The Elector had opened the University in 1776, and established a public reading-room, which he visited with no more ostentation than any one else. “All these institutions, as I looked upon it, had sworn allegiance to an unknown genius of humanity, and, for the first time in my life, my mind had a glimmer of the meaning and majesty of science,” writes the painter, Gerhard Kuegelgen, and how could Beethoven have thought differently? He had, it is true, devoted himself so exclusively to music that he had made very little progress in anything else. In the use of figures he always found great difficulty, and his spelling was worse than could be easily tolerated even in his own day, when orthography was a rather rare accomplishment. He had studied a little French and Latin. But the breezes of a higher intellectual culture which, at this time, swept through Bonn and influenced him likewise through his intimate intercourse with the most highly cultivated people of the city, soon lifted him to heights unattained by other artists and musicians of his century—heights from which he continually discerned new fields of action. As a consequence of this intercourse with the learned, he acquired intellectual tastes in various directions, and so seriously occupied himself with things intellectual that they became a necessity to his nature. He tells us himself that, without laying the least claim to real learning, it had been his endeavor from childhood to acquaint himself with what was best and wisest in every age. But these intellectual leanings did not prevent him from being, as the painter Kuegelgen said of himself, lovingly devoted to his art. And his own beloved art of music was, at this very time, cultivated in Bonn with a greater earnestness and devotion than any other.
The writer referred to above, speaking of the Elector, says: “Not only did he play himself, but he was an enthusiastic lover of music. It seemed as if he could never tire of hearing it. Whenever he went to a concert, he was the most attentive person in the whole audience.” And no wonder; for the musical instruction given to the children of Maria Theresa was excellent. Indeed, the art of music in Vienna was at that time at its height. That city was the scene of the labors of Gluck, Haydn and Mozart. And so there was only good music to be heard in the “cabinet” at Bonn. Our Beethoven, now a distinguished pianist, contributed his share to this; and we need not be surprised to find him employed by a prince who knew Mozart and loved him.
But it was not musicians alone who were benefited by prince’s patronage. No sooner did the condition of the country leave him the necessary leisure, and the state of its finances afford him the necessary means, than he turned his best attention to the theater and the orchestra. As far back as 1784, Maximilian Francis had organized an orchestra, and our young court organist took a place in it as a player of the tenor violin. The violinist, Ries, and Simrock, a performer on the French horn, were also members of it. Ries and Simrock had henceforth much to do with Mozart. The following year, a troupe visited Bonn, and gave Italian operas, French vaudevilles, as well as Gluck’s Alceste and Orpheus. They were followed by Grossmann, a person of rare intellect, and one who holds a distinguished place in the history of German dramatic art. His repertory included the plays of Shakespeare, Lessing, Schiller and Goethe, with all of whom Beethoven thus became acquainted early in life. In 1788, Maximilian Francis established a national theater, and, dating from this, dramatic poetry and music began to flourish in Bonn, so that it took its place, in this respect, side by side with Mannheim, Vienna and Weimar, and became a school well calculated to foster the great abilities of Beethoven. In the orchestra we find such men as Andreas, Bernhard Romberg and Anton Reicher, afterwards so celebrated as a writer on the theory of music. The latter was, at this time, Beethoven’s most intimate friend and companion in art. Actors, too, come upon the stage, many of whom subsequently filled all Germany with their fame. Dramatic works of every description appeared. There was Martin’s Tree of Diana, Mozart’s Elopement from the Seraglio, Salieri’s Grotto of Trophonius, Dittersdorf’s Doctor and Apothecary, and Little Red Riding Hood, Gluck’s Pilgrim of Mecca, besides Paisiello’s King Theodore, and greatest of all, Don Giovanni. The music “pleased connoisseurs;” and Figaro’s Marriage greatly charmed both singers and the members of the orchestra, who vied with one another to do justice to that beautiful opera. “The strength of our theater,” says a writer of the time, characteristically and simply, “lay in our opera.”
This continual contemplation of “characters in tone” played a decided part in the development of an artist who was destined to infuse into instrumental music so much of poetical and even of dramatic life. We are informed that Beethoven’s power of delineating character in the language of music was so great, even at this time, that when improvising, which he was very fond of doing, he was frequently asked “to describe the character of some well-known person.” One distinguishing peculiarity of the Bonn orchestra had a marked influence in the development of the great symphonist of the future, Beethoven. We refer to what has been called “the accurate observation of musical light and shade, or of the forte and piano.” This musical peculiarity was introduced into the Bonn orchestra by a former capellmeister, Mattioli, “a man full of fire and refined feeling,” who had learned orchestral accentuation and declamation from Gluck, and whose musical enthusiasm caused him to be considered the superior of Cannabich of Mannheim, who played such a part in Mozart’s life, and who had originated this mode of musical delivery in Germany. He was succeeded by Joseph Reicha, under whose energetic leadership the Bonn orchestra reached its highest point of perfection. In the autumn of 1791, we find that entire orchestra in Mergentheim, the seat of the German order of which Maximilian Francis was Grand Master; and we have an account of it from Mergentheim which gives us a very clear idea of Beethoven’s life as a student.
Our informant tells us, in the first place, that he was very much impressed by an octet of wind instruments. All eight players were, he says, masters who had reached a high degree of truth and perfection, especially in the sustaining of tones. Does not this remind one of Beethoven’s exquisite septet op. 20? How Ries infused life and spirit into all by his sure and vigorous bowing in the orchestra! What once could be heard only in Mannheim, we are told, was now heard here—the close observance of the piano and the forte and the rinforzando, the swell and gradual growth of tone, followed by the dropping of the same from the utmost intensity to the merest breath. Bernhard Romberg’s playing is lauded for “perfection of expression and its fine shades of feeling which appeal to the heart;” his cousin Andreas’s for “taste in delivery,” and the true art of his “musical painting.” Can we wonder that Beethoven’s emulation of, and struggling for the mastery with such men contributed constantly to develop his genius? He is praised for the peculiar expression of his playing, and above all for the speaking, significant, expressive character of his fancy. Our informant says, in closing his account: “I found him wanting in nothing which goes to make the great artist. All the superior performers of this orchestra are his admirers. They are all ears when he plays, but the man himself is exceedingly modest and without pretension of any kind.”
We have now seen what was Beethoven’s technical training both by practice and example, on the organ and the piano, in the theater and the orchestra, and how all these were to him a school of musical composition; for the Bonn orchestra was as conversant with Mozart and Haydn as we of to-day are with Beethoven. How thoroughly he comprehended and appreciated Mozart especially, is attested by what he once said to John Cramer, the only piano player to whom Beethoven himself applied terms of high praise. The two were walking, in 1799, in the park in Vienna, listening to Mozart’s concert in C minor. “Cramer! Cramer!” Beethoven exclaimed, when he heard the simple and beautiful theme near the close: “We shall never be able to accomplish anything like that.” “What a modest man!” was the reply. This leads us to say something of the few beautiful, purely human gifts which were the fruit Beethoven enjoyed through life, of his youth in Bonn.
In Bonn, lived Madame von Breuning, with her four children, who were only a little younger than our court organist. Beethoven and one of the sons, Stephan, received instruction in music from Ries, and were thus thrown together. But it was not long before our young artist himself was called upon to teach the piano in the family of Madame von Breuning. How lonely Beethoven felt after his good mother had succumbed to her many sufferings and sorrows, we learn from the first letter of his that has come down to us. We there read: “She was so good and amiable a mother to me! She was my best friend. O, who was happier than I while I could yet pronounce the sweet name of mother! There was once some one to hear me when I said ‘mother!’ But to whom can I address that name now? Only to the silent pictures of her which my fancy paints.” But Madame von Breuning became a second mother to him; and what her home was, we are informed by Doctor Wegeler, afterwards husband of Madame von Breuning’s daughter Eleonore, for a time one of Beethoven’s pupils. He writes: “Her home was pervaded by an atmosphere of unconstrained refinement, spite of an occasional outburst of the petulance of youth. The boy, Christoph, took very early to the writing of little poems. Stephan did the same thing at a much later date, and successfully. The useful and agreeable were found combined in the little social entertainments of family friends. It was not long before Beethoven was treated as one of the children. He spent the greater part of the day in Madame Bruening’s home, and not unfrequently, the night. He felt at home in the family, and everything about him contributed to cheer him and to develop his mind.” When it is known, on the authority of the same Doctor Wegeler, that it was at Madame von Breuning’s home that Beethoven first became acquainted with German literature, that there he received his first lessons in social etiquette, it is easy to estimate the value to him of the friendship of the Breuning family—a friendship which was never interrupted for a moment during his long life.
It was while in the enjoyment of this intercourse with the Breuning family that he felt the first, charming intimations of the tender passion. Wegeler makes mention of two young ladies, one of whom, a pretty, cheerful and lively blonde, Jeannette d’Honrath, of Cologne, was a frequent visitor at the Breuning’s. She took delight in teasing our young musician, and playfully addressed him, singing:
“Mich heute noch von dir zu trennen,
Und dieses nicht verhindern koennen,