June 6, 1980 NEW SOLIDARITY Page 11

Music: Vivian Zoakos

Beethoven and the Republic of MexicoWho really was Ludwig van Beethoven? He was the greatest musician and composer the world has ever known. But was he also a conscious political conspirator in the classical humanist tradition? On a recent trip to Mexico—the second great republic in the Western hemisphere—the question was urgently raised in my mind when I discovered the extent to which the German composer had intervened into the Mexican republican process Beethoventhrough his music.

The Mexican Founding Fathers were of the highest caliber of international leadership, who from the, outset identified the need to recreate within the population the highest cultural levels as the indispensable prerequisite if the republic was to survive. Forthcoming articles in this newspaper by the current heirs of this tradition will detail how their forefathers fashioned future generations of elites through a process of political and philosophical education. Other articles will lay out in more detail the crucial role which Beethoven's music played in this process.

The Seventh Symphony

Early in the 19th century Beethoven's friend, the mathematician Humboldt, had visited Mexico after coming to the United States. While there he had collected a number of popular Mexican tunes to present to Beethoven on his return to Europe. Beethoven subsequently proceeded to use these tunes as the thematic material for some of his music. Before going to Mexico I had known that, for example, the two themes in the third movement of the great Seventh Symphony were distinctly Mexican. But it turns out that there are many other examples— to the extent that an entire book has been compiled identifying the large scale use of Mexican thematic material by Beethoven.

This music was immediately put to political use by the Mexican republican leaders. These individuals were in the habit of holding regular soirees to listen to and discuss music. One of their number, the individual who seems to have been charged with responsibility for carrying forward the "music culture project" that emerged from these discussions, was the nineteenth century Mexican musician and scholar Jose Mariano Elizaga. Elizaga set out to develop a pedagogy for the stated purpose of generating composers on the model of Beethoven from among the Mexican population. This he compiled in the form of a volume entitled Elements of Music. Beyond this, he also created the first Mexican symphonic society to introduce the population in the music which Beethoven was in the meantime composing. In 1924, the year of the founding of the Mexican republic. Elizaga launched his first series of concerts, all focused on Beethoven's music.

I was able to see for myself the response which even the uneducated Mexican peasantry would have had to this music. Giving a class in Ciudad Obregon in the province of Sonora last week to a one hundred person audience including many peasants from the area, I began with a recording of the Seventh Symphony, which I introduced to them as "the greatest Mexican music ever written."

The response of the audience was unlike anything I have ever seen else-where. Though at first puzzled by the epithet "Mexican" given to a piece of contrapuntal writing never heard in their folk songs, the audience rapidly recognized the gay Mexican tune that forms the thematic basis of the third movement.

Their response was immediately joyful and excited, proud that Beethoven had used their music as the basis of his wonderful composition.

Lest anyone think that this audience's response was limited to a banal singling out of one specific tune, it is useful to mention their response to the overall class which focused on the "Pathetique" sonata of Beethoven. Seldom except when teaching a class for children, have I witnessed such capacity to grasp at ideas despite lack of formal education as I saw among these peasants of Sonora. This was true to the point where it called forth from me by far the best music pedagogy at my disposal.

Music and Morality

In retrospect the reason for this was obvious. The Mexican republican tradition, despite certain problems at the top, is very much a moral reality

among its population. As all great humanist leaders have identified, including most emphatically Beethoven, the capacity to respond to creative ideas whether in the form of music or otherwise is directly a function of the moral qualities of the individual.

This is what Plato meant when he said, conversely, that listening to great music will tend to make a person good. From this standpoint the republican population of Mexico was in the 19th century and is still today among the most naturally responsive to the moral intellect of their fellow republican, Ludwig Beethoven.