Beethoven unveiled

Synopsis

On today’s date in 1845, the sleepy little German town of Bonn played host to 5000 visitors. These ranged from curious natives and opportunistic pickpockets to famous composers, performers, and music lovers from many countries, including British monarch Queen Victoria and King Wilhelm the IV of Prussia.

The occasion? The unveiling of a bronze statue of great German composer Ludwig van Beethoven, who had been born in Bonn 75 years earlier. A festival of Beethoven’s music was in progress, and German composer Ludwig Spohr conducted Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis at the Bonn Cathedral before the unveiling of the statue.

For almost a decade, Hungarian composer and pianist Franz Liszt had been tirelessly fundraising for this event and was the largest contributor the Beethoven statue fund.

Alas, the local planning committee was totally unprepared for the huge crowd that descended on Bonn, and woefully incompetent in managing just about every aspect of the occasion. How incompetent? Well, consider this: as their majesties Queen Victoria and King Wilhelm the IV of Prussia looked on, with great fanfare the shroud fell from Beethoven’s statue — only to reveal the statue’s back facing the vast assembled crowd.

Oops.

Music Played in Today's Program

Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827): Congratulations Minuet; Berlin Philharmonic; Herbert von Karajan, conductor; DG 453 713

On This Day

Births

• 1644 - Bohemian composer Heinrich Ignaz Franz Von Biber, in Wartenburg (now Straz pod Ralskem) near Reichenberg (now Liberec)

Deaths

• 1612 - Italian composer Giovanni Gabrieli, c. 55 (his exact birthdate is uncertain), in Venice

• 1928 - Czech composer Leos Janácek, 74, in Ostrava

• 1992 - American composer John Cage, 79, in New York

Premieres

• 1845 - Verdi: opera Alzira, in Naples at the Teatro San Carlo

• 1964 - David Del Tredici: I Hear an Army for soprano and string quartet (based on a poem by James Joyce) at Tangelwood Festival in Massachusetts

• 1964 - Panufnik: Sinfonia Sacra, in Monaco, as the prize-winning work in an international competition sponsored by Prince Rainer III

• 1984 - Berio: opera Un Re in Ascolto (A King Listening), at the Salzburg Festival, conducted by Lorin Maazel

• 2001 - Esa-Pekka Salonen: Foreign Bodies, at the Schlewswig-Holstein Festival in Germany, with the Finnish Radio Symphony conducted by Esa-Pekka Saraste

Others

• 1845 - A statute of Beethoven is unveiled in Bonn, Germany, the composer’s birthplace. Ludwig Spohr conducts a performance of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis at the Bonn cathedral. Liszt had been instrumental in raising funds for the statue, and was present, as was Hector Berlioz, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Great Britain, and the King and Queen of Prussia.

• 1877 - Frequently listed (and almost certainly incorrect) date on which the American inventor Thomas Alva Edison recorded his own voice reciting, “Mary Had a Little Lamb” on a tinfoil cylinder phonograph of his own design. Edison filed the patent for his new invention on December 24, and it was granted on February 19, 1878. In London in April of 1888, Edison’s phonograph would record excerpts from a live Crystal Palace performance of Handel’s oratorio, Israel in Egypt. On December 2, 1889, Theo Wangemann, a representative of Thomas Edison recorded Johannes Brahms playing the piano in Vienna. The latest research suggests the voice introducing this famous recording is probably that of Wangemann, not Brahms himself, as was earlier thought.

• 1922 - First live broadcast concert of the New York Philharmonic over New York radio station WJZ. The concert was broadcast from Lewisohn Stadium during the orchestra's summer series, and included music by Dvořák, Saint-Saens, Mendelssohn, Rimksy-Korsakov, Brahms and Gluck. The conductor was Willem van Hoogstraten, the orchestra’s regular summer-event director. On October 5, 1930, the New York Philharmonic began its regular weekly series of Sunday afternoon national broadcasts over the Columbia radio network.