WOSU Public Media - Classical

Well, you knew it would happen.  The Web has made Beethoven a music video star. 

As we at WOSU Public Media gear up for a special day of Beethoven’s music on the man’s birthday, Dec. 16, I wanted to see just how big a star the master really is.

The answer: big.  One of the world’s most famous composers, Beethoven is an easy target for the exploits of videographers, animators, Web designers and other tech-savvy creative types who like to mix the old with the new.  In the category of “old” are: Beethoven, his music, and the music video genre, which since the days I ran home from school (I won’t say from what grade in school) with a friend to watch the release of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video has virtually redefined music as something for the eyes as well as the ears.  In the category of “new” are: the Web 2.0 (still kind of new), YouTube (getting less new by the minute), and using today’s tech gizmos (each one never as new as the next) to do stuff with old things like music Beethoven and the genre of music videos.

So easy a target is Beethoven and so easy this tinkering with technology that a whole new subgenre of Beethoven music videos has emerged online.  I bring some of these videos to your attention here because I thought you might get a kick out of seeing them.

Quite possibly the newest Beethoven music video out there is Tom Lloyd’s aptly named “Beethoven Music Video,” uploaded on YouTube just two days ago.  Against the backdrop of the famous beginning of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, the minute-long stop-animation video pits a lone violinist (who produces the sound of a full orchestra!) against a thick-haired conductor.  The one saws away on his little claymation violin; the other waves his little arms in wide-eyed detachment.  And there’s a surprise ending that, when you consider how much work it is for the violinist to sound also like a section of cellos, basses, bassoons, oboes, etc., isn’t really a surprise after all.  Here’s the video:

There are several videos out there set to the Scherzo from Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, and I bring your attention to a few of them.  One video, created by Michael Luckman of Luckman Media, is a stream-of-consciousness extravaganza of colorful jumping boxes, dancing trousers (free of bodies), and can-can lines of sheep (are they sheep?).  Watch this video when you need a postmodern whimsy fix:

Another Beethoven’s Ninth Scherzo video takes an altogether darker approach.  This video, actually a promo for the XBox 360 game Gears of War, has all the makings of a total-devastation film (all the makings, that is, except Bruce Willis, Jean-Claude Van Damme, or Will Smith): the smoke and embers of a destroyed city, a lone armor-clad warrior hurtling himself through the streets to battle a fierce arachnid. (Speaking of Bruce Willis, you may remember that the Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony ran like a leitmotif through the whole Die Hard series.)  My video game-playing days went away with Michael Jackson’s Thriller video, so I can’t comment on the game.  But these images and Beethoven’s grim Scherzo (dark humor if ever there were any) make disturbingly evocative bedfellows:

Contrast these apocalyptic images with those of a video dubbed “Beautiful Music and Nature.”  The maker had a sample of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony Scherzo on his (her?) hard drive and put it together with images of nature scenes.  Trees in full fall colors, mountains, placid lakes reflecting sunset-hued skies, baby penguins - nature in all its awesome splendor.  As unnerving as are the juxtaposition of Beethoven’s music with images of war, the nature scenes with this music are, to me, at least equally destabilizing.

Finally, for fantasy fans, the first movement of Beethoven’s “Moonlight” Sonata is the soundtrack for a  seven-minute Waterworld-meets-Lord of the Rings saga.  The theme of total devastation runs through this flick, too, as a tsunami washes out an entire village.  The themes of love and isolation are also constantly present, played out in hypnotic images by elusive characters who (not to give away the ending) leave us stranded in the No Man’s Land between dreams and reality.

So is classical music dead?  Hardly.  Roll over (in your grave) Beethoven?  I don’t think so.  Beethoven was, if nothing else, a man at once of his times and brilliantly, if also painfully, ahead of his time.  I think he’d like the idea that his music continues to inspire and accompany creativity, or at least that it continues to be heard and felt.

Don’t forget to tune in to WOSU 89.7 FM Dec. 16 for a day of special Beethoven programming.  See you then!

–Jennifer Hambrick

If you like classical music (even if you don’t!) and your work (at home, at the office, or elsewhere in the community) ever calls you to lead others, I recommend you read Roger Nierenberg’s new book, Maestro: A Surprising Story about Leading and Listening. It’s a fictional account of an executive of a floundering company learning leadership lessons from a wise and kindly orchestral conductor and his musicians. 

While Maestro might be new, the idea that business leaders can learn about the interpersonal subtleties of teamwork and leadership by studying the inner workings of the orchestra has been around a while.  That idea is the basis of The Music Paradigm, the executive training program Nierenberg launched in 1995 in which corporate leaders have a chance to sit among the musicians of an orchestra and speak with Nierenberg (himself a conductor) about the the hidden interpersonal challenges of playing in and leading an orchestra. 

Clocking in at 118 pages, Maestro doesn’t waste its readers’ time.  Nierenberg gets right to the matter: a corporate executive (whose name is never revealed) is besieged by squabbling and seemingly unmotivated division leaders who don’t seem to want to help him fix the company’s lagging sales figures.  His daughter’s violin teacher sets him up with a conductor known for being a good leader.  The conductor (whose name also is never revealed) invites the executive to sit in the orchestra while he rehearses it.  Over several rehearsals and conversations with the conductor, the executive discovers how the conductor inspires his musicians.  He also comes to realize how he has inadvertently micromanaged, dismissed and otherwise belittled his own employees.  I won’t tell you how the book ends, but I bet you can guess.

It isn;t a problem that Maestro, with its one-dimensional characters, its simplistic plot, its right-on-cue, egoless realizations of leadership ills perpetrated,  is not great literature.  Since the book is written for corporate executives who may or may not see the value of orchestras at all, much less their relevance to the corporate world, the essentialized nature of Nierenberg’s characters and story make for efficient reading.  More importantly, however, is that finally, finally someone has brought clearly to the fore that playing in an orchestra is a multi-level wonder of teamwork, and that people who do it (and the very best conductors who lead them) harbor profound and subtle knowledge of teamwork and leadership.  This book teaches pearls of wisdom that wise executives in any hierarchical environment should internalize: How to inspire creative people?  Communicate to them your larger vision and engage their creativity (i.e., what they do best) by soliciting their input.  How do you earn the respect of your team?  Encourage each member’s unique contributions and treat each member with equal respect.  How do I get to know my team members’ unique abilities?  Listen, listen, listen.

But most important for classical music, Maestro shows that music’s power isn’t just limited to its ability to move us emotionally;  if we care enough to explore it, music’s power can inspire us to inspire others.  What could be better than that?

–Jennifer Hambrick