Today, could we find a quiet moment to close our eyes and listen
to hope? Alice Sciscioli Pratt, an instructor at the Hochstein
School of Music, shares her thoughts Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony…
Hope never eludes me when I reach the fourth movement of the
famous Ninth Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven. It was his last
symphony before he died. Deaf at the time of its composition and
first performance and having lived through such a tumultuous
time in history, what was in his heart that, at the very end of
his life’s work, propelled the vision of hope despite such
bleakness? The most famous section of this movement includes the
setting of the poem “Ode to Joy”, by the German poet Friedrich
von Schiller. There have been countless other lyrics put to
Beethoven’s melody and it found its way into many a hymnal,
suggesting that there is something inherent in those notes about
the love of our God with or without the original poem. But the
most thrilling version is the one from its source. Besides the
melody, the orchest