# Für Elise



## pcnog11 (Nov 14, 2016)

If you like Für Elise, why? What is special about this piece? Which pianist has the interpretation that you like the most?

This piece is mysterious and complex, there a many layers of emotions, longing and desire tangled together in a piece of about 4 minutes long. I do not have favourite interpretation but wonder how would Beethoven play it.

Please share your thoughts.


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

It's not one of my favorite Beethoven pieces, but I still like it. I think that it shows a lighter and romantic side of the rich and multifaceted music of this great composer.

My favorite version of it is by Ashkenazy. It's intimate and delicate like it should be in my opinion.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

For the past score of years or so, whenever a character on a TV show or movie is required to be shown playing or practicing classical piano, she (usually it's a girl or a woman) is playing Fur Elise, as if that were the only piano piece ever written. If I ever hear it again, it'll be too soon.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

MarkW said:


> For the past score of years or so, whenever a character on a TV show or movie is required to be shown playing or practicing classical piano, she (usually it's a girl or a woman) is playing Fur Elise, as if that were the only piano piece ever written. If I ever hear it again, it'll be too soon.


I do hope Ludwig gets the residuals.


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## brianvds (May 1, 2013)

MarkW said:


> For the past score of years or so, whenever a character on a TV show or movie is required to be shown playing or practicing classical piano, she (usually it's a girl or a woman) is playing Fur Elise, as if that were the only piano piece ever written. If I ever hear it again, it'll be too soon.


You took the words right off my keyboard.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

There's nothing like a comfy pair of blue jeans, and I prefer Lees.

But when the Montana winter closes-in it's good to tuck into a pair of furry Lees to stave off the cold, especially if you're out riding.









I just didn't realize Beethoven wrote music about these here pants. I'm flabbergasted!


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## pcnog11 (Nov 14, 2016)

Allerius said:


> It's not one of my favorite Beethoven pieces, but I still like it. I think that it shows a lighter and romantic side of the rich and multifaceted music of this great composer.
> 
> My favorite version of it is by Ashkenazy. It's intimate and delicate like it should be in my opinion.


Ashkenazy is one of my favourite pianist. He has the right touch and tone colour. Good choice!


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## Larkenfield (Jun 5, 2017)

I enjoy Für Elise because of Beethoven's coy but beautifully balanced melody, possibly the most charming he ever wrote, and its wonderful logic of development that just about anyone can appreciate. Its middle section adds an energetic contrast and there's the suspenseful ending that returns to its charming theme. So there are surprises in what sounds like a piece that just happened to come to him between his major works. With its subtle grace, I often wonder if he was in love at the time he wrote it, in a work that sounds so characteristic of him. And it's easy enough, at least in the beginning, that even student pianists can't resist trying to play it.

The real intrigue is how it ends-on open octaves that have neither a major (optimistic and hopeful) or minor third (perhaps fearful and doubtful) about the outcome. By leaving out the third he keeps the listener guessing whether the ending is essentially happy or sad. Alfred Brendel...


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## LezLee (Feb 21, 2014)

SONNET CLV said:


> There's nothing like a comfy pair of blue jeans, and I prefer Lees.
> 
> But when the Montana winter closes-in it's good to tuck into a pair of furry Lees to stave off the cold, especially if you're out riding.
> 
> ...


That joke only works if, like 90% of people, you don't pronounce Elise correctly!
As it's German the final 'e' is not silent. Elise = Eh-lease-eh 

Incidently, I've never liked it, probably because of overkill.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

One of the first pieces I learned to play. I haven't played it in a good while, or listened to it. 

It's funny how people can call it overplayed or 'overkill' but are willing to listen to some dreary liturgical work by Bach for the 999th time in a week.


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## LezLee (Feb 21, 2014)

eugeneonagain said:


> One of the first pieces I learned to play. I haven't played it in a good while, or listened to it.
> 
> It's funny how people can call it overplayed or 'overkill' but are willing to listen to some dreary liturgical work by Bach for the 999th time in a week.


Not me, I don't possess any Bach!


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## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

eugeneonagain said:


> It's funny how people can call it overplayed or 'overkill' but are willing to listen to some dreary liturgical work by Bach for the 999th time in a week.


Not just willing, but excited about it.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Bulldog said:


> Not just willing, but excited about it.


Totally incurable madness.


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## Guest (Nov 5, 2018)

I think Beethoven's 9th has been played till you are quite numb to it. I'm probably alone in not really liking the choral part in the symphony.


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## LezLee (Feb 21, 2014)

poco a poco said:


> I think Beethoven's 9th has been played till you are quit numb to it. I'm probably alone in not really liking the choral part in the symphony.


Definitely not alone, I'm with you all the way.


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## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

MarkW said:


> For the past score of years or so, whenever a character on a TV show or movie is required to be shown playing or practicing classical piano, she (usually it's a girl or a woman) is playing Fur Elise, as if that were the only piano piece ever written. If I ever hear it again, it'll be too soon.


You mean there ARE other piano pieces out there???? :devil:


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## Dimace (Oct 19, 2018)

The ''Oh Susana!'' of Wien at Beethoven's time. The Greatest Ever made some good money with it to have the time, without financial problems, to compose some of his eternal music. Mozart was doing the same...


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Dimace said:


> The ''Oh Susana!'' of Wien at Beethoven's time. The Greatest Ever made some good money with it to have the time, without financial problems, to compose some of his eternal music. Mozart was doing the same...


I'm afraid Für Elise made no money for Ludwig. It was not published in his lifetime and only discovered 40 years after he died.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

Für Elise is Beethoven's classical period take on Bach's BWV 565


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

aleazk said:


> Für Elise is Beethoven's classical period take on Bach's BWV 565


Except that Beethoven actually wrote his?!


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

aleazk said:


> Für Elise is Beethoven's classical period take on Bach's BWV 565


A comparison with the minuets in G major and G minor that Bach may have composed for his wife Anna Magdalena seems more fair in my opinion.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Two words: Christian Petzold.


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## Xisten267 (Sep 2, 2018)

eugeneonagain said:


> Two words: Christian Petzold.


_"Christian Petzold is believed to have composed two of the pieces from the 1725 Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach: the familiar "Minuet in G major" (BWV Anh.II 114) and its partner piece, "Minuet in G minor" (BWV Anh.II 115). These were traditionally believed to have been composed by J.S. Bach but scholarship, particularly on the part of Hans-Joachim Schulze, has recently pointed to Petzold. The Minuet in G Major is catalogued as a BWV Anh. piece because *until today, nobody knows if Christian Petzold or J.S. Bach was the one who composed it.* Petzold acted as an agent of J.S. Bach keyboard Partitas."_

Source: http://www.bach-cantatas.com/Lib/Petzold-Christian.htm

It can be a piece by J.S. Bach.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

pcnog11 said:


> If you like Für Elise, why? What is special about this piece? Which pianist has the interpretation that you like the most?
> 
> This piece is mysterious and complex, there a many layers of emotions, longing and desire tangled together in a piece of about 4 minutes long. I do not have favourite interpretation but wonder how would Beethoven play it.
> 
> Please share your thoughts.


Listening closely, there are some very interesting note choices in the construction of the melody. It's all the things you've described, which are taken for granted because I suspect most people don't sit down to listen to it attentively. It's mainly experienced passively when used as incidental music.


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## eugeneonagain (May 14, 2017)

Allerius said:


> It can be a piece by J.S. Bach.


To me it matters not. Either way I like the music. The decision to demote it to the _anhang _wouldn't be done on a vague supposition.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Never liked the piece, but is much requested by my relatives. Only version I liked was Brendel's. Made me listen to it with new ears


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