Julian Bliss plays Weber:Themes and variations

25 October 2017: Town Hall, Birmingham

• Gioachino Rossini – Overture, ‘The Barber of Seville’
• Carl Maria von Weber – Clarinet Concerto no2 in E-flat major, op74 (J114)
• Ludwig van Beethoven – Symphony no8 in F major, op93

All of this afternoon’s works were composed within three years of each other – Weber’s concerto first, in 1811; Rossini’s overture last, in 1813 (albeit originally for his earlier opera, Aureliano in Palmira) – and yet, stylistically, apart from their Classical structures, they have little in common. What they do share are a contagious joie de vivre and characteristic confidence: all three composers at the top of their game – which, considering Rossini was only twenty-one, and Weber twenty-four, demonstrates just how rapidly their brilliance ripened. All three composers knew of each other, too: Rossini and Weber both meeting Beethoven in Vienna, in 1822 and 1823, respectively (around the time he was completing his Missa Solemnis and the Choral Symphony).

Both of the younger composers were much saddened at seeing their idol so isolated by his deafness; but it seems Beethoven’s wicked sense of humour (so apparent in today’s symphony) was still to the fore. He said to Rossini – a backhanded compliment, if ever there was one – that The Barber of Seville was “an excellent opera buffa”; but that Rossini should “never try to do anything other than comic operas – to want to succeed in another style would force your nature”! (This was despite the success of ‘serious’ operas such as Tancredi, Otello, and Mosè in Egitto.) His final words, repeated as he saw Rossini out of his “dirty and frightfully disorderly attic”, being: “Above all, you must make more Barbers.”

Weber was perhaps more fortunate – “You’re a devil of a fellow!” – even though he had been publicly critical of some of Beethoven’s earlier compositions, including the Fourth Symphony. Beethoven had been deeply impressed by Der Freischütz, and was so astonished at its originality that – according to Weber’s son, Max – he struck the score with his hand, and exclaimed “I never would have thought it of the gentle little man”. When they parted, Beethoven – having “served [him] at table as if I had been his lady” – embraced and kissed him several times and cried: “Good luck to the new opera [Euryanthe]; if I can, I’ll come to the first performance!”

Although this afternoon’s music is still essentially Classical in nature – Beethoven resolutely recalling its glory years – all three are now seen as the founding fathers, or architects, of Romanticism (despite Rossini describing himself as “the last of the Classicists”). What a joy it is to have them all in the same room!