Like a certain form of civilized cage fights piano duels were common entertainment in contemporary Vienna. Beethoven himself participated in many proving himself a true heavy weight champion. In this article we look at the curious case of the Beethoven vs. Steibelt fight.
In the Wild Wild West people used to make duels usually with one participant ending quite dead. At the same time in Vienna high society had their own duels, although a very different one. Being the capital of music at the time, their duels were music related. At such events musicians would “fight” against each other on musical instruments. Someone from the audience would croon a motif or a tune that had to be taken and improvised upon by the competing parties.
Daniel Steibelt, the man who challenged Beethoven
Now, at this time when our story is happening (spring of 1800) Beethoven was already a well established, well known composer in Vienna. Especially revered for his piano improvisations, considered to be without pair – even better than the late Mozart’s improvisations. There are many well documented duels in which Beethoven participated, but our story now focuses on a certain German musician called Daniel Gottlieb Steibelt (October 22, 1765 – September 20 1823). By the time Steibelt was already well known all over Europe, from Paris to Berlin, from St. Petersburg to Prague. Just before arriving to Vienna for this fateful encounter he had a very successful concert in Prague, earning a little fortune with it.
Daniel was a real showman, handsome, canny and had a significant fan base all over the major capitals in Europe. In his tours he was accompanied by his wife, herself a virtuosa of the tambourine, often playing together. The couple was heading to Vienna with the firm plan of taking the city by storm. Some fans of Beethoven had their hands shaking and worrying if this new guy will eclipse their local hero…
The duel
One evening Beethoven presented his Trio for Piano, Clarinet, and Cello (op. 11.). Steibelt was present in the audience. During the concert he did not pay the respect that was due, probably even making some remarks on the piece. A deadly sin in Beethoven’s eyes… Following the trio it was Steibelt’s time with his quintet. At the end he made sure to improvise, something he was famous for. Beethoven, after listening to the improvisation concluded that the visitor was a cheat and the improvisation was prepared in advance.
A week later at another assembly Steibelt enjoyed big success and applause, once again. Then, in his improvisation he went on to mock Beethoven and his music from a week before, clearly taking a theme from the Trio. In other words it was a challenge and according to the rules there had to be a response. The audience went crazy pushing Beethoven for picking up the fight! He was extremely provoked and finally started walking towards the piano. His student Ferdinand Ries noted that Beethoven played best when he was either in a good mood or was being angry. This time it was the latter.
On his way to the piano he picked up Steibelt ‘s score from the cello player and placed it upside down on the stand. As a show with a finger he randomly pointed to some upside down notes and using them as a theme started to improvise. Everyone was blown away! He displayed absolute mastery of the piano, playing with these dummy random notes, as he wished to.
As Beethoven played at some point Steibelt left the hall in humiliation and in a hurry left Vienna, too. He told after the event he is not willing to see him or be in the same room with Beethoven, again. To this statement he kept himself and never returned to Vienna again.
Although, not fully faithful to the original events, this little movie clip captures the essence of what happened.
