Beethoven, Siegessinfonie
Ludwig van Beethoven
Siegessinfonie
Modern edition by David Whitwell
Following a minor victory, the first of allied troops over Napoleon, the Battle of Vitoria in Spain on 21 June 1813, Beethoven’s friend Johann Mälzel saw an opportunity for a quick box-office success and talked the composer into writing a composition commemorating this battle which he could notate on his ‘mechanical orchestra’: the panharmonicon. Beethoven, however, wrote a composition for large band–an instrumentation so large that Mälzel could not build a machine large enough to perform the music. As an alternative plan, Beethoven rewrote the Siegessinfonie for orchestra, added a first part and renamed the work, Wellington’s Victory. In this form it was premiered in Vienna, together with the premiere of the Symphony No. 7 and a work performed by Mälzel’s mechanical trumpeter.
The original band composition survives in a presentation copy by Beethoven’s copyist, with the composer’s corrections and a title page entirely in his hand.
Download a preview of the score.
Buy the score and parts (PDF download) — $60.00
This live performance was given on 16 March 2000 by the California State University, Northridge Wind Ensemble, David Whitwell, Conductor.
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Dr. Whitwell’s publications include more than 127 articles on wind literature including publications in Music and Letters (London), the London Musical Times, the Mozart-Jahrbuch (Salzburg), and 39 books, among which is his 13-volume History and Literature of the Wind Band and Wind Ensemble and an 8-volume series on Aesthetics in Music. In addition to numerous modern editions of early wind band music his original compositions include 5 symphonies.
Comments