(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Music open thread: Beethoven, not the greatest hits, but pretty damn good [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-12-16 Despite its vast musical selection, boasting more than a hundred million tracks, finding music on Spotify can be a frustrating experience. Spotify looks to be on track to becoming profitable in 2024 by increasing premium subscription rates and laying off employees. Improving the music search capabilities does not seem to be a priority now. I’m in an organization that uses Ryver instead of Slack or Discord for messaging among the members. We have a song request channel, managed by a woman, call her “Kelly,” she prescreens the titles and puts them into our Spotify playlist. Back in September, I put in a request for Beethoven’s Opus 126 Bagatelles. Those pieces have never come up on the Spotify playlist. But Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony — only the opening Allegro con brio, of course — and a bagatelle by Ligeti have come up repeatedly. Kelly said that she put into Spotify’s search bar exactly what I asked for, and that’s what Spotify gave her. I was skeptical, but then I tried it myself and saw that yeah, searching on Spotify is frustrating. Searching on Google is much easier. Just type “Beethoven 126” and you can readily find multiple performances on YouTube, whether the whole set of six or various selections. x YouTube Video My favorite of these is No. 4 in B minor, but I’m also growing to really like No. 5 in G major. Neither of these are in any compilations of Beethoven’s greatest hits, but they do invariably include one bagatelle Beethoven himself didn’t consider worth publishing. The track listing from the Sony Classical compilation, for example, copied and pasted straight from the Amazon page: 1 Symphony No. 5 in C Minor, Op. 67: I. Allegro con brio - Leonard Bernstein 2 6 Minuets, WoO 10: No. 2 in G Major (Arr. T. Frost for Orchestra) - Eugene Ormandy 3 Bagatelle in A Minor, WoO 59 "Für Elise" (Arr. W. Smith for Orchestra) - William Smith 4 Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-Sharp Minor, Op. 27 No. 2 "Moonlight": I. Adagio sostenuto - Philippe Entremont 5 Die Ruinen von Athen, Op. 113: No. 4, Marcia alla turca - Eugene Ormandy 6 Symphony No. 6 in F Major, Op. 68 "Pastoral": I. Awakening of Cheerful Feelings upon Arrival in the Country - Eugene Ormandy 7 Egmont, Op. 84: Overture - Sir Colin Davis 8 Symphony No. 3 in E-Flat Major, Op. 55 "Eroica": III. Scherzo. Allegro vivace - Michael Tilson Thomas 9 Piano Concerto No. 5 in E-Flat Major, Op. 73 "Emperor": III. Rondo. Allegro - George Szell 10 Symphony No. 9 in D Minor, Op. 125 "Choral": IV. Recitative. O Freunde, nicht diese Töne! - Michael Tilson Thomas Except for the second and third tracks being orchestrations of piano solo originals, it would be a waste of money for me to buy this album. I already have all this music in my collection, and not just the excerpts, but the complete works these were drawn from. I like Beethoven’s Fifth, Sixth and Ninth Symphonies, but are the other six chopped liver? Not at all. The Symphony No. 4 in B-flat major is very damn good. To me it expresses a feeling of being out in the woods on a beautiful sunny day. Maybe that description sounds more like the Pastoral Symphony, but it’s actually a very different mood. Here’s Paavo Järvi conducting the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen. The son of former Detroit Symphony Orchestra Music Director Neeme Järvi is a nice man, I imagine, despite his unfortunate physical resemblance to Dictator Putin. Paavo probably rules the orchestra more like his father than like the infamously iron-fisted Fritz Reiner in Pittsburgh and later Chicago. x YouTube Video I would close out a playlist of Beethoven’s greatest hits with the Triumphal March from Tarpeja. The story of Tarpeia dates back to the ancient Romans, it’s a real downer. Beethoven wrote this music for a play by his contemporary, Christoph Kuffner, but apparently to begin rather than to end the performance. x YouTube Video Happy birthday, Beethoven. The open thread question: which of Beethoven’s compositions not included in any greatest hits compilation do you think ought to be included? [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/12/16/2212052/-Music-open-thread-Beethoven-not-the-greatest-hits-but-pretty-damn-good?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/