The forgotten symphonies of Beethoven's true contemporaries
And a heartfelt thanks to the ensembles who have revived them
Haydn’s final symphony was written in 1795; Schubert’s groundbreaking eighth and ninth symphonies were written about 30 years later. If not for Beethoven, how would we remember the intervening period?
According to the standard repertoire of symphonies performed in the United States, we would not remember that period at all. This is unfortunate, because I think the question, “I’ve heard Beethoven’s fifth, but what did other symphonies sound like around that time?” is not the question of specialists but the question of folks who are new to classical music as well—I know that I had that question. When presented with the notion that Beethoven is a unique genius, curiosity demands someone to compare him to.
Thanks to the ambitious work of ensembles of the last few decades, it is now possible to do exactly that. And the result, to the open and curious listening mind, is surprising: yes, Beethoven was unique, but his contemporaries were not epigones; they did not write less-captivating versions of the same Beethovenian phrases that we love, but had their own answers to the question Beethoven answered: what new things can be done with the symphony after the brilliance Haydn and Mozart? This was not only a question borne out of chronology but out of world events as well, since the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars disrupted the musical, intellectual, and economic conditions that produced such an enormous volume of compositions in the “late Classical” era.
But beware: if there is any standard summary of the music of this period, including Beethoven’s, it is that the early 19th Century was the “early Romantic” period, which implies that the period’s composers merely anticipated the overtly Romantic music of Chopin, Liszt, Tchaikovsky, etc. This notion makes the period seem much duller than it actually was, and the first rule of music history or criticism should be to make music more interesting and more difficult incorporate into what we think about music already.
So try listening to the symphonies of the following five composers by clearing your mind of two items: Beethoven and Romanticism. There are dozens of composers who wrote now-recorded symphonies between 1795 and 1825, but in the spirit of my previous command to the reader, I think it is worth organizing them not in relation to Beethoven or to future composers but in relation to themselves. These five composers seem to have conceived of themselves as writing in the after-glow of Haydn but not in the shadow of Beethoven (such as Schubert himself, Mendelssohn, Spohr, Ries, Weber, Kalliwoda, and many others—which is not to say that they either were Beethoven imitators).
Anton Reicha. Reicha played alongside Beethoven in the court orchestra at Bonn and was later perhaps a “frenemy” of his in early 19th Century Vienna. He adored Haydn, claiming to be Haydn’s closest confidante in the years before his death, and he dedicated his new system of fugues to Haydn complete with a commissioned poem—but Beethoven sneered, “these are not fugues at all”. Reicha claims that there was a change in musical taste in the Vienna of this period and that he had so many musical ideas at the time, he could hardly write them all down.1
His symphonies have been revived by Czech orchestras, and, more recently, German and even American ones, as his music buried in the archives of the National Library of France has been digitized. In fact, Reicha is the only composer in my list here who has had a symphony performed by an American orchestra since I started the classical music concert map: the Longmont Symphony in Colorado performed his G Major symphony with a reconstructed introduction by Richard Dudas based on some rediscovered bassoon bars. That is a sign of the vitality of classical music in America and an inspiration to me to continue work on the mapping project!
Here is a Spotify playlist of his symphonies and his hilarious overture in 5/8 time; they are easily available on other platforms as well (as are all of the symphonies written about here). Several Reicha symphonies have not been recorded, so hopefully this list expands!Étienne Méhul. Méhul makes my twin commands (forget Beethoven and Romanticism) difficult, because he was supposedly the first composer to be called romantic, and his first symphony is supposedly Beethovenian, which has drawn outsize attention to it compared to his other three. But follow the composer’s own words according to his Wikipedia article (which does not provide a source!), which place him in the exact historical position that I find interesting and under-explored:
Commenting after the premiere of his first symphony, he noted: "I understood all the dangers of my enterprise; I foresaw the cautious welcome that the music-lovers would give my symphonies. I plan to write new ones for next winter and shall try to write them… to accustom the public gradually to think that a Frenchman may follow Haydn and Mozart at a distance."
He apparently intended to write more than four symphonies, and a movement of a fifth exists, but he died before he could do so. There are three definite highlights of the Méhul discography: this fast recording of his first symphony by Christoph Konig and the Solistes Europeens Luxembourg, this glorously transparent recording of his third and fourth by Eric Juteau and Kapella 19, and this energetic recording of symphony 2 by Marc Minkowski and Les Musiciens de Louvre. There is a complete recording of the symphonies by The Gulbenkian Orchestra, but I think the quality is not nearly as high as in the recordings above, so don’t overrate the convenience.
Franz Krommer. Like Reicha, Krommer (or Kramar) was Czech, and he was a major figure in musical Vienna, though it is almost impossible to find substantial information about him in English today. There are suggestions in a couple of places that his symphonies were explicitly seen as rivals to Beethoven’s; but his “post-” relationship to Haydn is the most obvious in his delicious and stylistically diverse string quartets. He wrote about 70 of these, only 13 of which have been recorded, but every one of the 13 is worth a listen (several listens). The inexhaustible Howard Griffiths and the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, responsible for resurrecting many obscure symphonies, have recorded all of his symphonies; playlist here. Some of his symphonies have been lost, and his prominence in Vienna and his prolific writing in the genre demand more of the attention that instead for whatever reason is directed at his casual wind octets.
Joachim Nicolas Eggert. In charge of the Swedish Royal Court Orchestra, Eggert wrote prolifically—operas, string quartets, symphonies, etc., stopped only by his untimely early death. Only a handful of these pieces have been recorded. He introduced the music of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven to Sweden, but it is evident upon listening to his four symphonies that his audiences demanded something Eggertian rather than German when it was his own music on the program. He is among the first composers to include trombones in a symphony’s orchestration—this simply because the court orchestra employed trombones! Far beyond the “big 5” listed here, I think it becomes apparent when listening to rare symphonies of this period that composers were writing for their musicians as much as for their audiences. The Gävle Symphony Orchestra is the only group to have recorded his symphonies, and while the recordings are a treasure, I hope other ensembles offer their own interpretations one day. Spotify playlist here.
Johann Wilhelm Wilms. Like Reicha, Wilms was almost an exact contemporary of Beethoven, but he outlived him by a couple of decades. Until recent recording projects, he was surely the most obscure of the composers on this list; apparently the virtuousic Concerto Koln, who have recorded his sixth and seventh symphonies, initially launched the project with a total misconception of those pieces’ still-uncertain composition dates. To my ear, the purpose of Wilms’ symphonies is to exercise the athleticism of the orchestra, which you can hear to thrilling effect in the recording mentioned above as well as in the recording of the first and fourth symphonies by (once again) Howard Griffiths. The recordings by the Netherlands Radio Chamber Orchestra suffer a bit from weaker sound quality in my opinion (which is worth little!).
Dozens of other composers wrote symphonies between 1795 and 1825, many of which are fascinating and distinct from those of the five composers listed above. But I want to end this post with an example of the opposite: a symphony from this period that I consider very dull, Friedrich Witt’s Sinfonia in A Major2. This just to prove that advocates of obscure music are not delusional, do not like just anything—Wilms, Reicha, Krommer, Mehul, and Eggert are both obscure and damn good!
I hope folks find this subject as fascinating as I do, and if you are a musician who has explored non-standard-repertoire works, thank you! I hope they are just as worthwhile to you as they are to us listeners!
If you would like to see the data underneath the Classical Concert Map or would like to help expand and improve it, please email loft4map@gmail.com!
Reicha’s invaluable autobiographical notes were translated in a very old journal article by the scholar Maurice Emmanuel, but I am having trouble tracking down a link at the moment.
The ETA Hoffmann symphony on this album is much better, as are Hoffmann’s string quartets!