ABSTRACT
The conclusion seeks to identify the impact that an acknowledgment of the significance of Beethoven’s songs might have for our understanding of the lyric impulse. Like Abbate, the author challenges Edward Cone’s notion of a ‘monophonic single voice’ in lyric song in favour of ‘potentially multiple musical voices’. And yet it would be misleading to describe Beethoven’s songs as ‘unsung’ in the Abbate sense. The preceding discussion of Beethoven’s songs would suggest he did join in with the voices of the poets he was setting. Yet what he passed on was often raw, as though he were waiting for others to respond in their turn. The book seeks to convey my responses to the ingredients of Beethoven’s songs as patterns of voice that might provoke further soundings from both performers and listeners.
