IT HAPPENED TODAY 7 MAY 1824: BEETHOVEN’S NINTH SYMPHONY IS PERFORMED FOR THE FIRST TIME IN VIENNA
The anthem of a united Europe has a German soul and 198 years ago it resounded for the first time in a European capital: Vienna. Two years from now is the bicentenary of that important event.
The ninth symphony is also the last of Ludwig van Beethoven and is defined as “choral” because its performance requires not a simple integration of orchestra, choir and solo singers but it is also choral because it obeys various studies and songs previously composed by the German genius.
Even the realization path has a choral trend: the project takes from a commission by the Company after the London Philharmonic of 1817 but the compositional work develops years, between the end of 1823 and February 1824, when the autograph is produced original. Beethoven’s idea is that of a profoundly German opera, inspired by the German tradition and soul and the name initially chosen is “Allemande” (German).
The official name is “symphony n. 9 in D minor for solos, choir and orchestra op. 125 “; but everyone simply calls it “the ninth”.
In the 1820s the major musical center in the world was Vienna, then literally dominated by Italian composers, in particular by Gioacchino Rossini; despite the worldwide importance of the Austrian capital, Beethoven wants the “premiere” to be performed in Berlin, an option that clashes with the desire of his admirers and financiers who expect the greatest musical temple of the time for the premiere of the new opera: the show “Kärntnertortheater” (Carinthian Gate Theater) in Vienna. A petition pro Vienna is even signed and in the end Beethoven is convinced and agrees. But the German composer is as brilliant as he is inflexible idealistic, animated by very firm musical principles and considers the Kärntnertortheater an excessively opulent setting for an intimate and inspired opera like the “Nona” and asks to use a modest reduced; his friends, his friends, struggle hard to convince him to give up “a nutshell”, avoid a prestigious diplomat and make his debut in Vienna. For the occasion, the very young singers Henriette Sontag (18 years old) and Caroline Unger (21) are hired. Unger will also be very popular in Italy to the point that Bellini and Donizzetti will write songs especially for her.
The performance is a triumph and the audience, knowing of the composer’s deafness, waved their handkerchiefs for a long time in addition to applause.
The famous “finale”, in 1972, was adapted by the conductor Herbert von Karajan to a European anthem which is always played in the major institutional circumstances.
In 2001, the score and the text are declared by UNESCO “memory of the world”.