Muss es sein?
Those were the words written by Beethoven in his last string quartet (opus 135). It must be!, he answers. Unluckily, it had to be tragical; when he was starting to conceive his tenth symphony, Beethoven's heart did its last chord... as with Purcell and Mozart (and one year later with Schubert), the cold woman said NO to artistic creation.
But the story was not so short...
First of all, it must be clear that the Tenth Symphony was not the only work that he had in mind at the time of his death (March 1827). Beethoven's spirit was always inspired for new frontiers, and for perfection. His own exigencies for creating are famous; every work was revised one time and another. That's why his compositions can be analysed during their genesis. And his copybooks, full of projects and thoughts, are the other way of exploring into his life.
He left unfinished a Sixth concerto for piano in D major. There are about 60 fully instrumentated pages, of a great quality. There were projects for another opera: Bradamante, Melusine, Romulus and Remus, Bacchus, Fiesco are some examples. There was also a project for Goethe's Faust. Two masses, one just as project, and some sketches for a Mass in C sharp major. An oratorio, The voyage of the Saviour to the Hell. And finally, lost in many places, manuscripts for the Tenth Symphony.
The French composer Erik Satie, said that Beethoven's Tenth Symphony, still unknown, was one of the greatest. Fully proportioned, rich in ideas, with exact developments. He was obviously writing about the sketches.
Those sketches were the base of the modern consideration towards the Tenth Symphony. There is an important number of sketches written between 1822 and 1825. In 1827, Beethoven wrote in a letter about the intention of writing this symphony, and that the sketches were there... Karl Holz said that he had listened the whole 1st movement on the piano...
The sketches mention parts for horns, strings, timpani and woodwind, but indications for real orchestration are really insignificant. The structure includes an introduction in E flat major (the key of the work), then an allegro in C minor.
Ideas for the sketches for this symphony began as early as 1812; he wanted to write a third symphony along with the Seventh and Eight Symphonies. These sketches are not identical, but quite similar to the ones he wrote in the following decade. There were fragments for a Minuet in C minor, an Adagio in A flat major, and a Rondo-Finale in E flat major. But the project for this third symphony disappeared around 1813.
New ideas emerged around 1815 and 1817; there is evidence, in Beethoven's conversation books, that in 1820 he was working again in the symphony (while beginning to compose the Ninth). But the only surviving sketch of that period dates from 1818. It's an "Adagio Cantique", to be exposed alone, or as introduction to a fugue.
In 1822 he wrote more important sketches. There's an Andante in E flat (2/4), very similar to the second movement of the Pathétique Sonata, followed by an Allegro in C minor, marked fortissimo, and then a reprise of the Andante.
The sketches for the other movements are very short; however, the Finale is longer. It consists of a melody in minuet rhythm, 36 bars long. But it was used afterwards for the Gratulations-Menuett in E flat major, WoO 3, from 1822. So his plans had changed in an important way.
The next sketches date from 1824. The Andante seems to be in C major. Before the Andante itself, there's a brief introduction, and the melody is quite different from the one written in 1822. The idea of the Allegro, and the reprise of the Andante, continues in this version. There are no signs of the other movements.
In the 1825 sketches, the Andante is written again in E flat major, and the Allegro from 1822 is back. There's also an idea in A flat major, maybe for a slow movement, and another theme in C minor (3/4), Presto.
Altogether, the sketches are about 350 bars; about 250 of the first movement. With this platform, Dr. Barry Cooper (1949) reconstructed the possible first movement of the Tenth Symphony. This reconstruction is available in CD; it's a version of the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Wyn Morris (IMP classics, PCD 911). Despite we don't have the original version of such a magnificent work, the reconstruction is really well done, and really approaches Beethoven's style.
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