(Image of Beethoven created by and © Gwen Balogh)
New and Improved!
New and Improved!
Thanks to the hard work of graphic designer Tom Fairbanks and co-curator Jane O'Cain, ABS board member Anna Newman was able to load the new and much improved version of the online exhibit this morning (Sunday). One of the visitors to the site had caught a gaffe in which Linus was misidentified as Schroeder (Jane and I have "Schroeder-on-the-brain" disease, I think), Tom replaced the some of the old music scans of early 19th-century editions with much-improved ones Patricia Stroh (Beethoven Center curator) made for us, and we fixed some links and moved things around. We also added some links to websites and blogs that have mentioned us since the launch of the beta version on December 16.
Although I love physical exhibits and books, I am becoming more and more convinced that online exhibits are the real wave of the future and a great way to reach out to the people around the planet. Only so many people can afford to come physically to San Jose, and the exhibit was only up for the normal four months that original art work is supposed to be displayed (for preservation purposes). Online exhibits extend all the hard work in both time and place.
I love the ability too to be able to listen to audio files, watch related youTube videos, and enhance the experience on a number of levels as you move through the Schulz-Beethoven exhibit.
Patricia and I have been mulling over creating new online exhibits at some point in the future if we can find funding. (This one was made possible only because of donations of money and time.)
My first choice would be for an online exhibit based on research and a paper I've done on how Beethoven's music was used by the Allies and Nazis in World War 2. When I give the paper, I show movie clips, slides, play cassette tapes, and share written accounts. It would be a perfect fit for an online venue. While parts of it are as dark as any region of the human experience, there is much light and courage as well, and it helps you understand how Beethoven came to be understood in the middle of the 20th century. We own, for example, two comic books published in the U.S. during the war that have stories on Beethoven and the "V for Victory" campaign based on the famous 4-note motive of the Fifth Symphony. Imagine growing up in the 40s and learning about Beethoven in that way. If you were 8 in 1943, you'd be 74 today and probably till retain that experience of thinking of the Fifth as anti-Nazi propaganda. When I gave the paper at Orange County in Southern California a few years ago, an older man came up and told he remembered the comic but couldn't tell me when or who published it. We were lucky to find a copy on eBay last year. I wonder if the Beethoven comic books Schulz wrote about in one of the strips from the 1950s were based on knowing the ones from the 1940s? (If you know of or have Beethoven comic books from the 1950s, please let me know!)
It may be surprising to you, but a study on how fast or slow Beethoven's symphonies were performed in the 20th century showed clearly that--after World War 2--conductors slowed down the music from their pre-World War 2 tempos because they then associated the music with its monumental and heroic qualities. Was that related to the "V for Victory" campaign? Did some people get tired of the Fifth, I wonder, since the war was over and the world was ready to turn away from all that devastation, loss, and death? I am glad that the "V for Victory" campaign is not what I first think of when I listen to the Ninth. Many writers, including Owen Jander, have argued that it represents Beethoven's personal struggle against the realization that he was losing his most precious gift, his hearing. In the last movement of the Fifth, I think he is not depicting actual victory but determination to rail against what Fate had thrown in his path. In line with the goals of Classical period writers about aesthetics, the music works not because we have a personal issue with going deaf but with facing obstacles that seem insurmountable. That situation is the universal shared bond the music explores.
As I worked on the Schulz strips, I realized again and again how he drew inspiration from the world, events, and people around him. While most of the Peanuts strips have a timeless quality, we better understand some of them by exploring the history of the day. As many writers and scholars have noted, the past is not the past, it is always with us as part of our "present."
Bill Meredith
