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The Final Symphony: A Beethoven Anthology
Celebrate Ludwig van Beethoven’s 250th birthday with an anthology of comics inspired by the maestro’s life and music. Fantasy and History. Fables and Ghost Stories. Adventure and Romance. This tome of tales is written by Brandon Montclare and Frank Marraffino and features a dozen visual artists who reflect on the breadth of Beethoven’s influence. Carefully curated, readers will experience both masterpieces and lesser known gems in a brand new light. Cover design by David Mack.
208 pages, Paperback
First published December 8, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
December 25, 2022
1.5 ⭐
After a fantastic year of reading, it all ends here on the final and, by far, the WORST book of my reading year!
This anthology of Graphic novellas, written by Brandon Montclare and Frank Marraffino and contributed to by over a dozen artists (some notably better than others) promised to share, using Beethoven’s Death Bed Fever Dreams as a vessel, key memories of the great man’s life, interwoven with the literature which inspired him to never-before-seen artistic capacities. Additionally, there is a QR code near the beginning of the book that directs you to a “special [digital] playlist created by Deutsche Grammophon to accompany the stories within the graphic novel”. Apparently, these ”should be enjoyed as part of the reading experience – since the tracks directly relate to the contents and inspirational source of each chapter”… Sounds good right?
Wrong! For far too many reasons.
First of all, the pieces DO NOT match the novella they are coupled with in any but one case. The signs were there right from the start. The first novella, titled ‘Fables’ is a clumsy and heavy-handed delivery of basic, surface-level moral truths delivered by a random and ever-growing gathering of animals, inspired by the fables of Christian Gellert (“the German Aesop”). The intro to this work even includes, in the first paragraph, the line, ”Beethoven would later set music to several of Gellert’s poems”. Why then, is the accompanying track the “Kreutzer” Violin Sonata No.9, 3rd Movement – Op.47, which has nothing to do with the literature, instead of one of the 6 lieder that Beethoven set to Gellert’s text? It became clear, as I read on, and these kinds of logical fallacies accumulated, that there was never any intention to create any kind of complementary thematical tetherings between Beethoven’s music and its literary inspiration but, rather, to simply provide a below-par graphic representation of Beethoven’s literary influences coupled with any one of Beethoven’s “greatest hits”; take your pick! One more example, of many, is a Graphic novella inspired by August Kotzebue’s play, ‘The Ruins of Athens’ which is coupled with the Choral Fantasy Op.80. Surely it would’ve made sense to match this with… um… ‘The Ruins of Athens’ Op.113? Only one pairing in the entire anthology makes sense and that is the 4th movement of the Ninth Symphony which is matched with Schiller’s ‘Ode to Joy’ ("An die Freude"). This is, of course, the libretto.
Between the main works of the anthology which actually have, on the whole, very little to do with Beethoven, are interspersed some very short vignettes regardingkey events in the composer’s life. Okay! Now we’re talkin’! We can finally learn something about the big man, right?...
Wrong!
Too many of these “Interstitials” are comprised of anecdotes that are just as widely considered apocryphal as they are to have truly occurred. On top of this, there are downright factual inaccuracies. One of my favourites is Interstitial IV in which a young Beethoven is playing piano for the little maestro, Mozart. Only, Mozart appears to be, at the very least, in his mid-50s! A good 25 years older than he would’ve been in 1787 when, and if, the meeting ever occurred. In fact, a good 20 years older than he would ever be, given he died at 35!
Ladies and Gentleman: Mozart, Aged approx. 31
These Interstitials also play in to all the lazy, superficial stereotypes that plague the Beethoven Mythos. Rather than truly diving in and offering a nuanced depiction of the man that the book (published in celebration of the 250th anniversary of his birth, no less) is attempting to champion, it reduces him to a cliché. Almost a parody of himself.
The final 3 offerings are intended to demonstrate the ongoing impact/influence of Beethoven’s work and include stories featuring Max Richter, Alice Sara Ott and Ezinma. The Max Richter one was decent but the other two were just… Ugh. Just awful! Truly awful stuff.
Oh, and there are no page numbers which makes referencing difficult.
What genuinely grinds my gears about this collection is the clear lack of care taken in its production and in quality control. You’d presume that anyone taking part in such a project would be something of a Beethoven enthusiast and so would take some pride in providing an accurate and meaningful portrayal of his life and works but I just didn’t get that here. In fact, at times it was hard to believe any of the contributors had a sound knowledge of Beethoven’s history at all.
A missed opportunity to celebrate the anniversary of, arguably, the greatest composer to have ever lived. Do not recommend.
After a fantastic year of reading, it all ends here on the final and, by far, the WORST book of my reading year!
This anthology of Graphic novellas, written by Brandon Montclare and Frank Marraffino and contributed to by over a dozen artists (some notably better than others) promised to share, using Beethoven’s Death Bed Fever Dreams as a vessel, key memories of the great man’s life, interwoven with the literature which inspired him to never-before-seen artistic capacities. Additionally, there is a QR code near the beginning of the book that directs you to a “special [digital] playlist created by Deutsche Grammophon to accompany the stories within the graphic novel”. Apparently, these ”should be enjoyed as part of the reading experience – since the tracks directly relate to the contents and inspirational source of each chapter”… Sounds good right?
Wrong! For far too many reasons.
First of all, the pieces DO NOT match the novella they are coupled with in any but one case. The signs were there right from the start. The first novella, titled ‘Fables’ is a clumsy and heavy-handed delivery of basic, surface-level moral truths delivered by a random and ever-growing gathering of animals, inspired by the fables of Christian Gellert (“the German Aesop”). The intro to this work even includes, in the first paragraph, the line, ”Beethoven would later set music to several of Gellert’s poems”. Why then, is the accompanying track the “Kreutzer” Violin Sonata No.9, 3rd Movement – Op.47, which has nothing to do with the literature, instead of one of the 6 lieder that Beethoven set to Gellert’s text? It became clear, as I read on, and these kinds of logical fallacies accumulated, that there was never any intention to create any kind of complementary thematical tetherings between Beethoven’s music and its literary inspiration but, rather, to simply provide a below-par graphic representation of Beethoven’s literary influences coupled with any one of Beethoven’s “greatest hits”; take your pick! One more example, of many, is a Graphic novella inspired by August Kotzebue’s play, ‘The Ruins of Athens’ which is coupled with the Choral Fantasy Op.80. Surely it would’ve made sense to match this with… um… ‘The Ruins of Athens’ Op.113? Only one pairing in the entire anthology makes sense and that is the 4th movement of the Ninth Symphony which is matched with Schiller’s ‘Ode to Joy’ ("An die Freude"). This is, of course, the libretto.
Between the main works of the anthology which actually have, on the whole, very little to do with Beethoven, are interspersed some very short vignettes regarding
Wrong!
Too many of these “Interstitials” are comprised of anecdotes that are just as widely considered apocryphal as they are to have truly occurred. On top of this, there are downright factual inaccuracies. One of my favourites is Interstitial IV in which a young Beethoven is playing piano for the little maestro, Mozart. Only, Mozart appears to be, at the very least, in his mid-50s! A good 25 years older than he would’ve been in 1787 when, and if, the meeting ever occurred. In fact, a good 20 years older than he would ever be, given he died at 35!
Ladies and Gentleman: Mozart, Aged approx. 31
These Interstitials also play in to all the lazy, superficial stereotypes that plague the Beethoven Mythos. Rather than truly diving in and offering a nuanced depiction of the man that the book (published in celebration of the 250th anniversary of his birth, no less) is attempting to champion, it reduces him to a cliché. Almost a parody of himself.
The final 3 offerings are intended to demonstrate the ongoing impact/influence of Beethoven’s work and include stories featuring Max Richter, Alice Sara Ott and Ezinma. The Max Richter one was decent but the other two were just… Ugh. Just awful! Truly awful stuff.
Oh, and there are no page numbers which makes referencing difficult.
What genuinely grinds my gears about this collection is the clear lack of care taken in its production and in quality control. You’d presume that anyone taking part in such a project would be something of a Beethoven enthusiast and so would take some pride in providing an accurate and meaningful portrayal of his life and works but I just didn’t get that here. In fact, at times it was hard to believe any of the contributors had a sound knowledge of Beethoven’s history at all.
A missed opportunity to celebrate the anniversary of, arguably, the greatest composer to have ever lived. Do not recommend.
February 15, 2021
I will preface by saying I am by no means a Beethoven scholar, just a longtime fan of the man and a classically trained musician.
I was somewhat misled about the nature of this graphic novel, believing that it was largely a biographic work set to and inspired by the work of the subject. While there were short segments of biographic material that were admittedly well realized (despite being, at worst, entirely apocryphal and at best, historically inaccurate), the majority of the content, descriptively inspired by his works, is mostly vignettes of unrelated stories that were said to have inspired the composer himself. These vignettes were compact, a nice word for "too short". For all the Fantasia-like sequences, there isn't much room left for Beethoven himself, who ends up being distilled to a character of "tortured genius with childhood trauma". This characterization strikes me as cliche and ultimately dishonest. In other words, the strengths of this book are not in its narrative content or even really its understanding of the person on the cover.
The art, however, is excellent, and makes up the bulk of this novel's worth. I extremely enjoyed the diversity of styles (Turandot was particularly striking), color work, and relationship to the companion pieces (for the most part - some were iffy).
The music selections were considerably inclusive, but still felt like they barely scratch the surface, much like Beethoven's characterization in the parts of the novel actually devoted to him. Ultimately this playlist acts more like a primer for someone curious about Beethoven rather than a celebration of the man's life's work.
While this has no bearing on the review, I feel the need to point it out: the quality of the LPs is quite poor. There is significant distortion of sound as though the vinyl is warped in the majority of the pieces, to the point that the fidelity of sound is actually better on the digital playlist provided via a QR code. The LPs specifically were not worth the purchase due to this quality; if anyone reading this is debating on buying the LPs, don't.
Final thoughts
Pros:
- beautiful, memorable art with stunning diversity
- the portions actually dedicated to Beethoven are entertaining
- the inspiration between the pieces and the vignettes is pretty cool
Cons:
- while the Fantasia-like vignettes are cool, they aren't why people buy a book with Beethoven on the front
- decent selection of music, but better conceptualized as a taster than anything comprehensive
- the man himself is boiled down to somewhat of a cliche
- dubious historical accuracy at times
- skip the LPs (this has no bearing on my score of the novel, just bears repeating)
Verdict: 3/5. Entertaining, but I will likely not open it again except to look at the art. The audience attracted by promise of celebrating the life and work of the composer will likely be less satisfied customers, but if it gets more people into Beethoven, it can't be bad.
I was somewhat misled about the nature of this graphic novel, believing that it was largely a biographic work set to and inspired by the work of the subject. While there were short segments of biographic material that were admittedly well realized (despite being, at worst, entirely apocryphal and at best, historically inaccurate), the majority of the content, descriptively inspired by his works, is mostly vignettes of unrelated stories that were said to have inspired the composer himself. These vignettes were compact, a nice word for "too short". For all the Fantasia-like sequences, there isn't much room left for Beethoven himself, who ends up being distilled to a character of "tortured genius with childhood trauma". This characterization strikes me as cliche and ultimately dishonest. In other words, the strengths of this book are not in its narrative content or even really its understanding of the person on the cover.
The art, however, is excellent, and makes up the bulk of this novel's worth. I extremely enjoyed the diversity of styles (Turandot was particularly striking), color work, and relationship to the companion pieces (for the most part - some were iffy).
The music selections were considerably inclusive, but still felt like they barely scratch the surface, much like Beethoven's characterization in the parts of the novel actually devoted to him. Ultimately this playlist acts more like a primer for someone curious about Beethoven rather than a celebration of the man's life's work.
While this has no bearing on the review, I feel the need to point it out: the quality of the LPs is quite poor. There is significant distortion of sound as though the vinyl is warped in the majority of the pieces, to the point that the fidelity of sound is actually better on the digital playlist provided via a QR code. The LPs specifically were not worth the purchase due to this quality; if anyone reading this is debating on buying the LPs, don't.
Final thoughts
Pros:
- beautiful, memorable art with stunning diversity
- the portions actually dedicated to Beethoven are entertaining
- the inspiration between the pieces and the vignettes is pretty cool
Cons:
- while the Fantasia-like vignettes are cool, they aren't why people buy a book with Beethoven on the front
- decent selection of music, but better conceptualized as a taster than anything comprehensive
- the man himself is boiled down to somewhat of a cliche
- dubious historical accuracy at times
- skip the LPs (this has no bearing on my score of the novel, just bears repeating)
Verdict: 3/5. Entertaining, but I will likely not open it again except to look at the art. The audience attracted by promise of celebrating the life and work of the composer will likely be less satisfied customers, but if it gets more people into Beethoven, it can't be bad.
April 8, 2021
The idea was interesting but did not really work! The idea was to present Beethoven's literary canon: the books which inspired Beethoven's work; the books which were by his side at the time of his death. However, it did not work for a main reason. The vast majority of this graphic novel is dedicated to telling the stories of these books without making the relation between them and Beethoven's specific works clear at all. In other words it is not clear how these literary works shaped his music. This leads to reading a book which seems to hardly talk about Beethoven! There are a few biographical pages in between these stories but only a few and sporadic, random, instantaneous glimpses of his life which do not consist a complete work by any means and which do not help the reader to understand who Beethoven was. The artwork is nice and diverse and I did like most of it. Nonetheless, I would expect a better graphic novel to celebrate last year's Beethoven's anniversary.
May 16, 2022
I wanted to like this more than I did. I will confess I was hoping for more of a graphic novel biography of Beethoven alla Ottaviani and Myrick's brilliant Feynman, but many of the interconnected pieces based on the inspirations of the symphonies, quartets, and others threw me out of the story too often. The Spotify playlist is worth a listen, especially as it is curated by Deutsche Grammophon.
Also I was today years old that I realized that Heiliger Dankgesang was more than just the name of the opposing conductor from the PDQ Bach "version" of Beethoven's Fifth.
Also I was today years old that I realized that Heiliger Dankgesang was more than just the name of the opposing conductor from the PDQ Bach "version" of Beethoven's Fifth.
January 2, 2021
In celebration of Ludwig van Beethoven’s 250th birthday, Brandon Montclair and Frank Marraffino along with Z2 Comics have compiled the works of multiple artists to bring the composer’s music and biography to visual life in an absolutely beautiful graphic novel. Within the novel, there are a few details that many musicians and musical scholars might find frustrating. Random musical terminology is tossed about with little regard to meaning or context. The book at times incorporates the use of completely nonexistent musical terminology. The novel illustrates Beethoven’s introduction to Mozart at 16 (he was actually 17), but fails to highlight the fact that Mozart criticized him for playing his own music (Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor), and told Beethoven to, “Play something of your own,” as opposed to, “Legoto Allegro, Mezzo Forte,” as the novel suggests. And the novel suggests that at some point in their studies, Frank Joseph Haydn referred to music as art and suggested that it should be played with emotion and from the heart in a time when musicians were not considered artists, and few composers connected emotion with their works. But these flaws are easy to set aside. The artwork is beautiful and for the most part the text is brilliant. The manner in which the publisher connects famous literary works with the music of Beethoven, the linear element of the story as it relates to his life and oeuvre, and the way the artists visually represent his deafness and the way music can transport the listener, performer, and composer to a whole new world, are accomplished so beautifully. This is an amazing read for both the avid fan and scholar and the Beethoven novice. There’s a Spotify playlist that can be downloaded that accompanies the book. The source material encompasses music throughout Beethoven’s entire career, from his earliest works to his last, and the writers beautifully illustrate all of the literary elements that inspired each work. The Final Symphony: A Beethoven Anthology is an absolutely gorgeous book and one that I will most certainly revisit over and over again. Happy 250th birthday heir Beethoven!
March 1, 2021
In honor of Beethoven's 250th birthday, this graphic novel connects artistic dramatizations of influential events in the composer's life with depictions of literary works that were inspirational or relevant to his music. The stories as a whole, connected by the thread of Schiller's "Ode To Joy" which became the centerpiece of the choral finale to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, demonstrate the genius of his composition. The presentation gives musical insight into his work suitable for the layman, describing why Beethoven was revolutionary and still has relevance today. (Yes, some historical details are loosely interpreted, and some musical terminology is thrown at the wall to see what sticks.)
The artwork is beautiful throughout, and stylistic changes between the segments are complementary. Standouts from a story perspective are "Turandot" and "Fidelio."
Augmenting the graphic novel is a link to a playlist of both famed and lesser-known works that perfectly complements the text. Musicians Max Richter, Alice Sara Ott, and Ezinma also add a story each relating to the impact Beethoven and his music have had on their lives and the modern world.
This is a celebratory volume that both honors my favorite composer's legacy and sheds perception on his life and work.
The artwork is beautiful throughout, and stylistic changes between the segments are complementary. Standouts from a story perspective are "Turandot" and "Fidelio."
Augmenting the graphic novel is a link to a playlist of both famed and lesser-known works that perfectly complements the text. Musicians Max Richter, Alice Sara Ott, and Ezinma also add a story each relating to the impact Beethoven and his music have had on their lives and the modern world.
This is a celebratory volume that both honors my favorite composer's legacy and sheds perception on his life and work.
June 22, 2021
Neat concept! There’s a Spotify soundtrack that goes with each chapter of Beethoven’s music that inspired the content. Some chapters are about literature that inspired his music and others are about stories in his life. They all connect/flow together to appreciate the impact Beethoven has on the world.
June 16, 2021
A graphic novel dedicated to Beethoven that however hardly talks about him, rather using works that have inspired Beethoven as a pretext to collect disparate stories with different artworks separated by short glimpses in Beethoven's life.
June 21, 2021
I thought the graphic novel was great. But I was unsure how to read along with the playlist they included, since some pieces took longer than it took to read the chapters corresponding to said chapter.
February 12, 2021
inspiring af
April 17, 2021
Interesting stories and some beautiful art, but as a whole not quite what I was expecting.
June 9, 2021
Dos tres, no es una biografía es solo unas historias alrededor de Beethoven,
June 29, 2021
I learned about Beethoven, but the book kinda dragged along.
July 16, 2021
Full review here: https://dearstrangethings.substack.co...
September 23, 2021
Delightful variety of stories and styles, and the playlist curated as a companion piece really rounds this one out well.
did-not-finish
January 12, 2022Got to “Arminius” before giving up. Just not capturing my attention.
January 8, 2025
It was very beautiful and inspiring. I loved the various art styles and the message of the story.
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews