Beethoven

Desmond Maley is the music librarian at the J.W. Tate Library,
Huntington College, Laurentian University.

William Kinderman, a noted Beethoven scholar who teaches at the
University of Victoria and at the Hochschule der Kьnste in Berlin,
offers good advice when he suggests that this book can be browsed.
Beethoven is a challenging read from cover to cover unless one happens
to have plenty of records on hand. In fact, Kinderman says that the book
can be used as an analytical guide for specific works. He also says that
the difficult opening chapter on the aesthetic and philosophical ideas
of Beethoven’s day need not be read until later.

Beethoven is principally concerned with tracing the composer’s
aesthetics and creative evolution. In the process, Kinderman sheds light
on secondary themes such as humor (a leitmotif of Beethoven’s life and
work) and narrative design in music, and provides some nuanced
biographical detail.

Ultimately, Beethoven’s life can be viewed as a quest for what the
composer himself called “artistic unification,” a synthesis of the
rational and the sensuous, of expression and structure. Kinderman shows
how, in such culminating masterpieces as the Missa Solemnis and the
Ninth Symphony, Beethoven transcends aesthetic boundaries and enters
religious, moral, and ethical domains.

Kinderman is a thoughtful writer and analyst, but one cannot help
feeling that the narrative lacks a compelling, original thesis to
sustain it. Despite the impressive scholarship, the parts seem greater
than the whole. Still, serious listeners, scholars, and performers will
want to consult this worthwhile addition to the Beethoven literature,
which includes 24 plates of portraits, first editions, and compositional
sketches, as well as a bibliographical essay.