Opera, oratorio, the mass for the dead, symphony, beckoned to him, but his affections were fixed in the higher and purer regions of chamber music, the form which represents chaste ideals, lofty imagination, profound learning; which exacts a mutual sympathy between composer, performer and listener and binds them in something like that angelic wedlock which Weber said to Planché ought to unite librettist and composer. When the year 1826 opened, Beethoven was looking forward with no little eagerness to the first performance of the Quartet in B-flat—his “Liebquartett” it is once called in the Conversation Books. Schuppanzigh and his fellows had taken it in hand. They found the concluding fugue extremely troublesome, but the Cavatina entranced them at once; Schuppanzigh entered a record against any change in it. The performance took place on March 21. The second and fourth movements had to be repeated, but the fugue proved a crux as, no doubt, the players had expected it would. Some of Beethoven’s friends argued that it had not been understood and that this objection would vanish with repeated hearings; others, plainly a majority, asked that a new movement be written to take its place. Johann van Beethoven told the composer that “the whole city” was delighted with the work. Schindler says that the Danza alla tedesca, one of the movements which were demanded a second time, was originally intended for another quartet, presumably that in A minor. Lenz objects to the theory on critical grounds, but Nottebohm points out that the first sketches appear in A before the sketches for the B-flat Quartet and assigns them to the A minor Quartet without qualification of any kind. Dr. Deiters suggests that the movement was written for the A minor Quartet and put aside when the Song of Thanksgiving presented itself to Beethoven’s mind. There is another reason for believing that Nottebohm is right and Lenz, as he so frequently is, is wrong. As has been mentioned, Beethoven recurred to one of his old German dances, written for the Ridotto balls, in the first movement of the A minor Quartet; what more likely than that, thinking over the old German dance, he should have conceived the idea of a Danza tedesca? Schuppanzigh’s high opinion of the Cavatina was shared by many and also by Beethoven himself. Holz said that it cost the composer tears in the writing and brought out the confession that nothing that he had written had so moved him; in fact, that merely to revive it afterwards in his thoughts and feelings brought forth renewed tributes of tears.
The doubts about the effectiveness of the fugue felt by Beethoven’s friends found an echo in the opinions of the critics. Mathias Artaria, the publisher, who seems in this year to have entered the circle of the composer’s intimate associates, presented the matter to him in a practicable light. He had purchased the publishing rights of the Quartet and after the performance he went to Beethoven with the suggestion that he write a new finale and that the fugue be published as an independent piece, for which he would remunerate him separately. Beethoven listened to the protests unwillingly, but, “vowing he would ne’er consent, consented” and requested the pianist Anton Halm, who had played in the B-flat Trio at the concert, to make the pianoforte arrangements for which there had already been inquiries at Artaria’s shop. Halm accepted the commission and made the arrangement, with which Beethoven was not satisfied; “You have divided the parts too much between prim and second,” he remarked to Halm,[147] referring to a device which the arranger had adopted to avoid crossing of hands—giving passages to the right hand which should logically have been given to the left, the effect being the same to the ear but not to the eye. Nevertheless, Halm presented a claim for 40 florins to Artaria for the work, and was paid. Beethoven then made an arrangement and sent it to Artaria, also demanding a fee. To this Artaria demurred and asked Beethoven for Halm’s manuscript. Beethoven sent it by a messenger (probably Holz) with instructions to get his arrangement in return for it, but at the same time told Artaria, that while he did not ask that Artaria publish his work, he was under no obligations to give it to him; he might have it for twelve ducats. Artaria reconciled himself to the matter and paid Beethoven his fee on September 5. Schindler incorrectly states that the arrangement which Artaria announced on March 10, 1827, as Op. 134 (the original score being advertised at the same time as Op. 133), was Halm’s.
Other performances of the Quartet were planned, but it does not appear that any took place. Schuppanzigh was indisposed to venture upon a repetition, but Böhm and Mayseder were eager to play it. The latter with his companions gave quartet parties at the house of Dembscher, an agent of the Austrian War Department, and wanted to produce the Quartet there. But Dembscher had neglected to subscribe for Schuppanzigh’s concert and had said that he would have it played at his house, since it was easy for him to get manuscripts from Beethoven for that purpose. He applied to Beethoven for the Quartet, but the latter refused to let him have it, and Holz, as he related to Beethoven, told Dembscher in the presence of other persons that Beethoven would not let him have any more music because he had not attended Schuppanzigh’s concert. Dembscher stammered in confusion and begged Holz to find some means to restore him to Beethoven’s good graces. Holz said that the first step should be to send Schuppanzigh 50 florins, the price of the subscription. Dembscher laughingly asked, “Must it be?” (Muss es sein?). When Holz related the incident to Beethoven he too laughed and instantly wrote down a canon on the words: “It must be! Yes, yes, yes, it must be. Out with the purse!”[148]
Origin of “Es muss sein!”
Out of this joke in the late fall of the year grew the finale of the last of the last five quartets, that in F major. Op. 135, to which Beethoven gave the superscription: “The difficult resolution” (Der schwergefasste Entschluss). The story, almost universally current and still repeated, that the phrases: Muss es sein? Es muss sein, and Der schwergefasste Entschluss had their origin in
Es muss sein! Es muss sein! ja, ja, ja, ja
It must be! It must be! yes, yes, yes, yes
Es muss sein! ja, ja, ja, ja Es muss sein! ja, ja, ja, ja
It must be! yes, yes, yes, yes, It must be! yes, yes, yes, yes
Heraus mit dem Beutel! Heraus! Heraus: Es muss sein!
Come down with the rhino! Come down! Come down! It must be!
Ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, ja, Es muss sein!
Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, It must be!
a scene frequently repeated when Beethoven’s housekeeper came to him of a Saturday for the weekly house-money, was spread by Schindler, who was familiar in a way with the Dembscher incident but assigned it to the Quartet in E-flat. Holz was an actor in the scene and is the better witness, being confirmed, moreover, by the Conversation Book. Schindler probably took his clue from a page in the Conversation Book used in December, 1826, in which Beethoven writes the phrases “Must it be?” and “It must be,” and Schindler, after a conversation in which Schuppanzigh takes part, concludes with: “It must be. The old woman is again in need of her weekly money.” The joke played a part in the conversations with Beethoven for some time.
Holz says that when once he remarked to Beethoven that the one in B-flat was the greatest of his Quartets the composer replied: “Each in its way. Art demands of us that we shall not stand still. You will find a new manner of voice treatment (part writing) and, thank God! there is less lack of fancy than ever before.” Afterward he declared the C-sharp minor Quartet to be his greatest. The first form of the fugue-theme in this work, as has been noted, was written down in a Conversation Book in the last days of December, 1825. The theme of the variations, in a form afterwards altered, was also noted amid the records of conversations before the end of January, 1826. It is likely that a goodly portion of the work was written within a month and ready for the copyist, for Schuppanzigh once in January suggests that something from the work in hand be tried. Whether or not it was ever played in the lifetime of the composer can not be said with certainty. Schindler says positively that it was not. It was ready for the publisher in July and Schott and Sons, who had bought it for 80 ducats payable in two installments, sent the drafts early to accommodate Beethoven, who spoke of being on the eve of a short journey—of which nothing is known save that he did not make it. The score was turned over to Schott’s agent in Vienna on August 7. On the copy Beethoven had written “Put together from pilferings from one thing and another” (Zusammengestohlen aus Verschiedenem diesem und Jenem). This alarmed the publishers, who wrote to Beethoven about it and in reply received a letter stating: “You wrote me that the quartet must be an original one. As a joke I wrote on the copy ‘Put together, etc....’; but it is brand new.” It was published by Schott and Sons very shortly after Beethoven’s death in April, 1827, under the opus number 129. Beethoven originally intended to dedicate it to Wolfmayer but out of gratitude to Baron von Stutterheim, Lieutenant Fieldmarshal, who had made a place for Nephew Karl in his regiment, placed his name upon the title-page.