Beethoven's 5th symphony - was he incapable of applying the brake?

Question

I recently came across this in a novel I'm reading:-

"Although he was a very great musician, and a wizard composer of symphonies, Beethoven was quite often a dismal failure when it came to ending them. The Fifth was a perfect case in point.

I remembered that the end of the thing, the allegro, was one of those times when Beethoven just couldn't seem to find the 'off' switch
.
Dum ... dum ... dum-dum-dum, it would go, and you would think it was over.

But no----

Dum, dah, dum, dah, dum, dah, dum, dah, dum, dah, dum - DUM dum

You'd go to get up and stretch, sighing with satisfaction at the great work you'd listened to, and suddenly,

DAH dum. DAH dum. DAH dum. And so forth. DAH dum

It was a bit like a bit of flypaper stuck to your finger that you couldn't shake off. The bl**dy thing clung to you like a limpet" (Alan Bradley)

I've had this comment made to me in the past by others and just wondered how many agree with the view expressed?

dreamchanter · Accepted Answer

Susan McClary said "After [the longing] is established…  tonal procedures strive to postpone gratification… until finally delivering the payoff in what is technically called the ‘climax,’ which is quite clearly to be experienced as metaphorical ejaculation." And I thought it was a cadence!

trees · Answer

To clean issues up, there are a number of musical classes in nicely, song. From what I discovered in historic previous 4, there is the Renaissance, Baroque, Rococo, Classical, Romantic and present day. Beethoven's Symphony No.5 is obviously a symphonic form (pace association, rapid-sluggish-average DANCE-rapid). the 1st mvmt of a symphony is often an Allegro, in Sonata-Allegro variety, 2nd mvmt is Ternary, topic and version, or changed Sonata-Allegro from, the thrird is a Scherzo and Trio for Beethoven, and the final mvmt is is a Sonata-Allegro variety or Rondo variety. He wrote 9 symphonies, this one grew to become into written in his era of Externalisation. each and each of his symphonies have an enormously helpful character interior the final circulate. in case you elect greater element, (e.g. piece descriptions, song, video) basically deliver me an email.

suhwahaksaeng · Answer

Since I joined this forum, we have gotten two or three messages from university music students who were analyzing a compositions by Beethoven.
Their messages said something like "I have identified the exposition, development, and recapitulation, but I must have made a mistake because I marked the coda so far from the end."
We had to write back and assure them that the tail wags the dog sometimes.

A Cat · Answer

I suppose it's true in this case and a few others, I did expect it to end before it really did.  I hate to criticize the master but yes I agree with this one.  None of this changes the fact that I find many of his piano sonatas and other works to be hauntingly beautiful.

I · Answer

Hmm, I always listened to that part and thought Beethoven must have been quite the man.  He built up a lot of tension and energy and didn't stop until he had gotten every last bit of satisfaction out of that cadence.

It's MAJOR!  C MAJOR!  Oh yeah baby!   MAJOR!  MAJOR!  MAJOR!

Alberich · Answer

I will "halfheartedly" agree; but then I find the concluding measures - watch me get blasted out of the waters on this one - of the 9th, hurried/rushed/"hectic", if you will; and personally, not really satisfying.

     But then all of us have our..............."off days"-? : can't quite get to where we want to go.

          (((your question has caused me to wonder, if the great J.S. ever composed anything, that could reasonably be faulted - - - ???????)))

                                                                                                                Alberich

I. Jones · Answer

I believe that Beethoven knew exactly where he was going and what he wanted. 

... and executed it perfectly.

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Beethoven's 5th symphony - was he incapable of applying the brake?

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