It's Ludwig van Beethoven's birthday.
He should be about 243 today. Except that he's dead.
What a pity.
I do believe he's trying to smile.
This fellow is one of the greatest composers who ever lived. He is the favorite composer of many music enthusiasts and musicians, such as violinist Itzhak Perlman. Oh, and Schroeder. How could I forget Schroeder? (Beethoven isn't my favorite, but he's a close second.)
Ludwig composed symphonies (Ode to Joy from the ninth symphony is one of his best known melodies), piano sonatas (the Moonlight is perhaps the most famous -- and my least favorite, solely on account of its ubiquity), string quartets, concertos, and lots more. He is a towering and influential figure in music, helping to usher musical Romanticism into the vogue.
Actually, we aren't sure of his actual birth date. We do, however, have record of his christening, which happened on December 17. Since it was tradition to christen a baby the day after his birth, December 16 is the safest time to celebrate Ludwig's birthday. His family and friends appear to have celebrated his birthday on this date as well. (I don't recall reading of Ludwig celebrating his own birthday; I'm not surprised.)
Johann Sebastian Bach is perhaps the most respected and influential composer in the history of music and the composer I love the most (for now, at least). His mastery of contrapuntal harmony, familiarity with and innovation in musical styles and forms, and sheer musical genius have secured this honor. Interestingly, during his day he was not nearly as popular as other composers such as Georg Philipp Telemann and George Frideric Handel. He was a master organist and was most famous for being one while he lived, although never reaching the status that Telemann or Handel enjoyed. While occupying different jobs over the years and in different places in Germany, Bach wrote a staggering amount of music, most of which were left unpublished during his lifetime. Here, since I enjoy quotes, I shall insert some quotes (presumably) by J.S. Bach:
“Music is an agreeable harmony for the honor of God and the permissible delights of the soul.”
“I play the notes as they are written, but it is God who makes the music.”
“The final aim and reason of all music is nothing other than the glorification of God and the refreshment of the spirit.”
“There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself.”
“What I have achieved by industry and practice, anyone else with tolerable natural gift and ability can also achieve.”
“If I decide to be an idiot, then I’ll be an idiot on my own accord.”
Bach is also famous for writing J.J. (Jesu Juva -- Jesus, help) and S.D.G. (Soli Deo Gloria -- Glory to God alone) over his musical works.
Bach died at the age of 65, presumably of a stroke, following two botched eye surgeries. Bach and his "old-fashioned" music fell into obscurity for some time as the new Classical musical style took the place of thethBaroque. (I admit that I haven't read too much about Bach's life. I do have a biography, which I have not read entirely, and a copy of Bach's obituary, which I have finished. In light of Bach's greatness and the regard that many have for him, I don't think that I've made him sound as cool as this:)
Not that this is anywhere near Bach's actual coolness
However, Bach's influence survived. Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven were all familiar with some of Bach's works and sometimes dabbled with contrapuntal music (the stuff that Bach did in his sleep). Then, along came Felix Mendelssohn, one of the greatest prodigies ever. Mendelssohn was responsible for the revival of Bach's music, and Bach eventually became more famous than he ever was during his lifetime. As a result of this Bach revival, more than 1000 of Bach's works are now cataloged and published, and Bach is now known as one the greatest composers of all time (although his organ-, harpsichord-, violin-, viola-, and I-don't-know-what-else-playing has been forgotten -- perhaps if people only listened to his recordings more; he was such a thrilling performer).
His Consequences
Bach's genius is rightly appreciated today and is influential to countless of musicians, composers, and listeners. We have beautiful compositions by those who tried to imitate his style, amazing interpretations of Bach's works by performers, and classical-music converts who changed their minds about that weird old music that guys in wigs play (Classical music is tight yo). Just to show how much he is appreciated (or, in some terrible cases, worshiped), here are some more quotes:
"Not Brook but Ocean should be his name." - Ludwig Van Beethoven ("Bach" is the German word for "brook")
Whether the angels play only Bach praising God, I am not quite sure.
- Karl Barth
Bach is Bach, as God is God.
- Hector Berlioz
To strip human nature until its divine attributes are made clear, to inform ordinary activities with spiritual fervor, to give wings of eternity to that which is most ephemeral; to make divine things human and human things divine; such is Bach, the greatest and purest moment in music of all time.
- Pablo Casals (cellist)
..the greatest Christian music in the world...if life had taken hope and faith from me, this single chorus would restore all.
- Felix Mendelssohn
Bach is the beginning and end of all music.
- Max Reger
I had no idea of the historical evolution of the civilized world's music and had not realized that all modern music owes everything to Bach.
- Niccolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Bach is ... a terminal point. Nothing comes from him; everything merely leads to him.
- Albert Schweitzer (not surprising)
Study Bach. There you will find everything.
- Johannes Brahms
Bach's influence on composers following Mozart is undeniable. We have Mendelssohn's fugues (which stemmed from his study of Bach), Chopin's preludes (some of which explicitly remind the listener of Bach), Max Reger's organ works (which draw from Bach's vast ocean of organ compositions), Dmitri Shostakovich's 24 Preludes and Fugues (patterned after Bach's Well-tempered Clavier), and Eugene Ysaye's 6 Sonatas for Solo Violin (which follows the 6 Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin archetype), for example. Bach himself seems to have anticipated musical Romanticism; some of his preludes sound like Chopin nocturnes; and the slow movement from Bach's double violin concerto almost sounds like Brahms (or, perhaps, Brahms sounds like Bach). However, some things that the revival of Bach has (unintentionally) spawned are not exactly "refreshing to the spirit" for some people. These are all 20th century music figures, and, unsurprisingly, are met with polarized reactions. If you are used to Bach as he is usually played (the dry, dull, and *gasp* orthodox way) or if you are used to the Bach-Beethoven-Brahms harmony and pleasing-to-the-ear-ness, these guys are probably not your cup of tea. For instance:
This guy:
The piano is uncomfortable.
The pianist Glenn Gould. He plays Bach more than any other composer. In fact, Bach is his desert-island composer. He does all kinds of stuff with Bach: pick out melodies that aren't even supposed to be there, hit the keys so that every note gets justice, and add little stuff to Bach's works that no one else (except maybe another strange fellow, Friedrich Gulda) would dare to do. He turns his torso around while playing, as exemplified in the video below. He hums Bach (I don't know how) while playing and is notorious for doing so.
I love this guy. I even try to imitate him sometimes, which makes my mother and sister shake their heads. Here's why:
Weird fellow. If you don't exactly like him, you're in good company. Gould has many "haters". He is unorthodox with his interpretations (whatever that means) and has earned the fury of many purists. I have loved Gould's music since I first heard him, but my opinion is not objective.
And then we have another strange spawn of Bach:
Bela Bartok's Solo Violin Sonata
I apologize if Bach's influence isn't obvious. I mentioned before that Bach wrote a set of six sonatas and partitas for solo violin, and this set (or finished up) the foundation for all solo violin repertoire that would follow.
The video above is the fugue from the Bartok sonata. It isn't easy listening, but I eventually grew to like Bartok's music. If you dislike Bartok (as my sister does), that's fine. Do try to listen to his piano repertoire, though; you might find it a bit more palatable.
(If you want to find a Bach equivalent of the video above, here's an example of a Bach fugue for solo violin:
I still find it amazing that Bach wrote a multi-voice fugue on an inherently monophonic instrument. That makes me wanna scream like a fangirl.
You didn't read that last sentence.)
And we have this guy:
Paul Hindemith
Yes, it's Gould again, this time playing Paul Hindemith, a German composer who followed Bach's contrapuntal footsteps. Hindemith was criticized by Nazi Germany for being an "atonal noisemaker", and you might be inclined to say the same. (Atonality is basically the lack of a musical key, which makes for very dissonant music.) His piano composition Ludus Tonalis was intended to be the Well-tempered Clavier of the 20th century. You might be scratching your head now and wondering where Bach's influence is. It's right there, but I can't pinpoint it, ignorant teenager that I am (never mind); I can pinpoint it now after listening to the video (I confess: I just picked out this video of Hindemith because Gould was playing). It has all the elements of a good Baroque fugue, sans the typical pre-20th century harmony. This is as close to Bach as anybody in the 20th century can get while staying within the bounds of 20th century classical music.
These are just part of the torrent of musical ideas that was released because Johann Sebastian decided to write music. Bach certainly would never had anticipated the consequences of doing this. I'm sure he would be reluctant to receive all the praise directed at him. Nobody would dare say that the world would be better of without Bach or his influence, but some would say that the musical world might be better off without some things that were influenced by him. To some extent, I agree. Not everything written by composers, especially from the 20th century onward, were masterpieces or fit with Bach's final aim of music. (Not even everything that Bach wrote was -- dare-I-say-it? -- a masterpiece, but I agree with violinist Nigel Kennedy that he did not right one single inferior piece of music.) Not every interpretation of Bach's music is good -- the legendary and notorious Glenn Gould not exempted. Nonetheless, these composers and performers are out there, and-- believe it or not -- they have one common denominator with Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and the more "orthodox" performers out there: the once-obscure composer-musician turned musical giant, J.S. Bach.
So begins my first blog post. I have thought of creating one for some time now but have only brought that idea into fruition today on a whim. I simply want an outlet for the thoughts that crowd my head and take up most of my day. I take full responsibility for whatever errors I make in this blog.
This is a blog intended for whatever I wish to blog about, and I can think of no one better (or, really, no one else) to blog about first than one of my favorite authors: Gilbert Keith Chesterton, the prince of paradox.
Theodore Roosevelt
Mr. Chesterton is perhaps most famously known for his Father Brown stories, but my admiration for his works did not start with these. A year or so ago, I had been reading Gene Edward Veith's Reading Between the Lines, one of my favorite books on literature and the philosophies which accompany it (sparking in me an interest in philosophy). In the list of authors he recommended (which included Flannery O'Connor, about whom I would love to write in the future) I found the name of Chesterton and looked for one of his works.
I first read The Man Who was Thursday, which, like nearly all of his fiction, contains his wit, paradox, social commentary, and Christian symbolism. It read like a very intelligent thriller -- or, perhaps, a proto-thriller. His style contained nearly everything I looked for in an author, and I looked for other books of his on Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/). I went on to read The Napoleon of Notting Hill, which is absurd but not nihilistically so, The Club of Queer Trades, a series of stories about men who practice unique professions, Manalive, which is one of my favorite works of fiction ever, and The Ball and the Cross, which portrays the quarrel and eventual friendship of an atheist and a Catholic. These novels are brimming with wit, humor, sarcasm, and profundity which I rarely find all bunched together in the works of other authors.
Of course, I read the Father Brown detective stories and found them to be a perfect complement to the Sherlock Holmes stories I had been reading. Brown, opposite to Holmes, relies more on insight than intellect and generally makes for a more satisfying read. (Of course, Chesterton was a brilliant author, while Doyle was not really an author to begin with.)
I have not read enough of his non-fiction. I began What's Wrong With the World and found much that I am sure he would still say about the society today, but there seems to be too wide a temporal gap between him and us. I also began Orthodoxy and Heretics, both of which I have yet to finish. I hope to read The Everlasting Man, which "baptized" C.S. Lewis' intellect, just as George MacDonald "baptized" his imagination.
Here are some of my favorite quotes and passages from some of the books I mentioned:
"Truth must of necessity be stranger than fiction. For fiction is the creation of the human mind, and therefore is congenial to it." The Club of Queer Trades
"I don't deny that there should be priests to remind men that they will one day die. I only say that at certain strange epochs it is necessary to have another kind of priests, called poets, actually to remind men that they are not dead yet." Manalive
"The intellectuals among whom I moved were not even alive enough to fear death. They hadn't enough blood in them to be cowards. Until a pistol barrel was poked under their very noses they never even knew they had been born." Manalive
"... we were all in exile, and ... no earthly house could cure the holy home-sickness that forbids us rest." Manalive
"I have called this book 'What is Wrong with the World?' and the usphot of the title can be easily and clearly stated. What is wrong is that we do not ask what is right." What's Wrong With the World
"It is the one great weakness of journalism as a picture of our modern existence, that it must be a picture made up entirely of exceptions... journalism cannot be reasonably expected... to insist upon permanent miracles. Busy editors cannot be expected to put on their posters. 'Mr. Wilkinson Still Safe,' or 'Mr. Jones, of Worthing, Not Dead Yet.' They cannot announce the happiness of mankind at all. They cannot describe all the fork that are not stolen, or all the marriages that are not judiciously dissolved. Hence the complete picture they give of life is of necessity fallacious; they can only represent what is unusual. However democratic they may be, they are only concerned with the minority." The Ball and the Cross
"Nothing is plainer from real history than that each of your heretics invented a complete cosmos of his own which the next heretic smashed entirely to pieces. Who cares now exactly what Nestorius taught? Who cares? There are only to things that we know for certain about it the teaching of Arius, the heretic who came before him, and something quite useless to [an atheist], the heretic who comes after." The Ball and the Cross
"The cross cannot be defeated, for it is Defeat." The Ball and the Cross
"The father believed in civilization, in the storied tower we have erected to affront nature; that is, the father believed in Man. The daughter believed in God; and was even stronger. They never of them believed in themselves; for that is a decadent weakness." The Ball and the Cross
"... it was your Jesus Christ who started all this bosh about being God."
"No, the idea is older; it was Satan who first said he was God."
"Then, what... is the difference between Christ and Satan?"
"It is quite simple... Christ descended into hell; Satan fell into it."
"Does it make much odds?"
"It makes all the odds... One of them wanted to go up and went down; the other wanted to go down and went up. A god can be humble, a devil can only be humbled." The Ball and the Cross
"Obviously one should not trust any God that one can improve on." The Ball and the Cross
"He was not 'a thinking machine'; for that is a brainless phrase of modern fatalism and materialism. A machine only is a machine because it cannot think." The Innocence of Father Brown
"Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak." The Innocence of Father Brown
"'How do you know all this? Are you a devil?'
'I am a man,' answered Father Brown gravely; 'and therefore have all devils in my heart.'" The Innocence of Father Brown
"I did try to found an heresy of my own; and I when I had put the last touches to it, I discovered that it was orthodoxy." Orthodoxy
"Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete self-confidence is a weakness." Orthodoxy
I had not bothered to underline passages (or, rather, highlight, since I read Chesterton from a Kindle) in certain books, but had I done so, they certainly would have been included in this list. These quotes fail to demonstrate how well Chesterton weaves narratives, although I sometimes wish he would end certain books in different manners. (Apparently, most of this post has just been quotes. If you aren't impressed by his quotes, that is perfectly fine.) I hope that this will not be the last time I blog about Chesterton. I also hope to add more to this blog.
