Recital Attendance and Commentary Requirement

 

All students in Dr. Vess's section of IDST 2310 are required to attend the recital by Dr. Greg Pepetone on Tuesday, November 16, at 8:00 in the Max Noah Hall.  There will be a sign-in sheet at the recital.  Look for Dr. Vess. Students will be required to write a response of about a page on the music performed.  After reading Dr. Pepetone's commentary, attending his recital, AND participating in his class lecture/discussion on the 18th, respond to the following questions no later than November 30, 1999 (the first class after Thanksgiving break).

 

Assignment:

 

1.  In what ways does the music of Beethoven speak to you?  After hearing the recital and lecture/discussion, do you see Beethoven as a hero and the ultimate survivor?

 

2. What specific aspects of Beethoven's music strike you as heroic?  As full of pathos and sadness? As triumphant?

 

3.  How does the music of Beethoven reflect our unit theme of "art and the ordered cosmos?" In what ways is his music ordered, and what view of the ordered cosmos does his music express. A positive one or a negative one?

 

Dr. Pepetone=s Commentary:

 

In the first place, I'd like to explain the unusual title of my program. "Agonistes" is a classical Greek word for conflict or struggle. Much of the music I'll be playing is from Beethoven's so-called heroic period, during which his central message is one of defiant struggle. What exactly was he defying? Fate, society, his youthful poverty, childhood abuse, loneliness, the arrogance and incomprehension of his patrons, the pettiness of his class-ridden world, his growing deafness, the indignity of death itself --all this and more. Beethoven is the Eternal Rebel of classical music. In addition to personal hardships, he lived through a political era of exhilerating liberalism followed by sudden relapse into a stifling and unimaginative conservatism. This too must have contributed to his sense of frustration and disappointment. On the surface at least, this all sounds

admittedly depressing. So why should a Decorah audience wish to experience it? Because, in the final analysis, Beethoven's message is one of hope. He was a survivor, someone who took everything life could throw at him without flinching, compromising, or quitting. He fought like a hero, strove like an athlete, and in the end, he danced like a saint. As a result, his music can

stir us to renewed effort and a sense of connection with our fellow creatures._ One could argue that many people no longer want to be stirred that way; they simply want to be entertained. Beethoven does entertain us. Like Shakespeare he does so by reminding us that "ripeness is all." He uses sound to paint a complete picture of what it is to be human. It's a mistake to think of him as only a "dead, white, European male." A beacon of artistry -- yes, a benchmark of human achievement -- yes, a stern and obsolete cultural icon -- I think not.

I've chosen to perform the three most popular of his Thirty-Two Piano Sonatas -- the Pathetique, the Moonlight, and the Appassionata. I'm also programming Für Elise and the Thirty-Two Variations On An Original Theme. I chose these works because I love them. Just as most actors wants to play Hamlet, most pianists want to play this program at some point in their career. In a sense, this particular cluster of works is Beethoven's Hamlet. The nicknames speak for themselves: The Pathetique, a sonata that evokes the pathos experienced by Beethoven during the onset of his irreversible deafness.  Für Elise and the Moonlight Sonata come under the general heading of "love music". The Moonlight Sonata exemplifies the ardor (Movt. I), playfulness and delicacy (Movt.II) and passion (Movt. III) of romantic love. Indeed, its last movement exhibits a primal power that a perceptive, but musically untrained, colleague once compared to a "herd of stampeding buffalo." The Appassionata is a towering sonata of passion that removes this polite eighteenth-century genre from the drawing room and places it within the tempestuous realm of nature. As a child, I listened to these pieces endlessly. They opened a door into an unexpected world of wonder, terror, and sheer beauty. Though I've not come close to exhausting their

possibilities, in a sense I've been privileged to spend much of my life in that world. Sharing it with others is the appropriate way to express my gratitude.

 

Another reason I've chosen this repertoire is that I'm currently teaching an interdisciplinary course entitled The Gothic Imagination, in which Beethoven figures prominently. The subject matter of that course is, to quote Wordsworth: "Those mysteries of being which have made/And shall continue evermore to make/ Of the whole human race one brotherhood." Beethoven saw himself as a gothic character and, in these particular selections, paints a vivid self -portrait. This music is filled with mystery, pain, and vehemence all_ elements that define the gothic imagination. But, and here's the key to Beethoven's timeless relevance,_ he was somehow able to harmonize and articulate these powerful emotions. In doing so, he attests to the possibility of channeling potentially destructive energies in ways that enhance life. In that sense, Beethoven's

music is a persuasive alternative to Columbine and similar social ills, many of which stem from an inability to face the challenges of life with creative vision, discipline and compassion rather than violent self -assertion.

 

Considering how well known and frequently recorded this music is, some people might ask, "Why should anyone seek out yet another version of the 'same ol', same ol'?'_ My response to that question is that just as films have made certain plays and stories familiar to people who have never actually attended a theater production or read a novel, modern sound recordings have created a largely false impression of familiarity with the "standard repertoire." The simple truth is, if you haven't heard it live, you haven't really heard it. Even if you have, I'd like to think that

you'll experience it differently when I perform it. Why?_ Because I can't imagine my life without Beethoven; and if I succeed in conveying even the smallest part of all that his music has meant to me, my audiences will have received a more than adequate return on their investment in time and

attention.