TTT: The most famous German musician of all time

It is time for another #ThreeTuneTuesday. For those not familiar with it, here's an explanation.

About 89 Weeks ago @ablaze started this incredible movement:

Every Tuesday I'm going to share 3 songs which I like to listen to and I invite your feedback in the comments below. Or why not have a blast of your own Three Tune Tuesday and mention me in the post and I'll come and find the post and hopefully upvote it. It'll be a sweet way for us all to discover new music.

About four months ago I wrote about Johann Pachelbel and his famous Canon in D (I am still waiting for someone pointing me to a song where the Canon is combined with a trainbeat). I was not yet committed to posting about German musicians. Yet Pachelbel was indeed German, he lived in the late 17th century.

Today I want to take up on that and we venture a little bit in time again.

I was introduced to Beethoven's 9th symphony (or rather the 4th movement of it) when I was 9 years old. Somehow I got my hands on a little portable keyboard on which I tried to play some music. Besides a few buttons to emulate (if I remember correctly) 5 or 6 instruments with it, it had a red "demo" button. Pressing that button would let the keyboard play "Freude schöner Götterfunken" (Ode to joy)

This piece of music is one of the few that is guaranteed to trigger an emotional response in me. Especially the (many many) flashmob versions do so.

Seeing the reactions of the people who are surprised and enjoying it is so uplifting and can sometimes bring me close to tears of joy.

I would not be me if I did not also have a nice little fun fact for you:

The complete 9th Symphony takes over an hour to perform. In this time frame, the difference in just a few BPM can make an overall difference in several minutes.

When the specifications of the CD were to be fixed in 1979/80 and to be announced industry standard, the vice president of SONY insisted that the complete 9th Symphony should fit on one CD. The longest orchestral recording then was exactly 74 minutes long.

Others say this is just a rumor. Might be. But a nice story to tell. And in this case quite a coincidence, that a CD (back then) is just capable of fitting exactly that recording of the 9th symphony on it but nothing more. 😉

Oh and yes, it's also the hymn of the European Union. 😊

While Pachelbel is considered to be the first "One hit wonder", there are a few more of Beethoven's pieces still played today and widely recognized.

More importantly a lot of young folks are engaging with Beethoven and even experimenting with his work.

I think this version is spectacular. Lionel Yu has a lot more to offer to bring classical music to a broader audience and enhance it with modern elements. Check out his youtube channel if you like what you see/hear.

The next piece is a little less known. The first movement of Waldstein Sonate (Waldstein being a surname) was first presented to me at the end of the equivalent of High School.

It was part of the final exam in music class. We had 90 minutes after the first listen to write an essay on its structure and interpret it into our modern world.

I was smitten by the piece and stunned. For the first few minutes every one was writing but me, I simply could not move. Every 20 minutes there would be a break during which writing was not allowed and we listened to the piece again.

I won't bore you with my analysis (only got a C on that part anyway) but give you my final thoughts on the interpretation.

The change between the more frantic parts and the more slow/soft parts represents life phases, with a break (vacation or slower phases in life) being slowly overshadowed by faster played notes leading back into the more frantic parts. A lifetime in ten minutes if you will.

Ever since then it reminds me that after every more stressful part in life there will also be a time to lean back and relax.

And that there is more to discover in classical music than what we know from the "mainstream" of it. Never would have found this wonderful piano music if it wasn't for music class in High School.

Beethoven lived from 1770 until 1827 and revolutionized classical music as we now call it. Back then he was a rock star, directly in line after Mozart (1756-1791), and still influences musicians all over the world today. And I am sure he will still do so for the next few hundred years.

Thank you for reading and keep on rocking 🤘

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_{The embedded videos and songs are not mine, nor do I own any rights to them. They are embedded from youtube and serve an illustrative purpose for this article}

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