Beethoven: My Encore with Classical Film

Fulfilling my role as Marketing Manager for the North American release of Phil Grabsky's stunning film In Search of Mozart was a highly pleasurable experience, one that I will always adore. We enjoyed a successful run which lasted nearly a year and a half with the film gracing screens in New York, Chicago, Boston, LA, Seattle and countless other cities, filling hearts and minds with divinity from Grabsky's film-making and the Salzburger named Mozart. For me, there's nothing more satisfying than bringing his music to others and with cinema being popular, progressively popular as a platform for opera and classical music, who could ask for a more perfect medium or opportunity than what was before me?

Well, the truth is that I'll never be able to retrieve such an experience again. However, a film about his famous could-have-been pupil from Bonn would more than suffice as an encore to my experience with the classical documentary. Yes, you heard this correctly! As of last Wednesday, plans are in motion for our collaboration on In Search of Beethoven. I can't express just how thankful I am for this second opportunity to advocate classical music on such a level.

The film is currently in the UK, the Netherlands and New Zealand, and it will surely sweep more countries with its passion and originality, just as Mozart did in recent years. The U.S. premiere will be in Chicago in July at the Gene Siskel Theater, where Mozart broke a box-office record in 2007. Speaking of the late critic Gene Siskel, Beethoven has already received a fantastic review by his British equivalent, Philip French from The Observer: "One of the finest movies about a great musician I’ve ever seen." An excellent interview with Grabsky can be found on MusicalCritisicm.com by Dominic McHugh.

The meeting of Mozart and Beethoven has been debated and naturally fantasized. Given the documentation that does exist, many scholars believe that the young men probably met in Vienna in April 1787 when Mozart was 31 and Beethoven was 16 years old. Having studied and pursued public relations within the context of classical music, I find it amusing that a strategy found its place even surrounding this supposed "meeting of the masters." Legend proclaims that after hearing Beethoven play, Mozart said something like "...someday he will give the world something to talk about." What an accolade for the promoter's artillary!

Beethoven admired Mozart tremendously and studied his music in depth. Because of his talent, I think expectations were even greater for him to emulate the genius than Mozart's own son Franz Xaver, who himself was praised as being one of the finest pianists of his day. Beethoven moved to Vienna in 1792, one year after Mozart died, to further his musical career. Johann Heinrich famously wrote to him: "Mozart's genius hovers over you and, smiling at you, lends its approbation."

Do take a gander at the official Beethoven site and read more about the Mozart-Beethoven nexus. There's fascinating history to be found there!

Sherry