ÿþ<html> <head> <title>Forest Hill Chamber Music Festival 2004</title> <style> a:link {color:888888;text-decoration: none} a:active {color:888888;text-decoration: none} a:visited {color:888888;text-decoration: none} a:hover {color:000000;text-decoration: none} </style> </head> <body bgColor=ffffff topmargin=15 leftmargin=0 text=555555 link=000000 alink=000000 vlink=000000> <center> <a href="index.html"><img src="title01w.gif" border=0></a><BR> <BR><font size=3> { <a href="p1.html">6/11</a> &nbsp; <a href="p2.html">6/12</a> &nbsp; <a href="p3.html">6/13</a> &nbsp; <a href="p4.html">6/13</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="artists.html">artists</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="notes.html">program notes</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="photos.html">photos</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="contact.html">tickets</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="ack.html">acknowledgements</a> } &nbsp; { <a href="intro.html">about</a> } <BR><BR><BR> <table border=0 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0> <TR> <Td align=right valign=top> <table border=0 cellpadding=15 cellspacing=0><TR><TD align=right> <a href="n01-bach.html">Johann Sebastian Bach </a><BR> <a href="n02-beet.html">Ludwig van Beethoven </a><BR> <a href="n03-berg.html">Alban Maria Johannes Berg </a><BR> <a href="n14-druk.html">Jacob Raphael Druckman </a><BR> <a href="n04-dvor.html">Antonín DvoYák </a><BR> <a href="n05-hind.html">Paul Hindemith </a><BR> <a href="n06-mech.html">Kirke Mechem</a><BR> <a href="n07-mess.html">Olivier Messiaen</a><BR> <a href="n08-moza.html">Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart </a><BR> <a href="n09-rohde.html">Kurt Rohde</a><BR> <a href="n10-ss.html">Charles Camille Saint-Saëns </a><BR> <a href="n11-scho.html">Arnold Schönberg </a><BR> <a href="n12-schub.html">Franz Peter Schubert </a><BR> <a href="n13-schum.html">Robert Schumann</a><BR> </td></tr></table> </td> <TD valign=top> <img src="black.gif" width=1 height=310><BR> </td> <TD valign=top width=500> <Table border=0 cellspacing=0 cellpadding=15><TR><TD> <font size=5><center><b>Ludwig van Beethoven</b><font size=2><br><i> b. 1770 Bonn, Germany; d. 1827 Vienna, Austria</i></center><font size=3><br><br> <b>Seven Variations For Piano and Cello in E-flat Major on the Duet  Bei Männern, welche Liebe fühlen From Mozart s  The Magic Flute, WoO 46 (1801)</b><br> <br> If you needed a set of variations whipped up for some special occasion, say a birthday or anniversary, or to ingratiate yourself with some nobleman, or even for a contest, and you lived in 18th  19th Century Vienna, Beethoven was The Man. <br><br>Performer composers of that era were expected to have the skills to create variations on a musical theme; it was a popular genre, employed both to entertain and to sell music. <br><br>Beethoven responded to an invitation by composer-publisher Anton Diabelli, in which a variation was requested of 50 composers, by calling the waltz theme  trash and refusing to participate. Nonetheless, he later created a set of 33 piano variations on that very theme, which is now considered, perhaps beside Bach s  Goldberg Variations, to be the epitome of the art for all time. <br><br>Variations were very handy for garnering gifts, stipends, favors from nobility and rich patrons, and Beethoven wrote on themes from a variety of sources ranging from currently popular operas to  Rule Britannia and Handel s  Judas Maccabeus. <br><br>Mozart s opera  The Magic Flute provided inspiration for two sets of variations for piano and cello, written and published separately.  Twelve Variations on a Theme of Mozart, Op. 66, was published in Vienna in 1796, though the autograph for that is now lost. That set is based on the aria for Papageno,  Ein Mädchen oder Weibchen. <br><br> Seven Variations on a Theme of Mozart, using a duet between Pamina and Papageno,  Bei Männern, welche Liebe fühlen (In men who feel love, a good heart is never lacking), was published in Vienna in 1802, but without an opus number, and it is now listed in the Kinsky catalog of Beethoven s works as WoO 46 ( without opus  a separate list comprising over 150 works). That manuscript now resides at the Beethovenhaus in Bonn, Germany. <br><br>Whereas the young prodigy Mozart and his father, in touring the courts of Europe, collected mainly non-negotiable gifts such as jeweled snuff boxes, Beethoven managed to obtain more practical rewards in the form of money or credit, and quite useful items such as a horse, which was given to him for a set of variations written for the wife of Count Johann Georg von Browne, Beethoven s friend and long-time patron. It is that same generous gentleman to whom these  Seven Variations were dedicated. <br> </td></tr></table> </td> </tr> </table> </body></html>