Beethoven’s popularity is based primarily on symphonic and chamber music. But he was not indifferent to the theatrical stage. Several attempts to conquer the genre of opera are known to have been made, and in the end his efforts were crowned only by Fidelio. He wrote music for ballets (the most famous being The Creatures of Prometheus), overtures to the tragedies Coriolanus by Heinrich Joseph von Collin and Egmont by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and incidental music for stage plays, which is rarely performed nowadays. Such is the fate of the King Stephen Overture Op. 117. It is part of the music Beethoven wrote on commission for the opening of the new theatre in Pest (now part of Budapest). To honour Hungary’s loyalty to the Habsburg monarchy, Franz Karl Joseph of Austria ordered the composition of a “completely new theatre with a hall, casino, restaurant and café” with a completion term being 1810. And because construction was delayed, the opening day was planned for 4 October 1811 – the Emperor’s birthday. In order to ensure the musical splendour of this event, the organisers asked Beethoven to write music for the two plays by the German playwright August von Kotzebue that were to open the new theatre. One was King Stephen or the First Benefactor of Hungary, the other The Ruins of Athens, which framed the play The Rise of Pest as a Free City (a local production by an unknown author today) as Prologue and Epilogue.
Just as he was boarding the carriage to go on holiday to the spa town of Teplitz in Bohemia, famed for its hot health-improving spas, the composer received the commission. “After spending three weeks in Teplitz, I felt quite well,” Beethoven says, “So, even though the doctor had forbidden me to work, I sat down to write something about the mustachios, who love me very much.” He was disappointed to find that the opening of the theatre was again postponed and wrote to Archduke Rudolf to arrange a concert in his palace to present the last three symphonies (presumably the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth) and the ‘Hungarian’ overtures. Finally, a few months after this pre-premiere, the theatre in Pest was opened on February 9th 1812. The performances were repeated over the next two days to large audiences and loud applause. The critics remarked: ‘Beethoven’s music is very original, superb and worthy of its master’.
The incidental music to the King Stephen melodrama includes an overture and nine numbers featuring the chorus. The title refers to the first ruler who founded the Kingdom of Hungary. The play concisely presents important historical events: the conversion of the Hungarians to Christianity, the suppression of the pagan rebellion, the king’s betrothal to the Bavarian princess Gisela, and the joyous jubilation of the people when the ruler receives a golden crown as a gift from Pope Sylvester II. The most famous movement of Beethoven’s Op. 117 is the overture, which is performed as a stand-alone concert piece. In it he skilfully encrusts ‘Magyarisms’ – the Hungarian colouring in the opening theme, embellished with forshifts, the syncopated theme of the fast section. The piece is constructed with the alternation of typical Hungarian folk music ‘lassú’ and ‘friss’ (slow and fast dance movements respectively). The overture also includes the exquisite theme of the women’s chorus “Where innocence scattered flowers” – No. 4 from the incidental music. Notable in this work are the precursors of some musical ideas that Beethoven would use in his grand Ninth Symphony more than a decade later – the voluble orchestral unisons and melodic motifs of the future famous Ode to Joy.