Ep.6: The Lost Beethoven World – Through the Eyes of Adolf Bernhard Marx.

In this episode, Stefan and Wim explore how the 19th century gradually lost touch with Beethoven’s original world — and how one man, Adolf Bernhard Marx, stood right at the turning point.Marx saw himself as a guardian of Beethoven’s legacy, yet his writings reveal how profoundly performance ideals had already shifted. When he claimed that tempo words were too vague and that Maelzel’s metronome had “solved the problem,” was he still speaking Beethoven’s language — or already his own?We look at Marx’s descriptions of Beethoven, his relationship with Liszt and the early Romantic generation, and how his theories helped redefine what it meant to “understand” music. What emerges is a fascinating portrait of a time when Beethoven’s clarity gave way to Romantic subjectivity — the moment when the modern cult of interpretation was born. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit wimwinters.substack.com/subscribe