Music and Vinyl: Beethoven - Symphony No. 6 "Pastoral"

The benefit concert for Beethoven held in Vienna on 22nd December 1808 was a remarkable one. Not only was it very long (around four hours), but it saw the premieres of both the 5th and 6th Symphonies, as well as the 4th Piano Concerto and the Choral Fantasy. It was cold and the orchestra lacked rehearsal, but such an inauspicious start to the public life of the music did no lasting damage, and the symphonies have formed the heart of the symphonic repertoire ever since.

The 6th Symphony is one of Beethoven's few programmatic compositions, though the composer said it was more an expression of feeling rather than a musical painting of the countryside. Breaking with the classical tradition of four movements, the Pastoral has five - with the 3rd and 4th linked without a break. The sleeve notes below describe the music in detail, and this piece by Tom Service is an interesting analytical discussion of symphony.

Like my recent posts of the 5th Symphony and 7th Symphony, this recording is from Otto Klemperer's Columbia cycle with the Philharmonia, recorded in 1958.