Chapter 7 - One More Time

Summary

Monday, May 10, through Monday, May 17, 1824

The next week in Beethoven's life was especially chaotic. After drafting his letter of thanks to the participants of the first Akademie on the morning of Monday, May 10, he started a list of tasks that needed to be done and people he needed to see: “Letter to Duport. The rehearsals must be in agreement with Duport. [//] Umlauf. [//] Schuppanzigh.”

Once again, he needed to consider where to hold the repeat Akademie—in the small Landständischer Saal, the Kärntnertor Theater with its dry acoustic, or the more reverberant Grosser Redoutensaal, also depending upon the financial and logistical terms for each. Whether already on Sunday, May 9, or now, on Monday, May 10, Beethoven wrote Duport a letter of request to use the Kärntnertor Theater on Friday, May 14, a Norma-Tag, but in any case dated the request “May 9.” With Schindler temporarily out of the picture, Beethoven went to see Duport at the theater and gave him the request. Duport probably added his endorsement (dated “May 10”) to the document and sent it up the administrative chain: “No. 643/1824: Van Beethoven, musician, requests permission to give an Akademie on the evening of the 14th of this month, since it is a Norma Tag.” Ultimately, the high chamberlain, Prince Trauttmannsdorf, denied Beethoven's request.

On Tuesday, May 11, nephew Karl argued strongly against the Landstand and reminded Beethoven that the orchestra's stagehand and his helper were to be paid 21 fl.

That evening, the violinist Joseph Böhm and the amateur instrumental coordi-nator Ferdinand Piringer met with Beethoven and Karl at Neuling's beer garden in the Ungargasse, about three blocks south of the composer's apartment. Piringer noted that Böhm had made an appointment to see the theater manager Duport and that he wanted to augment the orchestra, as before.

On Thursday morning, May 13, Piringer appeared at Beethoven's apartment with a progress report that he had arranged for concert notices to be placed in Bäuerle's Theater-Zeitung, Kanne's Musikalische Zeitung, and Schickh's Mode-Zeitung (actually Zeitschrift). Beethoven had evidently paid the orchestra's stagehand earlier, and Piringer said that he had paid too much, that only one person should have received 21 fl.,