Did Raff, as a symphonist, tried to surpass himself?

[Peter1953]

The Dutch pianist Ronald Brautigam is giving a new series of performances of all 32 Beethoven piano sonatas. In a recent interview he states that in every new piano sonata Beethoven was inventing the perfect piano sonata again (in Brautigam’s view, of course). Beethoven wanted to surpass himself in every next piano sonata. For that reason, in Brautigam’s view, every sonata stands on its own and that makes the 32 sonatas such an inspiring series, because it shows the development in time, as Beethoven saw this.
I wonder what the audience in his days thought of this. And of course in our days. I know there are even (technically) better sonatas (like The Große Sonate für das Hammerklavier), but, just as a music lover, Beethoven never wrote a greater piano sonata than his no. 7 in D major, op. 10 no. 3. I think Beethoven would very much disapprove my opinion.

Now back to our unsung heroes. After listening to Raff’s 6th (op. 189) I was thinking whether Raff, like Beethoven in his piano sonatas, also wanted to surpass himself in every next symphony. In general we think that his best symphonies are his 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th (and I think for the catchy melodies, his 1st). Was Raff aware that his 6th didn’t meet his own (and the public’s) expectations? Or didn’t he care? Wasn’t writing a better symphony his intention anyway? And did Raff realize that he couldn’t meet his high personal standards all the time? Maybe he already spend a lot of his creative powers in his opus 185?

A symphonist like Rufinatscha was working towards his own style, like Alan said in another thread, and it looks like he outdoes himself in every new symphony.

Hopefully I’ve made my point, because I’m aware of my limited knowledge of my English.

Two questions to you all.

1. What is your opinion of Raff as a symphonist: did he try to surpass himself every time he was working on a new symphony?

2. Do you know of other unsung romantic composers (Rubinstein?) who tried to surpass themselves in the symphonic genre?

[JimL]

I find it difficult to agree that Beethoven "surpassed himself" with each successive sonata.  Does the Op. 54 Sonata "surpass" the Waldstein?  What about the 2 sonatas of Op. 49, which were early works published by Beethoven's brother behind his back?  Beethoven was irked, but finally gave his blessing because he was rather fond of the two "sonatinas" (and probably got a cut from his bro after the fact.)  Is the Op. 79 Sonata really superior to the one in F-Sharp, Op. 78?  He composed the G Major Sonata for a pupil.  I don't think he really set out to "surpass" each preceding work, as Romantic a concept as that may seem.  Nor, by extension did Raff.  I think that both composers strove for something different in each work.  I don't think that either composer judged one work "superior" to another.   

[Ilja]

A thought forwarded by Avrohom Leichtlich (if I recall correctly) is that Raff's symphonies evolve around the slow movement rather than the finale, which also explains our sometime disappointment when assessing his works from a finale-centric perspective.

So to analyse these, one should probably analyse and compare the slow movements rather than anything else.

As an global statement, it seems a bit farfetched, but the Larghetto of the Sixth Symphony appears to me to hold its own among its five predecessors. By contrast, the slow movements of the 7th and 8th symphonies are again a bit weaker, it seems. In the 8th Symphony I'd call it the weakest movement of the four (hardly a 'slow movement', in fact).

[Mark Thomas]

The straight answer to Peter's question is that we just don't know, but that it's a reasonable assumption. Raff himself thought that No.6 was an advance on No.5 and if you read Avrohom Leichtling's essay on the work at the Raff web site you'll see why. As I'm on holiday just now I can't really write at length on this, much as I'd like to, but Ilja is certainly correct that Raff didn't seem to subscribe to the view that everything built up to the finale. Rather that the slow movement was the emotional centre of the work and that the finale represented a relaxation of the tension.