The Brandeis-Wellesley Orchestra played to a packed Springold Theater on Sunday, May 2. They ambitiously and impressively performed Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in D minor (Op. 125), the German composer's final and most famous work. Conducted by Neal Hampton (MUS), the Orchestra is comprised of students, faculty and other members of the Brandeis and Wellesley communities. They were joined by the Brandeis University Chorus, the MIT Chamber Chorus, The University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth Chorus and the Wellesley College Choir for the final choral movement. With over 200 performers on stage, the symphony's ambitious nature was immediately apparent, even before a single note was played.Hampton was met by applause as he walked onto the stage. Hampton greeted his audience and briefly discussed the significance of Beethoven's Ninth. He noted that the most familiar portion of the symphony-the fourth movement, more commonly known as the "Ode to Joy"-is most revolutionary for its choral aspect, but reminded everyone that it is preceded by three movements equally as beautiful.
Flawlessly beginning with the powerful and brooding first movement, "Allegro ma non troppo e un poco maestoso," the Orchestra slowly began Beethoven's masterpiece. The second movement-"molto vivace"-followed as a light scherzo section, driven by rapid strings and a striking tympani. The calming "Adagio molto e cantabile," the third movement, then provided a natural interlude before the Orchestra could reach the Symphony's dramatic finale.

Not surprisingly, it was the triumphant fourth movement-"Presto"-that most amazed the audience. Truly a mini-symphony within a symphony, its sweeping epic progression mirrored the four-movement composition of the entire work. Proclaiming the commencement of the Symphony's choral section, baritone soloist David Kravitz interrupted the movement at its halfway mark. The German lyrics appropriately translate to "Oh friends, not these sounds! / But let us strike up more pleasant sounds / and more joyful!"

Having switched to D major, the movement's celebratory tones resonated throughout the theater, aided by the four choruses and professional soloists Kravitz, Andrea Matthews, Marion Dry and Ray Bauwens. As the booming strings, horns, tympanis, woodwinds and choruses reached Beethoven's powerful climax, the performance was greeted with a unanimous and deserved standing ovation.
Written intermittently between 1812 and 1824, Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in D minor is largely considered to be one of the greatest and most innovative pieces of classical music ever composed. Using lyrics from Friedrich Schiller's An die Freude ("Ode to Joy"), Beethoven's masterpiece was the first symphony to include a choral movement. Along with many other unconventional structural aspects, the use of vocals made the work a daring experiment that many critics found unlistenable. Yet even in Beethoven's own time, many considered his last symphony a masterpiece, a label proved true both by its lasting popularity and influence on generations of classical composers to follow.

Perhaps most amazingly, Beethoven composed the symphony as his hearing was rapidly deteriorating, and it is said that by its May 7, 1824 premiere in Vienna's KNrtnertor-Theater, he was almost completely deaf. A famous account of the evening alleges that the composer did not even realize when the performance had ended; one of the vocalists, Karoline Unger, had to show him the audience's applause by turning him around.

Beethoven never wrote a 10th symphony. He died less than three years later in March 1827. But like many of his other works, the legacy of Symphony No. 9 lives on with "Ode to Joy" serving as an anthem of freedom and unity. This was most recently made evident in 1989, when the famed Leonard Bernstein-a former Brandeis professor-conducted the symphony in Germany in celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Iron Curtain.

Indeed, it is safe to say that the Brandeis-Wellesley Orchestra and accompanying choruses lived up to this tradition this month, performing faultlessly and passionately for a receptive and extremely amazed audience.