A Pastoral Revolution

continuing Beethoven's finales,

In the search for a finale that binds a whole monumental work together rather than merely saying, “that’s it!”, ending with a bang seems promising, especially if you have real substance to offer. Mozart understood the options. His 38th Symphony, (Prague) ends with a nice confection of froth, 39 and 40 are both elaborate versions of the “showing-off” solution, but the 41st (Jupiter) is quite new. The Jupiter’s finale is a monument all by itself, owing not a little to Bach in the combination of slow and fast ideas. Even at the very end, in the coda, the music is again suddenly unveiling levels of complexity and intensity not even hinted at before.

And here lies the secret – the need to reveal something unanticipated, relevant, and new. It’s not enough simply to reassert your opening idea louder, faster, and three times over. A big choral dance number with all the cast on stage, all the loose ends tied up, and the dash for the cloakrooms and parking lots launched – ritual only; no guarantee of substance.

Beethoven’s first prototype whole-work finales were based on the “triumphant” strategy, what Michael Steinberg calls the “victory symphony.” In #3, the Eroica, his finale begins with a rush and a dash, and ends with total assertiveness. But these bookends have nothing much to do with the meat of the movement. The fifth symphony is more organic, with a finale emerging seamlessly, and ending generously enough to engulf the entire symphony. It even reverts back and quotes the third movement for a bit, which is a great idea, a gesture informing us that success is not yet complete. Good move. Mahler caught on and did that too, ineptly in the 1st, powerfully in the 5th, to the point of genius in the 6th, vacuously in the 7th.

But a triumphant ending is only one option, not necessarily the most convincing. Isn’t magnificence rather a cheap trick? One of the most startlingly original and influential of finale-inventions was Tchaikowsky’s – the utter despair of the slow ending to his Pathétique Symphony. But that still lies in the future.

With his 6th Symphony, Beethoven moved away from simple victory, and took a step towards what might be called the “text-symphony”. There is a static, masque-like story behind the Pastoral, a series of tableaux. Not yet an organic psychological unfolding in the manner of Wagner or Mahler, but at least an added dimension of emotional propositions underlying the music. By means of his simple sequence of static moods – happiness on arriving in the country – soothingly contemplating the brook – simple rustic company – the exhilaration of a storm, - Beethoven is able to set up an agenda for the finale which has not even been embarked upon yet. The movement is called the Thanksgiving after the Storm, but it is much more than that. After all, there was nothing very terrible about the storm; it interrupted a dance in mid-jump (memories of the disruption of the scherzo in the 5th symphony) and gave us the most energetic fun so far, but otherwise seems to have done little harm. So the thanksgiving called for isn’t like the gut-wrenching panic/relief of having survived a tornado or a hurricane. Rather is the finale an integration of the whole disparate rural experience; the initial relaxation, the more intense entry into the mood of peace, the frivolity, the exhilaration, and all these leading to a new mood, a mood of gratitude and contentment and confidence – a sense of having had a truly life-changing experience which needs time to consolidate precisely because it is not “in your face” as it starts out. It is, in fact, somewhat unconvincing initially, and needs time to earn our trust. By this means, the finale of the Pastoral is able gradually to get under our skin, and finally become so persuasive that it can risk falling almost silent before closing quietly with a sort of “QED.”

I may add, as a footnote, that this is a particularly difficult movement to conduct, since it is harmonically vague to start with, giving you no clear spot to nail the tempo, and the whole thing tends to slow down anyway – all too realistic a musical representation of falling asleep!

Despite being so different in effect, this literary, philosophically sustained music points directly to the finale of the 9th symphony – the true, undeniable birth of the text-symphony.

Yet more to come!
©2004 AJM
wavewillow@earthlink.net