hélène von Breuning to tutor her four children in music. He found comfort in the widow von Breuning and her elegant mansion. She became somewhat of a substitute mother to him and her home was the antithesis of his bleak and sad household. He also found interest in Frau von Breuning’s sixteen-year-old daughter Eleonore. Ludwig befriended the three younger boys as well, but he preferred spending time on the piano bench playing duets with Eleonore.[18]
Spending time in the von Breuning mansion also gave Ludwig his first exposure to social behavior among the upper class. He learned new manners, and he learned them well. He was also exposed to things he had missed in his lack of formal schooling, things such as German literature, ancient and modern history, geography and science. He also befriended Franz Gerhard Wegeler, a student from the new University of Bonn and a frequent visitor to the von Breuning mansion. This friendship gave Ludwig the opportunity to enroll part-time in the university as a philosophy student. [19]
In 1788 Count Ferdinand Waldstein moved to Bonn. He was a friend of Mozart’s and came from a background that impressed the Elector. He soon became a frequenter of the von Breuning mansion, and when he met Ludwig he was so impressed that he decided to do everything in his power to advance Ludwig’s career. The count tried to convince the Elector of Ludwig’s genius, but when Ludwig applied for a raise he was denied. Although to some he showed great potential, he hadn’t published a composition in years and was to others at the same level of most of the other court musicians with whom he played.[20]
An opportunity arose for Beethoven out of a tragedy: the death of Joseph II, “the people’s Emperor.” The Elector, Max Franz, was particularly upset, as Joseph II was his brother. A musical memorial was called for, and somehow Ludwig van Beethoven earned the honor of being announced as the composer for the event. Even though he was a nineteen-year-old court musician with no experience composing large-scale works to grieve the loss of a public figure, Beethoven had friends in powerful positions who must convinced the Elector in his fragile state to allow Beethoven this responsibility.[21]
For “various reasons”, Beethoven’s work for the occasion was never performed. It was assumed for a long time that he wasn’t able to finish it in time, but nearly one hundred years later , Johannes Brahms discovered Ludwig’s manuscript for the Cantata on the Death of Emperor Joseph II. It was a forty-minute work for five soloists, a full chorus and an orchestra of strings, double woodwind and horns. The Cantata was a perfect example of Beethoven’s unambiguous style, and it was too difficult for the performers of that time.[22]
Beethoven was invited soon after in that same year of 1790 to compose another work for the election of Joseph II’s eldest brother, Leopold, to the Holy Roman throne. He composed another powerful piece, the Cantata on the Accession of Leopold II, which was also withdrawn and never performed.[23]
In the winter of 1790, when Beethoven had just turned twenty, the well-known composer Joseph Haydn passed through Bonn on his way from Vienna to London and Beethoven had the opportunity to present him with one of his unperformed cantatas, although which one is not known. Haydn was impressed and urged Beethoven to pursue further studies in music.[24]
Those further studies were realized with Haydn himself when Beethoven moved to Vienna in November 1792, where he would remain the rest of his life. By the end of January 1793, Haydn announced that he was so pleased with Beethoven’s progress as a student that he was ready to compose “grand operas.”[25]
Beethoven spent the next few years studying with Haydn, performing, composing—doing all he could to further his career. He published his first two works with opus numbers in 1795. The Three Trios for Piano, Violin, and Cello, dedicated to Prince Karl Lichnowski, and the Three Sonatas, dedicated to Joseph Haydn, were numbered opus 1 and two, respectively.[26] In 1796 he gained wider notoriety with a five-month tour through Bohemia, Saxony and Prussia. During his tour, his performances brought members of the Berlin Singakademie to tears, earned him a gold snuffbox full of louis d’or from King Friedrich Wilhelm II and gave him a confidence that he was experiencing a time similar to the youth of Mozart.[27]
Very busy composing, performing and traveling, Ludwig van Beethoven continued to gain more acclaim over the next years. However, his growing success was met with a sad occurrence. Sometime around 1794 – 1798, he began going deaf. Various sources and letter suggest different dates regarding when his symptoms actually began. It started with a constant humming and buzzing in his ears and progressively got worse. He was careful to not tell anyone about it, as it was not until 1801 that he admitted in a letter to his friend Franz Wegeler, whom he had met through the von Breuning family in Bonn and who was trained in medicine, that “for the last three years [his] hearing has become weaker and weaker.” He went on to say that it was associated with the illness that caused him to have “violent diarrhea” and that he had seen several doctors and healers, some of whom helped his digestive situation, but his hearing continued to get worse. He expressed his grief of the fact that he had stopped attending social functions because he found it “impossible to say to people: I am deaf.” Later in the letter, he stated that he found it “surprising that some people have never noticed [his] deafness; but since [he has] always been liable to fits of absentmindedness, they attribute [his] hardness of hearing to that.” Beethoven lamented his condition and mentioned that he often cursed his Creator and his existence. He then begged his friend not say anything to anyone about his condition, as it was a terrible handicap in his profession and he worried what his enemies would say if they were to find out.[28]
He must have felt very lonely in his condition, for only two days later he revealed his secret in a letter to another friend, Karl Amenda. In this letter he referred to his hearing as his “most prized possession” and told Amenda that it had “greatly deteriorated.” In both letters he expressed to each Wegeler and Amenda how much he appreciated their true friendship and begged them to write to him more often, for their letters, “however short they may be, console [him] and do [him] good.”[29]
Perhaps Beethoven was also secretive about his condition because he was going through a period of great success, being offered more commissions that he could carry out. He was pleased that he no longer had to negotiate a fee with his patrons. “I state my price and they pay,” he wrote in that same letter to Wegeler.[30] A fear for losing his patronage also seems a likely reason to hide his worsening deafness from the public.
Driven to depression by the fact that he could no longer properly communicate in person and no longer hear what his fellow humans heard, Beethoven went to the country to live in solitude for some months. A document written by Beethoven in 1802, but only found after his death, now known as the “Heiligenstadt Testament,” addressed Beethoven’s thoughts of suicide during this period of his life, but he admitted that it seemed “impossible to leave the world until [he] had brought forth all that was within [him].”[31]
Over the next years, Beethoven traveled back and forth between Vienna and the country as well as other places, paying rent in four places at once at some points. Work was endless, as he was being constantly commissioned to produce new works and his prices were rising. He produced numerous compositions, including symphonies, solo concertos, string quartets, string sonatas, piano sonatas and much more, almost all of which were masterpieces and full of modern progressions and harmonies that were new and foreign to the contemporary ear.[32]
In October 1808, the new King of Westphalia, Jérôme Bonaparte, offered Ludwig a part-time position as Kapellmeister in Kassel. He saw this as an opportunity to bargain for an annual salary from the Vienna Imperial Court, writing to its directorate petitioning an annual fee of 2,400 florins to retain him as the in-house opera composer.[33] The directorate ignored Beethoven’s suggestion, and so he prepared to leave Vienna. In December he held a farewell concert for the Viennese public,[34] at which the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies were both premiered.[35]
However, Beethoven’s plans changed when upon the encouragement of Countess Anna Marie Erdödy, several of Vienna’s richest patrons pooled together to offer Beethoven an annuity much larger than what the King was offering him in Kassel, on the condition that he stay in Vienna.[36] He accepted their offer and decided to stay in Vienna, as stated in a letter dated March 4, 1809.[37] He was now earning four thousand florins a year, just to remain in that city.[38]
An exciting thing happened for Beethoven in 1811, when he began correspondence with Johann Wolfgang con Goethe, someone he admired very much. This was thanks to Bettina Brentano, who knew Goethe and wrote him a lengthy letter describing Beethoven, suggesting the two should meet. Goethe responded to Bettina sending his greetings to Beethoven and inviting him to Karlsbad as a possible place to meet.[39] Beethoven first wrote to Goethe in April 1811 and sent him a copy of Egmont, Op. 84 early the next year asking for comments, writing, “even your censure will be useful to me and my art and will be welcomed as gladly as the greatest praise.”[40]
That summer, Beethoven traveled to Teplitz to spend time at the Bohemian baths to see if his health might improve. There, he began preliminary sketches of the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies. He continued correspondence with Goethe, exchanging letters full of compliments back and forth.[41]
In the following year of 1812, Beethoven completed the Seventh Symphony in May and immediately continued working on the Eighth. He took the half-finished manuscript with him when he returned to Teplitz in July 1812 and continued his work on it there.[42] That the Eighth Symphony is such a light, jolly work is not at all evident of all that was occurring in his life at the time.
That summer at Teplitz, Beethoven finally met Goethe in person. This was a meeting for which he had been waiting years, and although Beethoven was very pleased to make the acquaintance, Goethe’s reaction was not entirely positive. Although Goethe marveled at Beethoven’s talent, Herriot suggests that Goethe found him “uncouth and far too laconic.”[43]
The summer of 1812 is also known for the famous letters written by Beethoven addressed to his “Immortal Beloved.” The letters were not found until after his death, and there is no named recipient. In these letters he writes of a profound love, asking if there is a way she can “alter the fact that you are not wholly mine, that I am not wholly yours?”[44] There was much speculation among musicologists over the centuries in regards to who the addressee of these letters was. However, in 1977 Maynard Solomon published a theory that has now become widely accepted as conclusive. He suggests that the letters were meant for Antonie Brentano, the wife of a friend of Beethoven’s. Whether an affair between Antonie and Beethoven was ever consummated is not known, nor whether Antonie ever read the letters. The fact is that she was also at Teplitz that same summer. So is it possible she read them and returned them to Beethoven, as it was too risky a document for her to keep as a married woman? Or did Beethoven write them without the intention of sending them, as an expression of his love for her, a dream of a relationship that could never be fulfilled?[45] Whatever the case, it is obvious from the letters that Beethoven was deeply in love at the time and deeply emotionally affected by it, writing, “Oh God, why must one be separated from her who is so dear…Be calm; for only by calmly considering our lives can we achieve our purpose to live together…what tearful longing for you…Oh, do continue to love me – never misjudge your lover’s most faithful heart. ever thine. ever mine. ever ours. L.”[46]
During these same summer months, a rumor was spreading that Beethoven’s brother Johann was involved in an illicit relationship with his lodger’s sister, Therese Obermeyer, whom he had hired as a housekeeper. Beethoven became furious about this news and traveled to Linz, where Johann was living at the time, to put a stop to their relationship, which he deemed immoral. He involved the civil authorities and the police and even went so far as to obtain an order to evict Therese if the relationship continued. Johann was offended and upset by his brother’s interference in his personal affairs, yet ended up marrying Therese that November in order to appease his brother. He later blamed Beethoven for having driven him into a marriage he never wanted.[47]
The Eighth Symphony was dated in Linz in October 1812.[48] That Beethoven was experiencing such turbulent times in his life during the months in which it was composed doesn’t come through at all in the music. Without knowing what was going on in Beethoven’s life, a listener would think from its light, warm affection, he was in the best of moods during the period in which he was composing it.[49] However, two things set it clearly apart from his other symphonies. For unknown reasons, Beethoven did not dedicate the Eighth symphony to anyone.[50] It also does not have any introduction. Of all the preceding symphonies, only the Sixth was composed without an introduction, and the presence of one is even a debatable topic.[51]
Beethoven called his Eighth Symphony “my little one.” Aside from it being actually shorter than his other symphonies, it also has a lighter instrumentation, with just two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoon, two horns, two trumpets, two timpani, violins I and II, violas, cellos and basses. It was also composed in a very short period of time. From the time the Seventh was completed, it was only five months before the Eighth was completed and dated, and it would be over a decade before the ninth was completed.[52]
The Eighth Symphony was premiered on February 27, 1814, almost a year and a half after it had been completed. It was first performed at the Redoutensaal in Vienna. The program of the concert began with the Seventh Symphony (which had premiered two months earlier), then “an entirely new Italian terzetto” (Op. 116), then the Eighth Symphony and it concluded with “Wellington’s Victory.” The Eighth did not receive as enthusiastic an applause from the audience as Beethoven’s previous symphonies had received.[53] His pupil, Carl Czerny, later asked him why it was that the Eighth was so much less popular than the Seventh. Beethoven is said to have responded, “Because it’s so much better!”[54]
By this point in his life, Beethoven’s deafness was so severe that “one had to shout so loudly that it could be heard three rooms distant” in order to communicate with him.[55] One wonders if this is why, in the recapitulation of the first movement of the Eighth Symphony, the melody is given to the bass instruments, which get completely drowned out by the upper-register instruments. Was he unaware that the audience could barely hear the melody? Not an unlikely assumption, as it is said that his conducting style had become peculiar and extreme, and he had even gotten lost in previous concerts he had conducted because he couldn’t hear some of the instruments.[56]
Compared with his output during the first thirty-five years of life, Beethoven produced very little music from 1815 until his death in 1827.[57] However, his compositions from this last period have a denser musical thought than any of his earlier works. By 1815 he had gone completely deaf, so he refrained from interacting in society as much as possible.[58]
Beethoven took on a large responsibility in 1815. After the death of his brother Caspar in the fall, he fought to gain custody of his nephew Karl. Caspar’s widow, Johanna van Beethoven, was still alive and wanted her son to remain with her. However, Beethoven’s status as a well-known musician and of nobility overrode Johanna’s attempts to gain custody. So Beethoven took over the care of nine-year-old Karl in January 1816.[59]
There is varying evidence about the nature of the relationship between Karl and his uncle Ludwig van Beethoven. Some people close to them suspected Beethoven of beating Karl, while others witnessed pure happiness in Beethoven’s eyes when the two were together, as well as scenes of Karl falling asleep while his uncle played the piano.[60]
In May 1824, Beethoven premiered his Ninth and final symphony, also his longest, at almost an hour in performance. Although Beethoven was completely deaf, he insisted on co-conducting the first performance alongside Michael Umlauf, who had advised the musicians to ignore the composer’s gestures.[61] The Ninth was his biggest and most ambitious composition yet, and the audience received it accordingly. The performance was interrupted four times by wild applause and Morris recounts that, at one point, “while the audience erupted with delight, Beethoven stood with his back to the hall, absorbed in the score before him. One of the soloists…had to…turn him around so that he could see the tumult.”[62]
During the years 1824 to 1826, Beethoven fulfilled his obligation to compose several string quartets, which had been commissioned before he was even deep into composing the Ninth Symphony. These last quartets were masterpieces, one of which (Op. 131) Beethoven considered his “most perfect single work.”[63]
Traveling with his nephew, Karl, in an uncovered coach and sleeping in an unheated village inn in early December 1826 left Beethoven deathly ill. He was suffering from pneumonia and pleurisy, as well as spitting blood. He recovered regained his strength after a couple weeks, but by mid-December he was ill again, this time with dropsy, a fatal illness. Beethoven underwent several surgeries over the course of the next few months, but to no avail. He was abusing his prescriptions and drinking heavily. On March 26, 1827, Ludwig van Beethoven passed away in Vienna, coincidentally on the same day of year he had made his child debut in Cologne exactly forty-nine years earlier.[64]
[1] Morris, pp. 11-12[2] Herriot, p. 20[3] Morris, p. 12[4] Ibid., p.20[5] Morris, p. 18[6] Herriot, p. 20[7] Morris, pp. 18-19[8] Ibid., p. 7[9] Morris, p. 8[10] Ibid., pp. 20-21[11] Ibid., pp. 21-22[12] Ibid., pp, 22-23[13] Morris, p. 23[14] Ibid., pp. 24-25[15] Ibid., pp. 27-28[16] Morris, pp. 30-31[17] Ibid., pp. 31-32[18] Ibid., pp. 32-33[19] Morris, pp. 33-34[20] Ibid., pp. 36-38[21] Ibid., p. 39[22] Morris, pp. 39-42[23] Ibid., p. 43[24] Ibid., pp. 45-46[25] Ibid., pp. 49-53[26] Herriot, p. 56[27] Morris, pp. 70-71[28] Anderson, pp. 59-62[29] Anderson, pp. 63-65[30] Ibid., p. 58[31] Morris, p. 96[32] Morris, pp. 100-109[33] Ibid., pp. 123-124[34] Herriot, p. 160[35] Kinderman, p. 123[36] Morris, p. 130[37] Anderson, p. 217[38] Morris, p. 135[39] Morris, pp. 143-144[40] Anderson, p. 318[41] Morris, p. 147[42] Ibid., p. 148[43] Herriot, p. 206[44] Anderson, p. 374[45] Hopkins, pp. 162-164[46] Anderson, p. 376[47] Hopkins, p. 221[48] Herriot, p. 207[49] Hopkins, p. 221[50] Young, p. 101[51] Hopkins, p. 222[52] Young, pp. 101-102[53] Hopkins, p. 220[54] Young, p. 102[55] Morris, p. 158[56] Hopkins, p. 197[57] Herriot, pp. 13-14[58] Hopkins, p. 188[59] Morris, pp. 175-177[60] Ibid., pp. 183-184[61] Young, pp. 109-110[62] Morris, p. 210[63] Ibid., p. 213[64] Ibid., pp. 218-223
References
Anderson, Emily, comp. The Letters of Beethoven. Vol. 1. New York, NY: St. Martin's P Inc, 1961.
Herriot, Edouard. The Life and Times of Beethoven. New York, NY: The MacMillan Company, 1935.
Hopkins, Antony. The Nine Symphonies of Beethoven. Seattle, WA: University of Washington P, 1981.
Kinderman, William. Beethoven. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California P, 1995.
Morris, Edmund. Beethoven : The Universal Composer. New York: HarperCollins, 2005.
Young, John B. Unlocking the Masters: Beethoven's Symphonies. New York: Amadeus P, LLC, 2008.
The Life of Ludwig van Beethoven
with special attention paid to Symphony No. 8, Op. 93
Ludwig van Beethoven was born in mid-December, 1770 in a town called Bonn, located about fifteen miles upriver of Cologne. The exact date of his birth is unknown, but he was baptized on December 17th, and it was customary in the Catholic practice at the time to baptize a child within twenty-four hours of his birth. He was the eldest, although not firstborn, son of Johann and Maria Magdalena van Beethoven.[1] Maria Magdalena had given birth to two children who both died in infancy before Ludwig was born. The second-born was baptized and buried in April 1769, also with the name Ludwig. Two siblings survived after Ludwig, and later Maria Magdalena gave birth to another two children who both died in infancy. Johann van Beethoven was a known drunk and a cruel and abusive father and husband, which no doubt contributed to the reasons that four of their seven children died in infancy.[2]
The elder Ludwig van Beethoven, Johann’s father, sponsored young Ludwig’s baptism. He had moved to Bonn in 1733 to take a prominent position as a court musician, Kapellmeister, and he was much admired and respected as Bonn’s most eminent musician. He died on Christmas Eve in 1773, when little Ludwig was just old enough to be able to form some memories of him.[3]
Music was the true language of Ludwig van Beethoven, it came to him “more readily than words.”[4] It was his escape from the cold home he lived in, with an alcoholic father and a neglectful mother who allowed him to run about unwashed and in dirty clothes.[5] He would sit at the harpsichord as young as age four, crying, unable to stop repeating his exercises.[6] Johann, being a poorly paid court singer, was critical of Ludwig’s musical gifts for improvisation and freed variation as a child, telling him to stop and that he wasn’t “to do that yet.” However, Johann did recognize his son’s talent and in 1778, when Ludwig was seven, he took him to Cologne to have him give a recital. He presented his son as being six years old, to make him appear as more of a prodigy. Johann was greatly disappointed and even more critical of his son after the recital drew very little attention and no press at all.[7]
Thinking that their son was maybe not a child prodigy in the rank of Mozart, Maria Magdalena and Johann decided to pay some attention to their eldest son’s general education. They enrolled Ludwig in a Latin grade school, where his unkempt appearance led his classmates to believe that he actually had no mother. He was not a very gifted student nor was he very social. He had trouble with more than just the basics of writing and arithmetic, and he has no evident desire to make friends. Some evidence suggests he may have been slightly dyslexic, often inverting numbers in his scores and letters. However, he surely exhibited genius in his quest to solve complex problems of counterpoint.[8] Morris discusses the relationship of his learning disability to his genius stating:
“He had, besides, a mastery of musical architecture that was as instinctual as it was innovative. Again, the possibility of dyslexia arises. Some orthographically challenged people have an almost cubist ability to visualize planes and dimensions from many different angels at once. Beethoven’s sound structures are full of disproportionate rooms and inner voids, with surprise changes of level, and windows full of sky; but they always balance out as total buildings, no matter how large their size.”[9]
He began composing sometime around the age of ten, not having had any formal training in composition. Somehow, he managed to write correctly without knowing how to do so. Soon after, he was withdrawn from school and thirty-three-year-old Christian Gottlob Neefe took him on as a student. Neefe was a court organist, trained in law as well as music. Having studied in Leipzig, he was able to teach Beethoven using the pedagogical tradition of Johann Sebastian Bach.[10]
Beethoven’s first publication in 1782 was under the influence of Neefe. It was a set of piano variations of a theme by Dressler. Having been an assignment from his teacher, the variations did not foreshadow much of the composer that he would become, except for in the final variation in which he suddenly takes off in a foreign key, something of which Neefe was not very encouraging.[11]
Despite his extremely formulaic style of teaching, Neefe saw the potential that Beethoven held, yet worried that the confines of Bonn would not allow him to fulfill his destiny as a composer. He published an anonymous article in 1783 commenting on his skill and genius, stating that if he had the opportunity to travel he could become “a second Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart”.[12]
Beethoven did travel to Holland with his mother in the fall of that same year where he played his first paid engagement. It was at a royal concert in The Hague. Also he was paid more than any other performer, he complained that the Dutch were penny-pinchers and that he would “never go to Holland again.”[13]
At age thirteen, when financial instability burdened his family after the death of his father’s palace patron, Ludwig had to apply for a court post to earn some money for his family. He was hired as the Assistant Court Organist, with no fixed salary. However, when the Elector, Maximilian Friedrich, died two months later, he was hired by the new Elector and was officially put on the court payroll earning 150 florins per year. His teacher’s salary had been cut from 400 to 200 florins per year, and when Ludwig got a 50-florin pay raise six months later, it put the mentor and protégé at the same salary. It became more and more difficult for Beethoven to learn from Neefe, as Neefe tried to tone town Beethoven’s wild musical ideas and Beethoven became resentful.[14]
During that time, Beethoven experimented his wild musical ideas with the court orchestra, exploring the sound of combining a high-pitched flute note with a low bassoon or hearing how a section of violins sounds playing a piece of all fingered notes without a single open string. He had a compositional dry spell and published almost nothing over the next few years. Still, he kept busy performing at mass every morning as well as piano solos or concertos in court.[15]
In 1787, having heard of Ludwig’s great talent and potential, the Elector sponsored Beethoven to travel to Vienna with the hope of being able to study with Mozart and return to Cologne as Kapellmeister, the same position his grandfather had held. So, in the spring of that year, Beethoven traveled the nine hundred miles to Vienna. Upon hearing him improvise a theme, Mozart was impressed with Beethoven, remarking to some friends that “some day he will give the world something to talk about.”[16]
However, after a very short time in Vienna, Beethoven received word that his mother had fallen critically ill and he rushed back to Bonn without having had much of a chance to study with the great Mozart. He arrived in Bonn while his mother was still alive, but in a very critical condition. She died July 17, 1787. Dealing with the grief of his mother’s death and the disappointment of a fruitless trip to Vienna, Ludwig van Beethoven became very depressed.[17]
He was hired shortly thereafter by Hélène von Breuning to tutor her four children in music. He found comfort in the widow von Breuning and her elegant mansion. She became somewhat of a substitute mother to him and her home was the antithesis of his bleak and sad household. He also found interest in Frau von Breuning’s sixteen-year-old daughter Eleonore. Ludwig befriended the three younger boys as well, but he preferred spending time on the piano bench playing duets with Eleonore.[18]
Spending time in the von Breuning mansion also gave Ludwig his first exposure to social behavior among the upper class. He learned new manners, and he learned them well. He was also exposed to things he had missed in his lack of formal schooling, things such as German literature, ancient and modern history, geography and science. He also befriended Franz Gerhard Wegeler, a student from the new University of Bonn and a frequent visitor to the von Breuning mansion. This friendship gave Ludwig the opportunity to enroll part-time in the university as a philosophy student. [19]
In 1788 Count Ferdinand Waldstein moved to Bonn. He was a friend of Mozart’s and came from a background that impressed the Elector. He soon became a frequenter of the von Breuning mansion, and when he met Ludwig he was so impressed that he decided to do everything in his power to advance Ludwig’s career. The count tried to convince the Elector of Ludwig’s genius, but when Ludwig applied for a raise he was denied. Although to some he showed great potential, he hadn’t published a composition in years and was to others at the same level of most of the other court musicians with whom he played.[20]
An opportunity arose for Beethoven out of a tragedy: the death of Joseph II, “the people’s Emperor.” The Elector, Max Franz, was particularly upset, as Joseph II was his brother. A musical memorial was called for, and somehow Ludwig van Beethoven earned the honor of being announced as the composer for the event. Even though he was a nineteen-year-old court musician with no experience composing large-scale works to grieve the loss of a public figure, Beethoven had friends in powerful positions who must convinced the Elector in his fragile state to allow Beethoven this responsibility.[21]
For “various reasons”, Beethoven’s work for the occasion was never performed. It was assumed for a long time that he wasn’t able to finish it in time, but nearly one hundred years later , Johannes Brahms discovered Ludwig’s manuscript for the Cantata on the Death of Emperor Joseph II. It was a forty-minute work for five soloists, a full chorus and an orchestra of strings, double woodwind and horns. The Cantata was a perfect example of Beethoven’s unambiguous style, and it was too difficult for the performers of that time.[22]
Beethoven was invited soon after in that same year of 1790 to compose another work for the election of Joseph II’s eldest brother, Leopold, to the Holy Roman throne. He composed another powerful piece, the Cantata on the Accession of Leopold II, which was also withdrawn and never performed.[23]
In the winter of 1790, when Beethoven had just turned twenty, the well-known composer Joseph Haydn passed through Bonn on his way from Vienna to London and Beethoven had the opportunity to present him with one of his unperformed cantatas, although which one is not known. Haydn was impressed and urged Beethoven to pursue further studies in music.[24]
Those further studies were realized with Haydn himself when Beethoven moved to Vienna in November 1792, where he would remain the rest of his life. By the end of January 1793, Haydn announced that he was so pleased with Beethoven’s progress as a student that he was ready to compose “grand operas.”[25]
Beethoven spent the next few years studying with Haydn, performing, composing—doing all he could to further his career. He published his first two works with opus numbers in 1795. The Three Trios for Piano, Violin, and Cello, dedicated to Prince Karl Lichnowski, and the Three Sonatas, dedicated to Joseph Haydn, were numbered opus 1 and two, respectively.[26] In 1796 he gained wider notoriety with a five-month tour through Bohemia, Saxony and Prussia. During his tour, his performances brought members of the Berlin Singakademie to tears, earned him a gold snuffbox full of louis d’or from King Friedrich Wilhelm II and gave him a confidence that he was experiencing a time similar to the youth of Mozart.[27]
Very busy composing, performing and traveling, Ludwig van Beethoven continued to gain more acclaim over the next years. However, his growing success was met with a sad occurrence. Sometime around 1794 – 1798, he began going deaf. Various sources and letter suggest different dates regarding when his symptoms actually began. It started with a constant humming and buzzing in his ears and progressively got worse. He was careful to not tell anyone about it, as it was not until 1801 that he admitted in a letter to his friend Franz Wegeler, whom he had met through the von Breuning family in Bonn and who was trained in medicine, that “for the last three years [his] hearing has become weaker and weaker.” He went on to say that it was associated with the illness that caused him to have “violent diarrhea” and that he had seen several doctors and healers, some of whom helped his digestive situation, but his hearing continued to get worse. He expressed his grief of the fact that he had stopped attending social functions because he found it “impossible to say to people: I am deaf.” Later in the letter, he stated that he found it “surprising that some people have never noticed [his] deafness; but since [he has] always been liable to fits of absentmindedness, they attribute [his] hardness of hearing to that.” Beethoven lamented his condition and mentioned that he often cursed his Creator and his existence. He then begged his friend not say anything to anyone about his condition, as it was a terrible handicap in his profession and he worried what his enemies would say if they were to find out.[28]
He must have felt very lonely in his condition, for only two days later he revealed his secret in a letter to another friend, Karl Amenda. In this letter he referred to his hearing as his “most prized possession” and told Amenda that it had “greatly deteriorated.” In both letters he expressed to each Wegeler and Amenda how much he appreciated their true friendship and begged them to write to him more often, for their letters, “however short they may be, console [him] and do [him] good.”[29]
Perhaps Beethoven was also secretive about his condition because he was going through a period of great success, being offered more commissions that he could carry out. He was pleased that he no longer had to negotiate a fee with his patrons. “I state my price and they pay,” he wrote in that same letter to Wegeler.[30] A fear for losing his patronage also seems a likely reason to hide his worsening deafness from the public.
Driven to depression by the fact that he could no longer properly communicate in person and no longer hear what his fellow humans heard, Beethoven went to the country to live in solitude for some months. A document written by Beethoven in 1802, but only found after his death, now known as the “Heiligenstadt Testament,” addressed Beethoven’s thoughts of suicide during this period of his life, but he admitted that it seemed “impossible to leave the world until [he] had brought forth all that was within [him].”[31]
Over the next years, Beethoven traveled back and forth between Vienna and the country as well as other places, paying rent in four places at once at some points. Work was endless, as he was being constantly commissioned to produce new works and his prices were rising. He produced numerous compositions, including symphonies, solo concertos, string quartets, string sonatas, piano sonatas and much more, almost all of which were masterpieces and full of modern progressions and harmonies that were new and foreign to the contemporary ear.[32]
In October 1808, the new King of Westphalia, Jérôme Bonaparte, offered Ludwig a part-time position as Kapellmeister in Kassel. He saw this as an opportunity to bargain for an annual salary from the Vienna Imperial Court, writing to its directorate petitioning an annual fee of 2,400 florins to retain him as the in-house opera composer.[33] The directorate ignored Beethoven’s suggestion, and so he prepared to leave Vienna. In December he held a farewell concert for the Viennese public,[34] at which the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies were both premiered.[35]
However, Beethoven’s plans changed when upon the encouragement of Countess Anna Marie Erdödy, several of Vienna’s richest patrons pooled together to offer Beethoven an annuity much larger than what the King was offering him in Kassel, on the condition that he stay in Vienna.[36] He accepted their offer and decided to stay in Vienna, as stated in a letter dated March 4, 1809.[37] He was now earning four thousand florins a year, just to remain in that city.[38]
An exciting thing happened for Beethoven in 1811, when he began correspondence with Johann Wolfgang con Goethe, someone he admired very much. This was thanks to Bettina Brentano, who knew Goethe and wrote him a lengthy letter describing Beethoven, suggesting the two should meet. Goethe responded to Bettina sending his greetings to Beethoven and inviting him to Karlsbad as a possible place to meet.[39] Beethoven first wrote to Goethe in April 1811 and sent him a copy of Egmont, Op. 84 early the next year asking for comments, writing, “even your censure will be useful to me and my art and will be welcomed as gladly as the greatest praise.”[40]
That summer, Beethoven traveled to Teplitz to spend time at the Bohemian baths to see if his health might improve. There, he began preliminary sketches of the Seventh and Eighth Symphonies. He continued correspondence with Goethe, exchanging letters full of compliments back and forth.[41]
In the following year of 1812, Beethoven completed the Seventh Symphony in May and immediately continued working on the Eighth. He took the half-finished manuscript with him when he returned to Teplitz in July 1812 and continued his work on it there.[42] That the Eighth Symphony is such a light, jolly work is not at all evident of all that was occurring in his life at the time.
That summer at Teplitz, Beethoven finally met Goethe in person. This was a meeting for which he had been waiting years, and although Beethoven was very pleased to make the acquaintance, Goethe’s reaction was not entirely positive. Although Goethe marveled at Beethoven’s talent, Herriot suggests that Goethe found him “uncouth and far too laconic.”[43]
The summer of 1812 is also known for the famous letters written by Beethoven addressed to his “Immortal Beloved.” The letters were not found until after his death, and there is no named recipient. In these letters he writes of a profound love, asking if there is a way she can “alter the fact that you are not wholly mine, that I am not wholly yours?”[44] There was much speculation among musicologists over the centuries in regards to who the addressee of these letters was. However, in 1977 Maynard Solomon published a theory that has now become widely accepted as conclusive. He suggests that the letters were meant for Antonie Brentano, the wife of a friend of Beethoven’s. Whether an affair between Antonie and Beethoven was ever consummated is not known, nor whether Antonie ever read the letters. The fact is that she was also at Teplitz that same summer. So is it possible she read them and returned them to Beethoven, as it was too risky a document for her to keep as a married woman? Or did Beethoven write them without the intention of sending them, as an expression of his love for her, a dream of a relationship that could never be fulfilled?[45] Whatever the case, it is obvious from the letters that Beethoven was deeply in love at the time and deeply emotionally affected by it, writing, “Oh God, why must one be separated from her who is so dear…Be calm; for only by calmly considering our lives can we achieve our purpose to live together…what tearful longing for you…Oh, do continue to love me – never misjudge your lover’s most faithful heart. ever thine. ever mine. ever ours. L.”[46]
During these same summer months, a rumor was spreading that Beethoven’s brother Johann was involved in an illicit relationship with his lodger’s sister, Therese Obermeyer, whom he had hired as a housekeeper. Beethoven became furious about this news and traveled to Linz, where Johann was living at the time, to put a stop to their relationship, which he deemed immoral. He involved the civil authorities and the police and even went so far as to obtain an order to evict Therese if the relationship continued. Johann was offended and upset by his brother’s interference in his personal affairs, yet ended up marrying Therese that November in order to appease his brother. He later blamed Beethoven for having driven him into a marriage he never wanted.[47]
The Eighth Symphony was dated in Linz in October 1812.[48] That Beethoven was experiencing such turbulent times in his life during the months in which it was composed doesn’t come through at all in the music. Without knowing what was going on in Beethoven’s life, a listener would think from its light, warm affection, he was in the best of moods during the period in which he was composing it.[49] However, two things set it clearly apart from his other symphonies. For unknown reasons, Beethoven did not dedicate the Eighth symphony to anyone.[50] It also does not have any introduction. Of all the preceding symphonies, only the Sixth was composed without an introduction, and the presence of one is even a debatable topic.[51]
Beethoven called his Eighth Symphony “my little one.” Aside from it being actually shorter than his other symphonies, it also has a lighter instrumentation, with just two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoon, two horns, two trumpets, two timpani, violins I and II, violas, cellos and basses. It was also composed in a very short period of time. From the time the Seventh was completed, it was only five months before the Eighth was completed and dated, and it would be over a decade before the ninth was completed.[52]
The Eighth Symphony was premiered on February 27, 1814, almost a year and a half after it had been completed. It was first performed at the Redoutensaal in Vienna. The program of the concert began with the Seventh Symphony (which had premiered two months earlier), then “an entirely new Italian terzetto” (Op. 116), then the Eighth Symphony and it concluded with “Wellington’s Victory.” The Eighth did not receive as enthusiastic an applause from the audience as Beethoven’s previous symphonies had received.[53] His pupil, Carl Czerny, later asked him why it was that the Eighth was so much less popular than the Seventh. Beethoven is said to have responded, “Because it’s so much better!”[54]
By this point in his life, Beethoven’s deafness was so severe that “one had to shout so loudly that it could be heard three rooms distant” in order to communicate with him.[55] One wonders if this is why, in the recapitulation of the first movement of the Eighth Symphony, the melody is given to the bass instruments, which get completely drowned out by the upper-register instruments. Was he unaware that the audience could barely hear the melody? Not an unlikely assumption, as it is said that his conducting style had become peculiar and extreme, and he had even gotten lost in previous concerts he had conducted because he couldn’t hear some of the instruments.[56]
Compared with his output during the first thirty-five years of life, Beethoven produced very little music from 1815 until his death in 1827.[57] However, his compositions from this last period have a denser musical thought than any of his earlier works. By 1815 he had gone completely deaf, so he refrained from interacting in society as much as possible.[58]
Beethoven took on a large responsibility in 1815. After the death of his brother Caspar in the fall, he fought to gain custody of his nephew Karl. Caspar’s widow, Johanna van Beethoven, was still alive and wanted her son to remain with her. However, Beethoven’s status as a well-known musician and of nobility overrode Johanna’s attempts to gain custody. So Beethoven took over the care of nine-year-old Karl in January 1816.[59]
There is varying evidence about the nature of the relationship between Karl and his uncle Ludwig van Beethoven. Some people close to them suspected Beethoven of beating Karl, while others witnessed pure happiness in Beethoven’s eyes when the two were together, as well as scenes of Karl falling asleep while his uncle played the piano.[60]
In May 1824, Beethoven premiered his Ninth and final symphony, also his longest, at almost an hour in performance. Although Beethoven was completely deaf, he insisted on co-conducting the first performance alongside Michael Umlauf, who had advised the musicians to ignore the composer’s gestures.[61] The Ninth was his biggest and most ambitious composition yet, and the audience received it accordingly. The performance was interrupted four times by wild applause and Morris recounts that, at one point, “while the audience erupted with delight, Beethoven stood with his back to the hall, absorbed in the score before him. One of the soloists…had to…turn him around so that he could see the tumult.”[62]
During the years 1824 to 1826, Beethoven fulfilled his obligation to compose several string quartets, which had been commissioned before he was even deep into composing the Ninth Symphony. These last quartets were masterpieces, one of which (Op. 131) Beethoven considered his “most perfect single work.”[63]
Traveling with his nephew, Karl, in an uncovered coach and sleeping in an unheated village inn in early December 1826 left Beethoven deathly ill. He was suffering from pneumonia and pleurisy, as well as spitting blood. He recovered regained his strength after a couple weeks, but by mid-December he was ill again, this time with dropsy, a fatal illness. Beethoven underwent several surgeries over the course of the next few months, but to no avail. He was abusing his prescriptions and drinking heavily. On March 26, 1827, Ludwig van Beethoven passed away in Vienna, coincidentally on the same day of year he had made his child debut in Cologne exactly forty-nine years earlier.[64]
[1] Morris, pp. 11-12[2] Herriot, p. 20[3] Morris, p. 12[4] Ibid., p.20[5] Morris, p. 18[6] Herriot, p. 20[7] Morris, pp. 18-19[8] Ibid., p. 7[9] Morris, p. 8[10] Ibid., pp. 20-21[11] Ibid., pp. 21-22[12] Ibid., pp, 22-23[13] Morris, p. 23[14] Ibid., pp. 24-25[15] Ibid., pp. 27-28[16] Morris, pp. 30-31[17] Ibid., pp. 31-32[18] Ibid., pp. 32-33[19] Morris, pp. 33-34[20] Ibid., pp. 36-38[21] Ibid., p. 39[22] Morris, pp. 39-42[23] Ibid., p. 43[24] Ibid., pp. 45-46[25] Ibid., pp. 49-53[26] Herriot, p. 56[27] Morris, pp. 70-71[28] Anderson, pp. 59-62[29] Anderson, pp. 63-65[30] Ibid., p. 58[31] Morris, p. 96[32] Morris, pp. 100-109[33] Ibid., pp. 123-124[34] Herriot, p. 160[35] Kinderman, p. 123[36] Morris, p. 130[37] Anderson, p. 217[38] Morris, p. 135[39] Morris, pp. 143-144[40] Anderson, p. 318[41] Morris, p. 147[42] Ibid., p. 148[43] Herriot, p. 206[44] Anderson, p. 374[45] Hopkins, pp. 162-164[46] Anderson, p. 376[47] Hopkins, p. 221[48] Herriot, p. 207[49] Hopkins, p. 221[50] Young, p. 101[51] Hopkins, p. 222[52] Young, pp. 101-102[53] Hopkins, p. 220[54] Young, p. 102[55] Morris, p. 158[56] Hopkins, p. 197[57] Herriot, pp. 13-14[58] Hopkins, p. 188[59] Morris, pp. 175-177[60] Ibid., pp. 183-184[61] Young, pp. 109-110[62] Morris, p. 210[63] Ibid., p. 213[64] Ibid., pp. 218-223
References
Anderson, Emily, comp. The Letters of Beethoven. Vol. 1. New York, NY: St. Martin's P Inc, 1961.
Herriot, Edouard. The Life and Times of Beethoven. New York, NY: The MacMillan Company, 1935.
Hopkins, Antony. The Nine Symphonies of Beethoven. Seattle, WA: University of Washington P, 1981.
Kinderman, William. Beethoven. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California P, 1995.
Morris, Edmund. Beethoven : The Universal Composer. New York: HarperCollins, 2005.
Young, John B. Unlocking the Masters: Beethoven's Symphonies. New York: Amadeus P, LLC, 2008.
26 January 2008
NYC
i hope this doesn't come off as cynical, but i really don't like new york city. it's a nice city to visit. i love going to see shows there (just saw avenue q the other night with my mom - it was hysterical). it's great for a fun night out on the town, but i could never live there. seriously never. there are just too many people. everywhere you go, you are surrounded by far too many people, yet somehow that city manages to make you feel all alone. nobody makes eye contact, nobody talks to you. it's a large, lonely city. i have always felt this way about new york (and london among other cities but that's for another post).
so it may come as a surprise to some that my mom just got an apartment in new york. yes, that's right. she loves new york. my mom and i are very similar; my sisters actually call me mini-mom. but i do not share her love for the big apple. still, i have to pause to appreciate the view from her 15th floor corner apartment at 96th st and central park west. few views in the united states could compete with this. just imagine what it must look like in the summer.
so it may come as a surprise to some that my mom just got an apartment in new york. yes, that's right. she loves new york. my mom and i are very similar; my sisters actually call me mini-mom. but i do not share her love for the big apple. still, i have to pause to appreciate the view from her 15th floor corner apartment at 96th st and central park west. few views in the united states could compete with this. just imagine what it must look like in the summer.
24 January 2008
23 January 2008
question: why do northwest montana taxis not have 4-wheel drive?
apparently there are some people who actually still check my blog, and have watched that bird video about a million times. so i figure i owe it to these dedicated souls to continue blogging. i will start back out slow.
here is a picture from my recent trip to montana. my taxi got stuck in the snow and had to be pulled out by some guy wearing loafers and shorts.
09 August 2007
brazilian alarm clock
Portuguese Lesson: Birds
passaro (pah-sah-roo) bird
Quantos anos vive um passaro? (kwan-toos ah-noos vee-vee oom pah-sah-roo) How many years does a bird live?
Here is a video of an incident that occurs at my window every morning at 6 a.m. Enjoy...
passaro (pah-sah-roo) bird
Quantos anos vive um passaro? (kwan-toos ah-noos vee-vee oom pah-sah-roo) How many years does a bird live?
Here is a video of an incident that occurs at my window every morning at 6 a.m. Enjoy...
24 July 2007
this is so brasil
don't get me wrong. i LOVE brasil!! the people are awesome. as long as you have all the time in the world, this is the best place to be. but as soon as you're in a little bit of a hurry, things get difficult. read on.
abridged translation of the conversations i've been having with people regarding my computer:
THURSDAY, JUNE 11th
Location: Mac Bahia Store
Elizabeth: My computer died.
Computer Tech: What happened?
E: I don't know, it keeps going to sleep. It started a week ago.
CT: I think it's the fan. I can repair it, but you need to bring it back tomorrow because I'm leaving now. You need to go the repair office on the fifteenth floor.
(note: the repair place is pretty far from where I live. it's not easy for me to get there.)
FRIDAY, JUNE 12th
Location: Mac Bahia Repair Office on the fifteenth floor
E: I need to drop off my computer to be repaired.
Secretary: What's the problem?
E: I don't know, it keeps going to sleep.
S: When did you buy your computer?
E: January 2006.
S: We can't repair it, you aren't covered by the warranty.
E: Yes I am. I bought the extended care warranty.
S: I need the registration number for your warranty.
E: No you don't.
S: Yes I do.
E: No....you don't. You just need my computer serial number.
(Pause)
E: Don't you think it's funny that you repair Macs but you're using a Dell to input all my information right now?
(Pause)
S: Ok, the tech will repair it. It'll take 72 hours.
(enter computer tech)
CT: Hello, I'm the computer tech, Francisco.
E: Hi, thanks for repairing my computer.
CT: It'll take 72 hours.
E: So I can pick it up on Monday?
CT: Well...tomorrow is Saturday and then it's Sunday, so....
E:..Wednesday?
CT: Yes, we'll call you when it's ready.
They didn't call me on Wednesday.
FRIDAY, JUNE 20th
Location: telephone conversation
S: Hello, Mac Bahia. How can I help you?
E: I dropped my computer off about a week ago to get repaired and I'd like to know if it's ready.
S: Let me get the tech.
(really bad hold music)
CT: Hi Elizabeth.
E: Hey Francisco, how's my computer doing?
CT: Well I repaired it and it seems to be fine, but I want to run a few more tests to make sure. I'll call you this afternoon, ok?
E: Great, I look forward to your call.
He didn't call me that afternoon.
Same day, 6:15 p.m.
S: Hello, Mac Bahia. How can I help you?
E: I'm calling to find out if my computer is ready to be picked up.
S: I'm sorry, the tech only works 9-6. You'll have to call back on Monday.
E: I have to write a paper. Is there any way you can find out?
S: No, you have to call on Monday.
MONDAY, JUNE 23rd
Location: telephone conversation
E: Hey Francisco, this is Elizabeth. Remember me?
CT: Yes I do. Your laptop is all ready to do, you can pick it up anytime.
E: When can I pick it up?
CT: Anytime.
E: No but really...when?
CT: Before 6.
E: I have class until 6.
CT: Well then you can come tomorrow after 9.
E: No, I need my laptop to write a paper which I wanted to write over the weekend but couldn't for obvious reasons.
CT: Well, I don't know....
E: Can you leave it at the store and I'll pick it up from there after I get out of class?
CT: Great idea! I'll leave it at the store.
E: Thanks, I'll pick it up tonight.
SAME DAY
Location: Mac Bahia Store
E: Hi, I'm here to pick up my laptop. It was being repaired.
Woman working in store: By the computer tech?
E: Yes.
W: He already left, you'll have to come back tomo--
E: No. I talked to him today. He said he'd leave it at the store because I had class until 6.
W: Well, he didn't leave anything here. He forgot his card, but that's it. You'll have to come back tomorrow.
E: No, I'm here to pick up my laptop now.
W: You talked to the computer tech?
E: Yes, I talked to Francisco on the phone today.
W: And he told you he'd leave the laptop here.
E: Yes.
(Woman calls Francisco, talks to him for minute, then hands the phone to me.)
E: Hey Francisco.
CT: Hi Elizabeth, how's it going?
E: Well, I'm here to pick up my laptop, but....
CT: Yeah, about that...I'm reaalllly sorry.
E: You forgot?
CT: I had a lot of things to do today. I was really busy...can you come back tomorrow?
E: Look, this is a big problem, because I have a paper to write for tomorrow but I can't because I don't have a laptop. I wanted to write it over the weekend but I couldn't because I didn't have a laptop. I'm here to pick it up now and I can't come back tomorrow.
CT: Ok let me talk to my colleague.
(I hand the phone back to her. She talks to him, and then hangs up.)
W: Ok Elizabeth, just give me a few minutes and I'm going to get your laptop from the office upstairs.
E: Thanks.
(45 minutes later...)
W: Alright, here's your laptop.
E: Thanks. Have a nice night!
I went to a surprise birthday party for a friend after that, to which I was an hour late. But, I have my laptop now. Phew!
Here's a picture from our Brazilian culinary class yesterday:
L to R: Casey (goes by João), Elizabeth (pronounced Elizabetchi), Marie (pronouced Mahee)
We were trying to make thug faces, but I don't think mine worked out too well.
abridged translation of the conversations i've been having with people regarding my computer:
THURSDAY, JUNE 11th
Location: Mac Bahia Store
Elizabeth: My computer died.
Computer Tech: What happened?
E: I don't know, it keeps going to sleep. It started a week ago.
CT: I think it's the fan. I can repair it, but you need to bring it back tomorrow because I'm leaving now. You need to go the repair office on the fifteenth floor.
(note: the repair place is pretty far from where I live. it's not easy for me to get there.)
FRIDAY, JUNE 12th
Location: Mac Bahia Repair Office on the fifteenth floor
E: I need to drop off my computer to be repaired.
Secretary: What's the problem?
E: I don't know, it keeps going to sleep.
S: When did you buy your computer?
E: January 2006.
S: We can't repair it, you aren't covered by the warranty.
E: Yes I am. I bought the extended care warranty.
S: I need the registration number for your warranty.
E: No you don't.
S: Yes I do.
E: No....you don't. You just need my computer serial number.
(Pause)
E: Don't you think it's funny that you repair Macs but you're using a Dell to input all my information right now?
(Pause)
S: Ok, the tech will repair it. It'll take 72 hours.
(enter computer tech)
CT: Hello, I'm the computer tech, Francisco.
E: Hi, thanks for repairing my computer.
CT: It'll take 72 hours.
E: So I can pick it up on Monday?
CT: Well...tomorrow is Saturday and then it's Sunday, so....
E:..Wednesday?
CT: Yes, we'll call you when it's ready.
They didn't call me on Wednesday.
FRIDAY, JUNE 20th
Location: telephone conversation
S: Hello, Mac Bahia. How can I help you?
E: I dropped my computer off about a week ago to get repaired and I'd like to know if it's ready.
S: Let me get the tech.
(really bad hold music)
CT: Hi Elizabeth.
E: Hey Francisco, how's my computer doing?
CT: Well I repaired it and it seems to be fine, but I want to run a few more tests to make sure. I'll call you this afternoon, ok?
E: Great, I look forward to your call.
He didn't call me that afternoon.
Same day, 6:15 p.m.
S: Hello, Mac Bahia. How can I help you?
E: I'm calling to find out if my computer is ready to be picked up.
S: I'm sorry, the tech only works 9-6. You'll have to call back on Monday.
E: I have to write a paper. Is there any way you can find out?
S: No, you have to call on Monday.
MONDAY, JUNE 23rd
Location: telephone conversation
E: Hey Francisco, this is Elizabeth. Remember me?
CT: Yes I do. Your laptop is all ready to do, you can pick it up anytime.
E: When can I pick it up?
CT: Anytime.
E: No but really...when?
CT: Before 6.
E: I have class until 6.
CT: Well then you can come tomorrow after 9.
E: No, I need my laptop to write a paper which I wanted to write over the weekend but couldn't for obvious reasons.
CT: Well, I don't know....
E: Can you leave it at the store and I'll pick it up from there after I get out of class?
CT: Great idea! I'll leave it at the store.
E: Thanks, I'll pick it up tonight.
SAME DAY
Location: Mac Bahia Store
E: Hi, I'm here to pick up my laptop. It was being repaired.
Woman working in store: By the computer tech?
E: Yes.
W: He already left, you'll have to come back tomo--
E: No. I talked to him today. He said he'd leave it at the store because I had class until 6.
W: Well, he didn't leave anything here. He forgot his card, but that's it. You'll have to come back tomorrow.
E: No, I'm here to pick up my laptop now.
W: You talked to the computer tech?
E: Yes, I talked to Francisco on the phone today.
W: And he told you he'd leave the laptop here.
E: Yes.
(Woman calls Francisco, talks to him for minute, then hands the phone to me.)
E: Hey Francisco.
CT: Hi Elizabeth, how's it going?
E: Well, I'm here to pick up my laptop, but....
CT: Yeah, about that...I'm reaalllly sorry.
E: You forgot?
CT: I had a lot of things to do today. I was really busy...can you come back tomorrow?
E: Look, this is a big problem, because I have a paper to write for tomorrow but I can't because I don't have a laptop. I wanted to write it over the weekend but I couldn't because I didn't have a laptop. I'm here to pick it up now and I can't come back tomorrow.
CT: Ok let me talk to my colleague.
(I hand the phone back to her. She talks to him, and then hangs up.)
W: Ok Elizabeth, just give me a few minutes and I'm going to get your laptop from the office upstairs.
E: Thanks.
(45 minutes later...)
W: Alright, here's your laptop.
E: Thanks. Have a nice night!
I went to a surprise birthday party for a friend after that, to which I was an hour late. But, I have my laptop now. Phew!
Here's a picture from our Brazilian culinary class yesterday:
L to R: Casey (goes by João), Elizabeth (pronounced Elizabetchi), Marie (pronouced Mahee)We were trying to make thug faces, but I don't think mine worked out too well.
20 July 2007
brain in a bag
Earlier this week, my Contemporary Brazil class took a field trip to a market here in Salvador. There are a lot of markets around the city, most of which are pretty tourist-aimed. However, this definitely was not a touristy market. When we first got in, the kinds of things being sold seemed pretty usual to me. Clothes, blenders, spices, kitchenware, flip flops and so on. However, there was immediately a plethora of smells, none of which were pleasant, none of which I could identify, coming from every direction penetrating my pores. I knew at that point that this was going to be an experience I would never forget.
Eventually we got into the live animal area. First we saw chickens, ducks, pigeons and other types of birds in overcrowded cages. Then we saw a live chicken being wrapped up in newspaper. Then we saw goats and pigs. Then we saw a barely-alive-goat in a burlap sack be thrown over a man's shoulder and carried away. Another goat was pulled out of the pen screaming like a child as it's four legs were tied together and it was thrown in a wheel-barrow and carted away.
The fruit section was next, full of flies, cockroaches and dead rats. Yes, I saw dead rats next to baskets of fruit.
The meat section was the most disturbing part for me. I saw mean in every fashion: hung up, laid out, in bags, in nets, in newspaper and more. I saw intestines, eyeballs, tongues, testicles and I also saw brain in a plastic bag. Many of them. I saw every organ of every animal I had seen alive just a few minutes earlier. This is where all the smells were coming from.
I'm glad I went. It gave a much better real-life idea of not only where my food comes from, but also the kind of work some people have to do to survive. I don't think I'll ever go back to that market, but I definitely appreciate the food I eat a lot more now.
PORTUGUESE LESSON #4: FOOD
Some of my favorite foods/drinks since I have been in Brazil:
1. Pão delícia (paong deh-lee-see-ah) literally means "bread delight" and it is.
2. Açaí (ah-sah-ee) a brazilian berry most often made into a smoothie mixed with other fruit. My favorite is açaí with banana.
3. Suco (soo-koo) juice. Brazilians make juice out of every fruit, only it's not the juice we're used to. They just stick the fruit in a blender and add water. Most brazilians also like to sweeten the juice with sugar. Some of my favorite sucos are melância (watermelon), manga (mango), maracujá (passion fruit) and lime-rind, but I can't remember how to say that one in Portuguese.
Até mais! Till next time!
Eventually we got into the live animal area. First we saw chickens, ducks, pigeons and other types of birds in overcrowded cages. Then we saw a live chicken being wrapped up in newspaper. Then we saw goats and pigs. Then we saw a barely-alive-goat in a burlap sack be thrown over a man's shoulder and carried away. Another goat was pulled out of the pen screaming like a child as it's four legs were tied together and it was thrown in a wheel-barrow and carted away.
The fruit section was next, full of flies, cockroaches and dead rats. Yes, I saw dead rats next to baskets of fruit.
The meat section was the most disturbing part for me. I saw mean in every fashion: hung up, laid out, in bags, in nets, in newspaper and more. I saw intestines, eyeballs, tongues, testicles and I also saw brain in a plastic bag. Many of them. I saw every organ of every animal I had seen alive just a few minutes earlier. This is where all the smells were coming from.
I'm glad I went. It gave a much better real-life idea of not only where my food comes from, but also the kind of work some people have to do to survive. I don't think I'll ever go back to that market, but I definitely appreciate the food I eat a lot more now.
PORTUGUESE LESSON #4: FOOD
Some of my favorite foods/drinks since I have been in Brazil:
1. Pão delícia (paong deh-lee-see-ah) literally means "bread delight" and it is.
2. Açaí (ah-sah-ee) a brazilian berry most often made into a smoothie mixed with other fruit. My favorite is açaí with banana.
3. Suco (soo-koo) juice. Brazilians make juice out of every fruit, only it's not the juice we're used to. They just stick the fruit in a blender and add water. Most brazilians also like to sweeten the juice with sugar. Some of my favorite sucos are melância (watermelon), manga (mango), maracujá (passion fruit) and lime-rind, but I can't remember how to say that one in Portuguese.
Até mais! Till next time!
12 July 2007
south american computer saga
PORTUGUESE LESSON #3: Fixing a computer
Meu computador morreu. (meh-oo com-poo-tah-door moh-heh-oo) My computer died.
Você fala inglês? (voh-seh fah-lah een-glays) Do you speak English?
Pode me conectar com alguém que fala inglês? (poh-djee mee coh-neck-tar cong ahl-game key fah-lah een-glays) Can you connect me with someone who speaks English?
Meu computador morreu. (meh-oo com-poo-tah-door moh-heh-oo) My computer died.
Você fala inglês? (voh-seh fah-lah een-glays) Do you speak English?
Pode me conectar com alguém que fala inglês? (poh-djee mee coh-neck-tar cong ahl-game key fah-lah een-glays) Can you connect me with someone who speaks English?
02 July 2007
my blogger menu is in portuguse
instead of "new post" is says "novo postagem." i love brazil. sorry to tell all of you i haven't really taken any pictures. i'm afraid to take my camera anywhere for fear of it getting stolen. one of my friends got robbed in broad daylight on her way back from the beach on saturday. the man just came up to her and grabbed her bag right off her shoulder. soon enough i'll figure out when it's safe to take my camera and when it's not. i do have have one good picture i got on camera phone.
i took this picture from the bus on my way to go visit some Baha'i friends who live about an hour north of salvador. maybe it's immature and juvenile of me to have taken it, but whatever. i thought it was funny.
PORTUGUESE LESSON #2: MUSIC
Onde posso comprar um violão? (on-jee poh-soo com-prahr oom vee-oh-laong) Where can I buy a guitar?
A música brasileira é muita bonita. (ah moo-zee-kah brah-zee-lay-rah eh muytah boh-nee-tah) Brazilian music is very beautiful.
I have about 5 minutes left on this computer, so that's it for today folks. Till next time!
i took this picture from the bus on my way to go visit some Baha'i friends who live about an hour north of salvador. maybe it's immature and juvenile of me to have taken it, but whatever. i thought it was funny.PORTUGUESE LESSON #2: MUSIC
Onde posso comprar um violão? (on-jee poh-soo com-prahr oom vee-oh-laong) Where can I buy a guitar?
A música brasileira é muita bonita. (ah moo-zee-kah brah-zee-lay-rah eh muytah boh-nee-tah) Brazilian music is very beautiful.
I have about 5 minutes left on this computer, so that's it for today folks. Till next time!
28 June 2007
a praia bahiana
estou no brasil, na bahia, em salvador, na praia. here is the view i've had from my hotel window for the past few days.
from here on out my blog will serve as a mini-portuguese lesson as well.
PORTUGUESE LESSON #1: THE ESSENTIALS
Olá. Tudo bem? (Oh-lah. too-doo bay) 1. Hey, what's up 2. Hi, everything ok? 3. Yo, how's it going?
Onde é a praia? (On-djee eh ah pry-ah) Where is the beach?
today i will move in with my host family. i got to meet my host mother last night. her name is conceição. she has been hosting students with this program for six years! so even though i'm just one on a list, she took my right in as a member of the family. i love the brazilians. also, she lives right across the street from the hotel, so i'll still be right on the sea! yes, life is good. tá boa.
from here on out my blog will serve as a mini-portuguese lesson as well.
PORTUGUESE LESSON #1: THE ESSENTIALS
Olá. Tudo bem? (Oh-lah. too-doo bay) 1. Hey, what's up 2. Hi, everything ok? 3. Yo, how's it going?
Onde é a praia? (On-djee eh ah pry-ah) Where is the beach?
today i will move in with my host family. i got to meet my host mother last night. her name is conceição. she has been hosting students with this program for six years! so even though i'm just one on a list, she took my right in as a member of the family. i love the brazilians. also, she lives right across the street from the hotel, so i'll still be right on the sea! yes, life is good. tá boa.
20 June 2007
they're growing up!
yesterday was graduation at the preschool where i work. the kids were all dressed up and so excited to graduate. we saw a slide show with baby pictures and recent pictures of each of them, pictures of the classes, and shots of them doing different kinds of activities.
then they each went up with their families and received their diplomas. for every child, a teacher read a few sentences of some nice things their friends had to say about them. for example, "i love her because she has a beautiful dress and beautiful shoes. she has beautiful all over her!" or, "i like to play with him because he likes to catch girls too." it was very sweet, touching and very funny.
last on the program was a little concert to be given by yours truly. when i first got on stage, i knew these kids were not going to be able to listen to thirty-minute set i had planned, so i decided to cut it down dramatically. the first song was a sing-along called "the great big moose." the kids were into it, but by my fourth song, i knew i was losing them. the last song i sang was a duet with my coworker rachel. another coworker shareen actually managed to record it. annoying as it was at the time, the video actually turned out to be pretty funny.
19 June 2007
flight of the conchords
i can't remember who first introduced me to them, but i started watching flight of the conchords clips on youtube a few years ago. they're a comedic folk music duo from new zealand. i just can't enough of their stuff. i was flipping channels last night and noticed they were on hbo, and apparently they have their own tv show now. i was lucky enough to have happened upon the series premier. i recommend you check it out. you can watch it here. in the meantime, here is a little teaser:
13 June 2007
07 June 2007
jake shimabukuro is my new hero
back last june, when i bought my first ukulele, i posted a video of a famous ukulele player named jake shimabukuro. here is a video of him performing the same song, "while my guitar gently weeps," live in concert with an uber cool extended intro. this guy is incredible. the bridge gets me every time. it's about five and a half minutes in so you have to wait for it!
03 June 2007
it's always better when we're together
amelia and i are finally roommates! but only for three weeks...
30 May 2007
25 May 2007
13 May 2007
i did not turn into a giraffe
the saga continues...
surgery was monday. i was released from the hospital tuesday. wednesday and thursday i started eating real food, as opposed to the clear liquid diet i was on for monday and tuesday. thursday afternoon i started getting stomach cramps. you see, nothing in my digestive system had been moving since my surgery if you know what i mean. friday the cramps were worse, and my tongue was black. i went back on the clear liquid diet, plus ginger ale.
(this picture really doesn't do justice to the blackness of my tongue. also notice the tape on my neck. that is the location of my to-be battle scar.)
saturday i was half-half on the diet. i had some bread and chicken soup. my tongue went from kind of black to purple and back to normal by nighttime. today i'm not so sure what i want to do. my digestive system finally showed some movement today, but i think i'm going to keep my diet simple. i had some high-fiber cereal for breakfast. that should help things.
on a lighter note, i know how to solve a rubik's cube!
surgery was monday. i was released from the hospital tuesday. wednesday and thursday i started eating real food, as opposed to the clear liquid diet i was on for monday and tuesday. thursday afternoon i started getting stomach cramps. you see, nothing in my digestive system had been moving since my surgery if you know what i mean. friday the cramps were worse, and my tongue was black. i went back on the clear liquid diet, plus ginger ale.
(this picture really doesn't do justice to the blackness of my tongue. also notice the tape on my neck. that is the location of my to-be battle scar.)saturday i was half-half on the diet. i had some bread and chicken soup. my tongue went from kind of black to purple and back to normal by nighttime. today i'm not so sure what i want to do. my digestive system finally showed some movement today, but i think i'm going to keep my diet simple. i had some high-fiber cereal for breakfast. that should help things.
on a lighter note, i know how to solve a rubik's cube!
08 May 2007
the definition of irony
you are in the hospital recovering from a left thyroid lobectomy, a surgical procedure in which the left half of your thyroid is removed, and your cousin brings you a butterfly-shaped balloon.
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