PROGRAM NOTES SPONSORED BY THOMAS WARD

Today’s concert begins with an “auspicious beginning” in at least two different ways. First, being his Symphony No. 1, it marks Ludwig van Beethoven’s (1770-1827) entry into a field long dominated by Joseph Haydn. We don’t think of Beethoven as a timid personality, but he clearly waited to enter the symphonic realm until he felt sufficiently mature. All of his earlier publications were chamber works, including solo piano sonatas, piano trios, string duos and the like. With the Opus 18 string quartets he finally stepped onto Haydn’s turf. Those quartets were quickly followed by the Symphony No. 1 in C Major, Op. 21, composed in the late 1790s. It was the first of nine magisterial symphonies Beethoven would ultimately produce.

In his first symphony, Beethoven also chose to exert himself with a bold opening gesture: a dissonant chord that points to a key other than the tonic (i.e., home) key. To begin a large-scale public work with so forceful a dissonance was probably unprecedented in 1800. Beethoven’s irreverence of starting with an ending device – a dominant-seventh chord to full cadence – shows wit worthy of Haydn. Moreover, he cadences in the “wrong” key of F major. This deflection further muddies the waters, inspires a prolonged excursion into dominant harmony, and makes the eventual arrival at C major all the more satisfying. A big part of hearing Beethoven’s comic effect lies in appreciating how conventional classical-era music was. Cadences, for instance, are the punctuation marks 18th-century musical grammar, closing off ideas with either full or partial stops. Thus, as noted by Beethoven’s contemporary Johann Matheson, “When cadences are used at the beginning of a piece, they become something special, since they normally along at the end.” In sum, Beethoven is playing with stylistic conventions.

Beethoven actively sought a fresh start with this symphony, and the spirit of innovation resonates across later passages. Overall, the work maintains many norms of the four-movement symphony: a fast Allegro with slow introduction, slow lyrical movement, a dance, and a vivacious finale. But on closer inspection, many characteristics are updated for the dawning 19th century. For instance, whereas most slow movements of the day used a reduced scoring, Beethoven’s second movement calls upon the full orchestra. This Andante con moto also moves at a quicker pace than typical slow movements. The third movement Minuet goes so quickly as to qualify as a Scherzo, which became the composer’s preferred type for symphonic third movements. In fact, with its jabbing accents and syncopations, it sounds less like a graceful Minuet than the second movement.

One of the true innovations is Beethoven’s virtuosic wind writing. Where a previous composer might have used the string-woodwind contrast in call-and-response fashion, Beethoven combines them more tightly in the presentation of his themes. This elevation of wind instruments helps explain the appeal of today’s arrangement by Carl Friedrich Ebers (1770-1836). Ebers was a minor composer and music director, but he supplemented his income with successful arrangements like this. In fact, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 appeared in a collection of “symphonies by diverse authors” as arranged for these particular instruments by Ebers.


Although his name did not leave quite the same impact in the contemporary Western world as that of Beethoven, Ernő Dohnányi (1877-1960) was a veritable giant of 20th-century musical life in central Europe. Born in the formerly Hungarian Pozsony (now Bratislava), the precocious talent began musical tuition with his father, with lessons in both violin and piano. Before his entry into the Budapest Academy of Music in 1895, Ernő had also written over a dozen compositions. That might have been enough to impress the Academy’s examining committee, but he also displayed stellar piano playing. Having secured composition lessons with Hans Koessler and piano lessons with István Thomán (a former pupil of Liszt) at the Academy, Dohnányi convinced his childhood friend Béla Bartók to follow suit by attending the same institution.

Dohnányi began his career as a pianist in Berlin in 1897, but would be forced to return to Budapest in 1915 because of World War I. There he served as a piano professor (and later director) at the Academy for several separate stints and as principal conductor of the Philharmonic Orchestra until 1944. During that 30-year period, Dohnányi almost singlehandedly reshaped Budapest’s musical scene through actively promoting young native composers – including Bartók, Kodály, and Weiner – and programming hundreds of concerts during his tenure with the Philharmonic. After Dohnányi relocated to Vienna in the final year of World War II, he drew criticism from both ends of the political spectrum. Some accused him of sympathizing with the conservative Hungarian regime in power at the time, while others saw his actions as resistance to rising fascism. In 1945 he was prohibited from returning to his home country, and he eventually ended up in the United States at Florida State University. Dohnányi died in 1960 while he was in New York making recordings.

Dohnányi wrote his Sextet in C Major in 1935. During a time shadowed by an overcommitted schedule and several illnesses, the composer still managed to return to work after having written only two other pieces so far in that decade. The Sextet seems to enthusiastically herald Dohnányi’s return to creativity in its opening measures: the music reaches towards orchestral timbres with a lyrical blast from the horn and a thick texture beneath supplied by cello and piano. The horn’s rising / falling theme passes to clarinet before the violin finally takes its turn. Next, the winds and strings gradually fade into the background as the piano makes its pyrotechnic debut. The movement continues with the energy of the opening measures while it charts a course through the broad outline of the three-part sonata form: exposition, development, and recapitulation.

The second movement opens peacefully with strings and piano. Very soon, however, the latter introduces a stark march, at which point the winds join to complement this strangely somber interjection. The third movement opens with the clear, relaxed voice of the clarinet. The calm is misleading as Dohnányi once again allows the piano, winds, and horn to bring hints of a storm to the tranquility. Without pausing to breathe, the finale begins with an energetic burst. Dohnányi allows each instrument its own brief moment in the spotlight in a heady race to the end.

© Jason Stell and Emily Masincup, 2026