Some early reviewers

Recommended recordings

Other:

Metronome markings. As Kolisch makes clear ("Tempo and Character in Beethoven's Music," 1942), Beethoven's musical gestures are consistent regardless of the instrumental forces employed. So are his metronome markings, and that's where the trouble starts: tempi which sound elegant and fleet played by a string quintet can sound hectic (Scherchen) or glib (Gielen) played by an orchestra.

Not that 'hectic' and 'glib' are without their place -- I have come to feel that the passage at I/300 is *meant* to sound empty and pompous, and that the fugato at I/236 is *meant* to sound cramped and hectic. Furtwängler alone slows way down for the fugato passage, as if it were an organ piece. It makes a good effect in the moment, but he then has to compensate later on by distending I/338. You might say he plays it like Bruckner.

Tempo stability. What the tempo maps show is "musical respiration." Without the back-and-forth of small tempo changes, the music feels lifeless. I've done tempo-maps of jazz (Jelly Roll Morton, Lionel Hampton) and popular music (the Coasters, Abba, the Beach Boys, the Beatles), and they all systematically vary tempo.

Klemperer. Beethoven, like Shakespeare, contains beauties which are obscure in theoretically 'correct' interpretations, but can be brought to light by 'incorrect' ones. The massiveness of the first movement of the 'Eroica' is real, but is not its main claim on our attention. That honor goes to its astonishing 'story' (aka 'structure'), and what is to me most unique about Klemperer is that his understanding of the structure remains unchanged no matter what his tempo. Thus, my favorite Klemperer performance (Testament) is also his fastest, even though the orchestra isn't the best.

Mengelberg. The thing which separates Mengelberg from all the rest is wide tempo fluctuation within individual phrases. The same 'prose' fluctuations have always been appropriate in piano music, but not common in orchestral writing until late in the 19th Century. In short, Mengelberg conducts Beethoven as if it were Mahler, but the results are often interesting when they're not insane.

HIP. Some contend that interpretive challenges (tempo, phrasing, balance) are lessened through use of 'authentic' instruments, phrasing, and so on, but attempts to demonstrate this have failed. This is not only true of orchestral practice. It was claimed (regarding Beethoven's famously 'blurred' pedal effects, in the WaldsteinSonata and elsewhere) that using an 'authentic' fortepiano would clear the fog. It did somewhat, but the fundamental sound remains.

The great contribution of the HIP movement to contemporary performance has been to revivify the late-20th Century's moribund palette of timbres and phrasings. Beyond that, so-called HIP performances are just conventional performances in antique dress. Brüggen is far more like Barenboim than he is like Norrington, who is more like Gielen than he is like Harnoncourt, etc.

There seems to be a widespread feeling that HIP performances are more rigid (in regards to tempo) than 'conventional' ones. My measurements show that at 'high' and 'medium' levels (80 bars, 10 bars), this is not true. I don't doubt people's feelings, I just haven't found what they're really responding to. Perhaps it will show at smaller (4-bar, 2-bar) levels.