Another Beethoven mystery

[John H White]

Rather than add this to interesting thread on Beethoven's piano concerto fragments I thought I should start  this as a fresh topic.
    Around 50 years ago I distinctly remembering hearing a broadcast on the BBC of the composer's 2nd Symphony which included what was claimed to be the original Andante second movement which was later replaced by the familiar Larghetto. A few years ago, I contacted the Unheard Beethoven web site, but nobody there could find any trace of this Andante movement.
Sadly, at the time of the performance, I had no means of recording it. I wonder if anyone here has any information about the above symphonic movement.

[TerraEpon]

 Hmm.....outside of Symphony No. 8 having a different original ending to the first movement, I haven't seen any indication of any extra Beethoven symphony movements, at least none cataloged by Hess. Consioder the enormity of Beethoven's sketchbooks, I guess it's possible they recorded something from them...

[fuhred]

I have read about the strange practice during Beethoven's time, that occasionally substituted the well-known Allegretto from the Seventh Symphony (!!) for the original Larghetto of the Second.

Here's another possibility: Beethoven orchestrated the slow movement of his Piano Sonata No.12 (Op.26) in 1815 as part of the incidental music to 'Leonore Prohaska', WoO 96. The sonata is more or less contemporaneous with the Second Symphony, so maybe some bright spark at the BBC thought to use this instead of the Symphony's original slow movement?

[eschiss1]

Does Ries-Wegeler turn up anything here? It's been awhile since the once I read it.

[JimL]

...Here's another possibility: Beethoven orchestrated the slow movement of his Piano Sonata No.12 (Op.26) in 1815 as part of the incidental music to 'Leonore Prohaska', WoO 96. The sonata is more or less contemporaneous with the Second Symphony, so maybe some bright spark at the BBC thought to use this instead of the Symphony's original slow movement?

You mean the Funeral March?  Hardly likely, unless he also changed the key.  That movement is in A-flat minor, about as far from D Major (the key of the symphony) as it's possible to get (a tritonal relationship).  Beethoven may have been experimental in his key relationships, but not that experimental.

[TerraEpon]

Doing a quick aural check vs. a virtual piano, it sounds like the orchestal version is in B minor...

...http://imslp.org/wiki/Leonore_Prohaska,_WoO_96_%28Beethoven,_Ludwig_van%29 and the score agrees. Would work perfectly as a slow movement to a D major work.

[mbhaub]

Here's another possibility: In George Grove's study of the 9 Beethoven symphonies, he mentions Beethoven's struggle with the movement under discussion, and includes some musical examples of early ideas such as an early version of the main theme. Is it possible that some musicologist took those sketches and fleshed them out in the manner of Barry Cooper doing the 10th? Leonard Bernstein did the same sort of thing with the first movement of the 5th. Groves doesn't say just how much material is available.

[fuhred]

Now that's a fascinating possibility. I'd like to hear that myself!

[John H White]

I haven't visited the Unheard Beethoven web site lately, but I'm sure that it is the best place to go for fragments of unfinished Beethoven works.