Vidéo à la demande: Beethoven Symphony no. 7

In the big cities, happy citizens could hear orchestral music in selected places, but otherwise it was difficult. Like a symphony by Beethoven for example. But there was one solution: arrangements and scores for smaller ensembles. Johann Nepomuk Hummel – only the name arouses curiosity! – was a skilled composer and virtuoso pianist and also a good friend of Beethoven in Vienna. He arranged several of Beethoven’s symphonies, including the seventh, for piano, flute, cello and violin, which allowed the publisher to sell plenty of sheet music to all the music-hungry local music societies. In our time these versions are seldom performed, but here is a rare occasion.

Johann Nepomuk Hummel’s arrangements of the “Grandes Symphonies” of Beethoven were arranged for piano solo with an ”accompaniment” of flute, violin and cello. For this performance, his version has been freely adapted to reduce the amount of piano doubling and to incorporate some extra material from the orchestral parts of the respective instruments.

Recorded for GSOplay 3 April 2020