Beethoven's music is often woven from minimal gestures which, on their own, contain a universe: like the famous motif of his fifth symphony or the insistent notes of his fourteenth piano sonata ‘Moonlight’, these four timpani strokes concentrate a silent tension, charged with meaning. In his violin concerto, far from the usual ornamental virtuosity, Beethoven proposes a dialogue between violin and orchestra as if it were a symphony. It was such a novel proposal that the public of his time did not understand it: in fact, the work fell into oblivion for almost 40 years, until it was rediscovered by a new generation of German musicians.

One of them, Johannes Brahms, lived this legacy more intensely than anyone else. Settled in Vienna, where Beethoven's shadow was still present in every corner, it took him more than 20 years to complete his First Symphony Op.68, blocked by the expectations of an inevitable comparison. It was in 1868 when, while on holiday, he wrote a little Alpine melody, that he found the central theme of the work. When it was finally premiered in 1876, it was dubbed “Beethoven's Tenth”.

Juan Velázquez.-