Symphony No. 4 in B-Flat Major, op. 11
performed Oct 21, 2001

Beethoven's time was one of revolutions and wars, terror and reform, poverty and extravagance and in many ways his music reflects the turbulence of the age in which he lived. Austria was at war with Ottoman Turkey, the French were in dispute with Austria, and England with France. The fall of the Bastille in 1789 was a sign of the end of the old order, extinguished forever. The period brought wide cultural changes, changes in political philosophy and in society, in literature, in painting and in music with the towering genius of Beethoven, later referred to by Liszt as "the pillar of smoke that led to the Promised Land." Beethoven is seen as the bridge from the restraint and preoccupation with form of the Classical era, to the widely personalized and emotional Romantic era.

Beethoven had a remarkable musical output. Just to name a few: 32 piano sonatas, 16 string quartets, 6 piano concerti plus a fragment (of which only 5 remain in the repertoire), 10 violin sonatas, 4 cello sonatas, 172 folk song arrangements, 60 conons and "musical jokes," at least 2 ballets, an opera ("Fidelio"), and a large number of other works for chamber ensembles, choir, voice... and 9 great symphonies that still represent the highest consistent level of symphonic output by any composer in history. Regardless of the success that surrounded Beethoven during his life and the enduring admiration for his music, many works slipped through the cracks of time. Biographers and annotators cannot be blamed for waxing lyrical over the Symphony No. 4 in B-Flat Major, op. 60, of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827). Few can resist reading a romance in its pages, and some even believe it is a testament of passion to the infamous "Immortal Beloved" in Beethoven's famous undated and unaddressed letter.

Who was the "Immortal Beloved"? A subject of much conjecture! There was the Countess Theresa von Brunswick, whom Beethoven wooed and won... for a while. Another likely suspect is Theresa's cousin, Countess Giulietta Guicciardi. While there is no way to know for certain if Theresa or Giulietta inspired the symphony, facts and circumstances seem to favor Theresa. And yet, there is very little to connect the symphony directly to the romance.

What is byond question is that the spring and summer of 1806, when the symphony was written, were one of the happiest times in Beethoven's stormy career. The spring had been almost purely holiday, spent in Hungary on the estate of Count Brunswick. There he had reveled in the beautiful natural surroundings and courted the Count's sister, Theresa. And there, in May, he apparently became engaged to her... or so Theresa said. Customary to Beethoven's love life, the affair came to nothing. The official dedication of the Fourth Symphony is to Count Franz von Oppersdorf, to whom Beethoven had been introduced by his friend and patron, Prince Lichnowsky. Oppersdorf's private orchestra performed Beethoven's Second Symphony, much to Beethoven's delight, and the Count decided to commission a symphony of his own. The delighted Beethoven pocketed an advance of five hundred florins. However, when the Fourth Symphony finally arrived, the Count was anything but pleased; by the time he received it, the Fourth Symphony had already been sold and published. No further commissions came from the Count.