Why are Citizen Kane and Vertigo the greatest films of all time? What’s so special about the Mona Lisa or Van Gogh’s Sunflowers? Did human invention really peek at sliced bread? And while we’re at it, what’s the deal with Beethoven? These are the kinds of questions that, as artistic laymen, we’re sometimes afraid to ask but often ponder: we take those in the know at face value when they label something as a masterpiece even without a nuts‘n’bolts answer as to why.
It’s this wall between critic and audience member that I appreciate A World Without Beethoven? breaking down – not through simply explaining what the great composer gave to the world, but what the world might be without him. Released in 2020 but new to Netflix (and for the first time in the UK, from what I can tell but also released in full on YouTube last year), this award-winning German-made documentary is presented by Sarah Willis, a horn player in the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. In seven sections, Willis covers a lot of ground at remarkable speed, and she does so without ever feeling shallow in her explorations. Travelling around Europe and America, she speaks to a range of musicians and people in the biz about Beethoven’s legacy, specific to their particular field or genre.
You might expect a string of classical concert players and conductors, and while there are plenty of them, more refreshing are the insights of unexpected Beethoven fans: The Scorpions’ Rudolf Schenker on how the Fifth Symphony’s famous four opening notes arguably became the foundation for European rock; Billy Bragg on Beethoven’s daring political dedications in his music, predating the modern canon of protest songs (though he changed his mind on being Team Napolean); Beach Boys associate Van Dyke Parks on Beethoven’s themed song cycle An Die Ferne Geliebte (To The Distant Beloved) – aka the first ‘concept album’; and celebrated jazz trumpeter Wynton Marsalis on, most unbelievably, Beethoven’s final piano sonata, which some consider a precursor to jazz 100 years before its invention.
Alongside this, Willis also examines the composer’s importance in establishing and popularising live music venues, as well as the metronome, that ticking pyramid that’s both the bane and best friend of all music students. Turns out, not enough performers were that fussed about keeping a rigid tempo until Beethoven wrote an article singing the praises of his mate Johann Maelzel, the first to patent them. The further into the present-day his reach goes, Willis’ question – can we imagine a world without Beethoven? – increasingly looks like an unrecognisable one, musically speaking.
The only hold-out is Marsalis, who respectfully dismisses the idea by suggesting that this kind of genius, while indeed special, is replicable. If not Beethoven, surely, someone else would have done these things, right? It is conceivable: Beethoven isn’t the only musical genius to have ever lived, even in his own time. He was so closely influenced by forebear Mozart, in fact, he even feared he’d accidentally stolen his idol’s ideas.
In her interview with Scorpion Schenker, Willis also agrees that while classical music is foundational to rock and pop in Europe, blues provides that bedrock in America. It’s not really made explicit, but the undertone of both these conversations speaks to our tendency to quickly deify white creatives while erasing the contributions of minority ones – such is the pervasive myth of the White Male Genius.
All of that aside, while there might be plenty of addendums to Willis’ points from other experts, A World Without Beethoven? certainly leaves classical music novices feeling a lot more enlightened and, more importantly, appreciative of the music and industry around it he shaped that we take for granted.
A World Without Beethoven? is streaming now on Netflix.
words HANNAH COLLINS
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