'Glorious Beethoven' March 24-25: His magnificent Ninth Symphony

You’ll have a chance to enjoy a true classical music masterpiece when the orchestra, joined by the Sacramento Master Singers, presents its “Glorious Beethoven” concert March 24 and 25.

The power of this music is made even more extraordinary by the fact that Beethoven was completely deaf when he wrote it. At the premiere in Vienna in 1824, an era when multiple standing ovations were properly reserved for royalty, the audience rose five times in long, thunderous applause. The 54-year-old Beethoven, unable to hear, had to be turned toward the crowd to see the clapping. 

With its complex music and the addition of the chorale, this symphony is the most artistically demanding work our orchestra has ever undertaken. The concert will feature 70 symphony musicians and 80 singers, including four soloists. 

Folsom Symphony conductor Maestro Michael Neumann will lead the ensemble through the symphony’s four movements, in which Beethoven imposed his own variations on the standard composition form of the time, sometimes to contemporary criticism. It is the fourth movement that contains the famous choral finale, sung by the Master Singers. Some music writers have characterized this last movement as a “symphony within a symphony” composed of four movements of its own. 

In the finale, the soloists and chorale perform the song of joy, Beethoven’s tune set to the words of the Friedrich Schiller poem “An die Freude,” translated for this work as “Ode to Joy.” Here the soloists perform: soprano Robin Fisher; mezzo-soprano Buffy Baggott; tenor Jaeho Lee; and bass-baritone Burr Phillips. 

Schiller’s poem celebrates the spiritual brotherhood of mankind, and Beethoven, who rewrote some of the text for this symphony, seemed intent on imparting that message. It’s a message still timely today, 300 years after it was written. 

Beethoven’s Ninth will be performed as the final selection of the evening. To open the concert, Dr. Ralph Hughes, the director of the Master Singers, will guest-conduct the musicians and singers in additional orchestral and choral works, including the world premier of “The Song of the Bell,” a new piece commissioned by the Master Singers to San Francisco composer Aaron Pike. The music is set to the 18th-century Schiller poem of the same name. 

Dr. Hughes also will lead the ensemble in “Toward the Unknown Region,” Vaughan Williams’ musical interpretation of Walt Whitman’s 1881 poem “Darest Thou Now O Soul” from “Leaves of Grass.” 

Beethoven’s Ninth is a treasure that many music lovers will see live only once in their lifetimes. To allow as many patrons as possible to experience the music, we are presenting it twice – our standard Saturday evening performance at 7:30 p.m. and an encore presentation on Sunday at 3 p.m. Both concerts will be at Three Stages in Folsom. For tickets, see this website or call 916-608-6888.