Beethoven's boogie-woogie (was:: Africa-Europe)

hi Jon,

> From: "Jon Szanto" <JSZANTO@...>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Thursday, June 26, 2003 6:20 PM
> Subject: [tuning] Re: Africa-Europe
>
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@l...> wrote:
>
> > >> invented boogie-woogie is Beethoven (in his sonata 32, op 111?)
> > >
> > > No one can take that question seriously, Gene.
> >
> > Except for me.
>
> Come on, Carl. The mere fact that someone at an
> earlier time had a broken rhythm left hand on a
> keyboard doesn't mean he is the father of boogie-woogie.
> It is a coincidence. That sonata has as much to do
> with b-w as Joanne Castle has to do with Carl Czerny
> (maybe less).

while i agree that the resemblance between Beethoven's
sonata and real 20th-century boogie-woogie is purely
a coincidence, the resemblance is truly uncanny, extending
even into the syncopated rhythm of the block chords.

usually most performers play this variation too fast
to my taste, which hides the resemblance to boogie-woogie.
here's my MIDI-file of it, slowed down to where i like it:
(copy and paste the link if it has a line-break)

/metatuning/files/boogie-woogie_variation-ps32.
mid

-monz

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

/metatuning/topicId_5040.html#5040

> usually most performers play this variation too fast
> to my taste, which hides the resemblance to boogie-woogie.
> here's my MIDI-file of it, slowed down to where i like it:
> (copy and paste the link if it has a line-break)
>
> /metatuning/files/boogie-
woogie_variation-ps32.
> mid
>
>

***Or, even easier than pasting and fixing the break, just go to the
*Files* section of this forum, and download it from there...

Thanks, Monz!

Joe

Hi Monz,

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:
> here's my MIDI-file of it, slowed down to where i like it:
> (copy and paste the link if it has a line-break)

Hey, I appreciated your effort to upload that segment, which was similar to other midi files I checked out. Tempo or no, it didn't change my mind, because I listen to that music - as I have in times past - and never once thought of b-w. I think it is a surface resemblance, displaced rhythms and all, and has no connection other than coincidental, to anything remotely funky.

Cheers,
Jon

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "Jon Szanto" <JSZANTO@A...> wrote:

> Hey, I appreciated your effort to upload that segment, which was
similar to other midi files I checked out. Tempo or no, it didn't
change my mind, because I listen to that music - as I have in times
past - and never once thought of b-w.

I guess I'm a square. I did--then again, while I grew up on
classical, I also grew up up on a few other things, one of them being
boogie-woogie.

hi Jon,

> From: "Jon Szanto" <JSZANTO@...>
> To: <metatuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Saturday, June 28, 2003 10:42 AM
> Subject: [metatuning] Re: Beethoven's boogie-woogie (was:: Africa-Europe)
>
>
> Hi Monz,
>
> --- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:
> > here's my MIDI-file of it, slowed down to where i like it:
> > (copy and paste the link if it has a line-break)
>
> Hey, I appreciated your effort to upload that segment,
> which was similar to other midi files I checked out.
> Tempo or no, it didn't change my mind, because I listen
> to that music - as I have in times past - and never once
> thought of b-w. I think it is a surface resemblance,
> displaced rhythms and all, and has no connection other
> than coincidental, to anything remotely funky.

i already said that i agree with your assessment
of this hypothesis.

... but, the resemblance to boogie-woogie piano
is something that struck me the first time i heard
the Beethoven, when i was a kid. in fact, i'm quite
surprised that i never read that anyone else noticed
it, until this thread began about a week ago.

and i also agree with Gene that it is not *entirely*
impossible that one of the guys involved in the
creation of the boogie-woogie piano style might
have also been familiar with Beethoven's 32nd Sonata.
someone would have to do some research to find out
about that.

here's a good webpage describing the origins
of boogie-woogie:
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boogie_woogie

and if it simply *is* a pure coincidence, then i
find the resemblance of Beethoven's variation to the
real boogie-wooge of a century later a bit unnerving,
more than anything for the reason that it's so
unlike anything else that was written in 1822 and
so much like something that happened in the future.
to me, that's weird.

-monz

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

/metatuning/topicId_5040.html#5056

>>
> and if it simply *is* a pure coincidence, then i
> find the resemblance of Beethoven's variation to the
> real boogie-wooge of a century later a bit unnerving,
> more than anything for the reason that it's so
> unlike anything else that was written in 1822 and
> so much like something that happened in the future.
> to me, that's weird.
>
>
>
> -monz

***Well, as I was suggesting in the other forum, perhaps the desire
to vary meter (Beethoven here uses unusual ones!) and vary placement
of accents was the same common motivation... with a similar (at
least superficially) result...

J. Pehrson

Hello Joseph!
I Agree with this trend of thought!
Often in music, various music makers will find themselves at the same
intersection, yet approached from and left from different direction. It is one
reason i find the idea that another composer "influences " another not always
is the case. Personally i do many things that others did before me, but i dod
not know of their work. Still people say i am influenced by them. If Ives had
lived in Europe , everyone would say he influenced everyone else.
The same muse will speak to many and lately i understand their is a myriad
speaking to a myriad of those who listen as best they can.

Joseph Pehrson wrote:

>
>
> ***Well, as I was suggesting in the other forum, perhaps the desire
> to vary meter (Beethoven here uses unusual ones!) and vary placement
> of accents was the same common motivation... with a similar (at
> least superficially) result...
>
> J. Pehrson
>

-- -Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
http://www.anaphoria.com
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU 88.9 FM WED 8-9PM PST

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

> /metatuning/files/boogie-
woogie_variation-ps32.
> mid
>
>
>
>
> -monz

you should used the "honky-tonk piano" sound! :)

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

> and if it simply *is* a pure coincidence, then i
> find the resemblance of Beethoven's variation to the
> real boogie-wooge of a century later a bit unnerving,
> more than anything for the reason that it's so
> unlike anything else that was written in 1822 and
> so much like something that happened in the future.
> to me, that's weird.
>
>
>
> -monz

maybe the fact that he was deaf had something to do with it. he
didn't have any outside listening inspiration to draw on, but his
aural imagination was already so fertile, it simply had to branch
into new and unheard directions . . . ??

----- Original Message -----
From: "Paul Erlich" <PERLICH@...>
To: <metatuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, June 30, 2003 12:12 PM
Subject: [metatuning] Re: Beethoven's boogie-woogie (was:: Africa-Europe)

> --- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:
>
> > and if it simply *is* a pure coincidence, then i
> > find the resemblance of Beethoven's variation to the
> > real boogie-wooge of a century later a bit unnerving,
> > more than anything for the reason that it's so
> > unlike anything else that was written in 1822 and
> > so much like something that happened in the future.
> > to me, that's weird.
> >
> >
> >
> > -monz
>
> maybe the fact that he was deaf had something to do with it. he
> didn't have any outside listening inspiration to draw on, but his
> aural imagination was already so fertile, it simply had to branch
> into new and unheard directions . . . ??

knowing what i know about Beethoven, i'd say that
that's a reasonable hypothesis.

the thing that really gets me about this "boogie-woogie
variation" is how bizarre it must have sounded to
people who heard it back then when it was written.

i remember a long time ago reading a big fat book that
was a guide to low-priced classical music records (vinyl),
and the author writing about Beethoven's last piano sonata
said something like "by this time Beethoven had gone
beyond everyone else, and was compeletely shut off into
his own world". he's talking about the piece this
variation comes from.

-monz

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

> ... but, the resemblance to boogie-woogie piano
> is something that struck me the first time i heard
> the Beethoven, when i was a kid.

It struck me the first time I heard the Beethoven sonata as well.
While this wasn't when I was a kid, I *had* been exposed to boogie
growing up, as well as classical music.

> and if it simply *is* a pure coincidence, then i
> find the resemblance of Beethoven's variation to the
> real boogie-wooge of a century later a bit unnerving,
> more than anything for the reason that it's so
> unlike anything else that was written in 1822 and
> so much like something that happened in the future.
> to me, that's weird.

It's possible to play the syncopations in a florid part of Hummel's
piano concerto #2 in a way which make it sound pretty jazzy, but
really Beethoven is all alone out there.

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:

> maybe the fact that he was deaf had something to do with it. he
> didn't have any outside listening inspiration to draw on, but his
> aural imagination was already so fertile, it simply had to branch
> into new and unheard directions . . . ??

I think this is clearly what happened. Beethoven's creative activity
slowed down greatly when he became totally deaf--and then burst forth
with renewed strength, taking his music in an utterly original
direction.

--- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:

> the thing that really gets me about this "boogie-woogie
> variation" is how bizarre it must have sounded to
> people who heard it back then when it was written.

Much of late Beethoven sounded bizarre to people back then. There are
plenty of musically literate people who still don't get it when it
comes to late Beethoven, in fact.

> i remember a long time ago reading a big fat book that
> was a guide to low-priced classical music records (vinyl),
> and the author writing about Beethoven's last piano sonata
> said something like "by this time Beethoven had gone
> beyond everyone else, and was compeletely shut off into
> his own world". he's talking about the piece this
> variation comes from.

And the late quartets are even more in a world completely his own.

his music was always quite syncopated and so it would resemble later syncopated
styles. Maybe you are right though in that this is one of the ways the muses
play with us. Compositions have a way of having a life of their own dispite
their creators sometimes.

Gene Ward Smith wrote:

> --- In metatuning@yahoogroups.com, "Paul Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:
>
> > maybe the fact that he was deaf had something to do with it. he
> > didn't have any outside listening inspiration to draw on, but his
> > aural imagination was already so fertile, it simply had to branch
> > into new and unheard directions . . . ??
>
> I think this is clearly what happened. Beethoven's creative activity
> slowed down greatly when he became totally deaf--and then burst forth
> with renewed strength, taking his music in an utterly original
> direction.
>
>
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-- -Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
http://www.anaphoria.com
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU 88.9 FM WED 8-9PM PST

I must sadly say that his use of this ensemble has never grabbed me despite
going back to it again and again. Shostakovitchs has this down for me .
Britten's first is also great but is hard to find and have never understood why.
But i greatly digress

Gene Ward Smith wrote:

>
>
> And the late quartets are even more in a world completely his own.
>
>

-- -Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island
http://www.anaphoria.com
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU 88.9 FM WED 8-9PM PST