The romantic Beethoven: 1827–1927–2027
International Conference and Practical Workshop on the 200th Anniversary of Ludwig van Beethoven's Death
Cooperation project of the Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn, the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart, and the Beethoven-Haus Bonn
Concept and Management: Prof. Dr. Tobias Janz (Bonn), Prof. Dr. Andreas Meyer (Stuttgart)
Does Beethoven belong to Romanticism? What sounds like a musicological exam question proves, upon closer consideration, to be a complex cultural-historical issue. That the "romantic Beethoven" is also a reception phenomenon was the central thesis in Arnold Schmitz's book The Romantic Beethoven Image from 1927, a book that stands at the beginning of musicological reception research. For Schmitz, Beethoven's connection with Romanticism was even purely a reception phenomenon, a fatal misinterpretation for which Schmitz held "romantic" poets and poets (!) and composers responsible. Even with Schmitz, it becomes clear that these contexts were never solely about a question of stylistic history – Classicism or Romanticism? His book addresses aspects of "political Romanticism" (in the sense of Carl Schmitt), contemporary theology, as well as literary and art historical discussions. Through the romantic Beethoven, Schmitz also conducts the cultural battles of the Weimar Republic. The history of Beethoven reception began under the auspices of a, from today's perspective, exaggerated critique of Romanticism.
In the intellectual history of the 20th century, the 1920s form only the prelude to a long phase of sometimes severe anti-Romanticism, which continued into the 1960s and 1970s. Since then, partly due to the postmodern debate, a revaluation of Romanticism or the "Romantic" has taken place. In the research of literary and philosophical history, common basic concepts of (Weimar) Classicism and (Jena) Early Romanticism are being worked out today: the autonomy of art, the emphasis on creative individuality, the departure from "imitatio naturae." The reflexivity and modernity of the Romantic movement is also emphasized (“Romanticism as the first Modernity”), along with its pan-European dimension. The protagonists of Romanticism poetize and think in the horizon of the French Revolution – with different, and in the course of their personal development, also changing consequences.
Although Beethoven's music particularly responds to the mentioned characteristics, these discussions in music literature have hardly led to a revision of conventional epoch images and ingrained notions about the "Viennese Classicism." This entails – for all the progress of research in detail – the risk of uncritically passing on stereotypical notions (such as about Beethoven as the epitome of "heroic historiography," as a paradigm of classical form theory, etc.) and forfeits the potential for deeper historical research and aesthetic theory formation in this field.
The project in honor of Beethoven's 200th anniversary of death in 2027 consists of two parts: a practical workshop at the HMDK Stuttgart (November 25–27, 2026) and an international conference at the Beethoven-Haus Bonn (April 15–18, 2027). The results will be published in a collected edition of the Stuttgart Musicological Writings by the end of 2027.
