Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven)/archive1

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[edit] Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven)

Partial self nomination. user:Opus33 is the primary author. I took the article, polished it up, and added a good deal of references following a trip to my University's research library. I'm particularly proud because the article includes a full (copyleft) version of the entire symphony, an ogg for each of the four movements included with the paragraph describing that movement. Raul654 02:50, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

  • Sexy support. Great article, very clean, very thorough, and v interesting—and, to tangent for a moment, it's past time for Wikipedia to get its first classical music FA! We have four 20th-century classical music composer FAs, and not a single pre-20th century one; 14 songs, and not a single one from before 1963 (1955 if you count "My Belarusy"). Symphony No. 5 is a great place to start. -Silence 04:17, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Sexy object until some of Tsavage's and others' points below are addressed and the article is further expanded. Most of the other requests have been mostly relatively easy to resolve (copyediting and all that junk), but the mounting evidence of not being comprehensive is troubling. -Silence 19:13, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Sexy reply. Why would I have said any of the above if any of it wasn't my opinion? It's not as though votes must be in a vacuum. Changing your vote based on new evidence and comments that people make is a good sign, as it shows that one is keeping an open mind to contrary opinions and re-weighing the article according to new criticism. Someone who refuses to change his vote even when he's changed his mind is weakening the system, and I change my mind a lot. :f I still think the article's excellent and would make a worthy FA in the future, but I'd no longer be comfortable with its being FAd right now until some more of the below problems are resolved, so I've changed my vote accordingly. -Silence 09:23, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Sexy apology. Even though I said the above with a light heart (note the smiling emoticon — no attack was intended), I retract what I said. I am very inexperienced at FAC voting; it is an interesting approach you have, and shows humility in the face of new evidence. Thanks for your reply. Saravask 07:49, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Sexy apology acceptance. Thank you for understanding. Though we're kinda getting off-topic for the FAC now, so, back to Beethoven. :o -Silence 19:35, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Object; a very good article, but still needs some work:
  • A number of points that should be directly referenced are not:
  • "Because of the length of time it took for Beethoven to compose the 5th Symphony, its proper chronological place in Beethoven's output often goes unrecognized."
  • I'm not really sure what you mean by this not being referenced. The symphony was composed in bits and pieces over the course of 8 years (as is discussed at length in the article). That music historians have a hard time putting a firm date to it (relative to the other works) is an inevitable consequence. Raul654 05:22, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • I've moved it and slightly rephrased this to make it more clear. Raul654 05:39, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • "Groundbreaking technically and emotionally, the Fifth Symphony has had a large influence on composers and music critics, and inspired work by Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Bruckner, Mahler, and others. The symphony stands with the Third Symphony and Ninth Symphony as the most revolutionary of Beethoven's symphonies, and indeed, all his compositions."
  • Done. Raul654 15:55, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • "Schindler's testimony concerning any point of Beethoven's life is disparaged by experts (he is believed to have forged entries in Beethoven's conversation books), and moreover it is often commented that Schindler offered a highly Romanticized view of the composer."
  • The "Textual questions" section contains a single sub-section and nothing else; is there a reason for the extra level of headings?
  • Fixed. Raul654 05:15, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • The sections on the movements are somewhat unbalanced; it's possible that there is little to be said about the second movement, of course, but the four-sentence section looks unfinished.
  • The inline citations are lost in a sea of other parenthetical notes; particularly egregious is the appearance of "(op. 69)" at the end of a sentence, where it resembles a malformatted citation more than anything else. It may be helpful to use footnotes instead; otherwise, some effort needs to be made to ensure that the citations are clearly distinct from other parentheticals.
  • A valid concern - I have switched over to ref/note style for inline citations and left the opus and other parenthetical information intact. Raul654 05:15, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
Finally, the article needs extensive copyediting; sentences like "That treaty dissolved the Holy Roman Empire, of which Austria had been a province, ceased to exist, and the modern Austrian Empire began" are scattered throughout. I'll try to go over it sometime tomorrow if nobody else has done it by then. Kirill Lokshin 04:19, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
Support now that the changes have been made. Kirill Lokshin 17:42, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

  • Object. It's a good article overall, and I love the fact that it includes free recordings of the music. But some of the writing is awkward. Here's a sentence I can't follow at all: The irony that they were composed by a German was not lost on many of the audience or for the more musically educated that it was 'Fate knocking on the door' of the Third Reich. Also, ending with a parenthesized statement about the Animaniacs is not the most convincing conclusion to the article.

    Something I felt was missing was a description of the four-note motif as a rhythmic motif that appears in other movements. For instance, the scherzo theme takes the short-short-short-long rhythm of the first movement, but stays rather startlingly on the same note for a while. I felt that the scherzo theme didn't get its fair share of description: the article simply mentions that it exists and that it is played by the horns, and moves on. That was a bit disappointing.

    Also, I don't have much of a problem with short paragraphs (see my own nomination at Voting system), but I predict that others will complain. rspeer 04:29, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

    • I've expanded the discussions of the individual movements per Michael Snow's objection below. I believe the things you say are lacking are now adaquently covered. Raul654 15:31, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
      • Not really. The short-short-short-long motif -- the most prominent thing uniting the entire symphony -- is now mentioned once in the introduction, mentioned obscurely as "3+1" in a quote, and never brought up anywhere else. Also, other comments have drawn my attention to the poor writing in the "popular culture" section, and I agree. rspeer 22:47, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • As far as bad grammatical constructions - I fixed the one you cited, and several others have copyedited the article and done some good cleaning up. Raul654 15:32, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • A new objection from me: the footnotes don't work right. Clicking the links doesn't take you to the appropriate places. They're probably out of order. Also, "Ibid" is archaic, although resolving this in a concise way will involve some heavy use of the complex "ref note" and "ref label" templates. I really want this article to get to featured status, but I don't have time to do the research that will get it there. But if it's getting there at some point in the future, I'll help with the technical stuff like footnotes. rspeer 23:46, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Object, sorry. I would forgive a few flaws for an article with recordings of all four movements, but this still has some rather serious problems in my opinion. (Incidentally, perhaps it's time we launched Wikipedia:Featured recordings?) One issue is that the article presents uncritically in the introduction a claim that it is "Beethoven's best known work—the most popular orchestral work of its length". Granted, this is properly quoted, but it appears the quote is more than 70 years old, and the claim is much more dubious today. The first half of the statement is probably untrue, as especially since the fall of the Berlin Wall the Ninth tends to come out ahead of the Fifth in surveys of popularity. My next major concern is the inadequate discussion of the movements from a musical perspective. While a number of things could be said beyond reciting what happens in each movement, the omission of one thing struck me in particular, which relates to the famous theme. In its rhythmic form, the short-short-short-long pattern recurs repeatedly and prominently throughout the entire symphony, not just the first movement (for example, the horns' theme in the third movement). This is an important element of what provides unity to the composition and needs to be discussed. --Michael Snow 06:40, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • I've toned the introduction down a bit. Raul654 07:01, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • I've now expanded on the descriptions of the first, second, and third movements. (particluarly the second) Raul654 15:17, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
      • I think things are a bit better now, although I sympathize with the criticism below of the popular culture section. With respect to the concerns of the non-musical, I tried to make sure that links are provided on the first appearance of specialized terms. More than that would be excessive, I think. There's simply no way you can expect this article to explain all of music theory in order for its meanings to be transparent for the uninitiated. They have to follow the links and educate themselves. --Michael Snow 06:45, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Weak object. It's a good article, no question, and we do not currently have a featured article on a classical "abstract" composition. However it's not quite comprehensive. The discussion of the work's form is somewhat lightweight. While there is a section on the symphony in popular culture, there is no section on the symphony's influence on other classical composers or works (if I can think of two off the top of my head - Martinu's Memorial to Lidice and Vaughan Williams' Fourth - there must be lots!). I may get time to address some of these, but I can't promise. --RobertG ♬ talk 13:35, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • I've significantly expanded discussion of the individual movements in response to the above objections. Raul654 15:38, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • As far as influences on other composers, yes, there is a section - "Reception and influence" Raul654 15:46, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
      • I still have reservations. Perhaps it just doesn't seem to me to be quite up to the best Wikipedia can offer (criterion 1), and perhaps not everything questionable is referenced. I'd certainly like to support, and will probably end up doing so, but don't feel able to quite yet. I will keep trying to come up with concrete suggestions: as soon as I can express my objections I will do so. Meanwhile I will just keep trying to improve the article. Signing off, for now, however. One thing I think would be an improvement : would there be any objection to my rearranging footnotes and references as I did them for Olivier Messiaen? --RobertG ♬ talk 17:50, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Object - That was pretty good! The version I read a few minutes ago flowed quite smoothly (there are a couple of typos). The short paragraphs make for somewhat choppy reading, but it is not too long an article, so that kind of balances it out. I listened to the first movement as provided while reading the rest, which was cool. My objection concerns comprehensiveness. Following my normal practice when "looking up something on the Web", I keyword searched (Google in this case) for "Beethoven Symphony No. 5", and skimmed the first five or six results that seemed promising from the SE excerpt. Every page I visited included at least a couple of items of information that seemed quite relevant, and that were not found in this FAC. I'm no musicologist or even devoted classical fan, so these simply appealed to my general interest and curiosity as to why they weren't treated here.
  • Critical analysis/description not mentioned here:
    • First movement: We must emphasize that the generating motif of this part also appeared in other works, either in the composer’s creation (sonata Appassionata), either in Mozart or Haydn’s works. (this seems important...especially if the "generating motif" is duh-duh-duh-duuuh).
    • Third movement: This is considered to be the key moment of the entire symphony, both psychologically and from the point of view of the musical construction. (Is this a reasonably widely held scholarly opinion/analysis?)
    • Third movement: has a free form, neither scherzo nor intermezzo (contradicts what's here; I dunno a scherzo from a...whatever, but, is this wrong?)
      • It's a scherzo. If one guy says it's not a scherzo, it's because musicologists love to be controversial and revise the common interpretation of a piece. rspeer 22:47, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • is rightly considered a natural continuation of Symphony No. III, "Eroica", because it approaches the same themes and it expresses the relationship between particular and general.
    • Beethoven's Fifth is also historically important: it established the pattern of what later became known as the "finale symphony", i.e. a symphony whose finale assumes a level of importance at least as great as the other movements, if not greater. (Compare, for example, the Eroica; great as the finale undoubtedly is, it is overshadowed by the first two movements).
  • General information not found:
    • It is of his nine symphonies. (only mentioned in a title in References)
    • The name under which it sometimes circulated, " The Symphony of Destiny ", is linked to the words of Anton Felix Schindler... (A title in the References does refer to this)
    • Until the recent, almost inexplicable, supremacy of Vivaldi's 'The Four Seasons', this was the single most recorded piece of classical music ever. (and even second place is interesting...)
    • The symphony is immediately recognizable by its four-note opening motif. Because of the motif's resemblance to the Morse code for the letter V (dot dot dot dash), it was used as a shorthand for the word "victory" to open the BBC's radio broadcasts during World War II from an earlier Wikipedia version, posted on another site; also, from elsewhere: The four notes which launched a thousand resistance raids in World War II (reading this made doubt the whole very contemporary pop culture section, as overblown and an easy way to round this out with some "accessible" stuff for the genreal reader, while ignoring the 5th's cultural effect in previous decades...)
      • This is found (and cited) at the end of the pop culture section. (Someone complained that ending the article on an animaniacs refernece wasn't great style)
    • Written after he became deaf.
      • Incorrect. It was written while he was going deaf (a fact which I thought was in the article but apparently is not). Raul654 11:33, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
        • It was meant as a quick note, but to put a finer point on it, I believe I read that he started having noticeable progressive problems with his hearing mid 1790s, and by around 1800 was probably 60% deaf, often able (from his own letters) to hear the tones but not the words of people in conversation, and to find loud noises painful (recalling best I can what I read a couple days ago). I don't believe deaf simply means stone cold not-hearing deaf... --Tsavage 15:33, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • No significant historical context - What was Beethoven the man going through during the composition years, both in his personal life (was he rich or poor, who working for, social climate, etc;), and in the overall course of his musical life (what stage was he at in his professional evolution kinda thing). This former seems to inadequately addressed in part with the slightly out of place tumultuous times/Napoleon stuff... Examples on the musical career context side:
    • 1792-1802: Viennese period-Symphonies Nos.1 and 2 are composed in this period. In them, Beethoven innovates within the classical style.l 1803-1815: Heroic period-Symphonies Nos. 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 are composed in this period. With these symphonies, Beethoven makes revolutionary breaks with classical style; 1820-1826: Late period-This period is dominated by the most revolutionary and influential composition of Beethoven's entire career: Symphony No. 9.
    • Symphony No. 5: The Expressive Ideal Fully Formed. [...] He subjects form to context. He establishes motivic development as a fundamental of his art. He introduces the concept of drama into the formal layout of movements. He introduces the concept of primal, almost rock-and-roll-like rhythm as a narrative element. And he decrees that music must, above all, be self-expression.
  • No notable recordings/performances - although a potentially controversial area, there should still be some mention of "important" recordings/performances; particularly with the emphasis given to the "textual question"; much of the article relies on quoted and attributed critical opinion, so it wouldn't be inconsistent to rely on the same for a "recordings" section.
These are all first-pass examples only (there are likely more) that immediately jumped out at me... The point is not "perfection", but being able to stand up beside other sources is a good test of comprehensiveness (unless those sources all ALL WRONG). So, I think more work is required. --Tsavage 19:01, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Reluctantly object. There's lots of good stuff here, but
    • (my main objection) the "popular culture section" is toe-curling. "Eventually, Donald joins Goofy in saving Mickey" adds nothing to my understanding of the symphony; things like this are information about the cartoon, not about the symphony. The paragraph on The Simpsons and Hitch-hikers is far too geeky, and tells me more about the preferences of the authors than about the subject of the article.
    • One and two-sentence paragraphs are not good writing.
    • The account of the symphony's influence is lacking. While it's fair enough to say "Every significant symphony since has been written under the influence of this achievement or in reaction against it", the article also specifies that, "the Fifth Symphony ... inspired work by such composers as Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Bruckner, Mahler, and Hector Berlioz". The obvious question is then: which work(s)?
    • Other than the Hoffmann quote, there's a lack of criticism generally.
    • "The symphony is one of the most often-played orchestral works of its length" is an awkward formulation, and as has been mentioned above, a 70-year old citation is not impressive support for a claim about the symphony's popularity now. I'd just say "The symphony is one of the most popular in the repertoire", which there's no dispute about and which therefore doesn't need a citation at all. Mark1 19:29, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • Object: Full of jargon. Many terms are used without definition or description (from just the first paragraph, we have "sonata allegro", "andante", and "scherzo"). Section 3.3 tells me that the second "is a lyrical work in theme and variation forms in rondo". I have utterly no idea what that means; I thought that there generally weren't any lyrics in Beethoven's music. Terms which are "basic" to musically-educated individuals, like "movement", should receive at least brief definitions. The first section announces that it's going to show us a four-note motif, then proudly illustrates eight notes; I assume that this discrepancy is related to what a "motif" is in music jargon. -- Creidieki 00:28, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
    • The four note motif is short-short-short-long. It's used twice right at the beginning of the symphony - hence 8 notes. Raul654 00:30, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
    • As to the rest of this objection - the purpose of using internal links is so we don't have to define every bit of technical jargon -- especially basic ones. And (no disrespect intended) if you don't know something as basic as what a movement is, then it's a bit unfair to complain that you didn't understand the entire article. Raul654 11:13, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
      • You shouldn't dismiss this objection like that. If this article is featured, that means it's good enough to go on the main page, at which point it's being exposed to lots of people who probably know or can figure out what a "movement" is, but will have not a clue what "lyrical work" or similar terms mean. Hell, I'm not entirely sure what "lyrical work" means (I do music theory much more than music history). You can assume that your audience is somewhat educated, but not that they are all musicians. rspeer 23:38, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
      • You're probably right that "movement" may have been too basic an example. But I strongly disagree that internal links should be used to provide dictdefs. I've been taking the view that a Featured Article should lead someone through exactly enough context to understand the concepts involved. A general reader should be able to get through this article with a basic understanding of the points made without having to go through subarticles. I'm not saying that someone could learn all of music theory from reading the article, or that an uneducated reader should understand every subtlety of the article. But they should be able to read the article from start to finish. I see that as one of the real strengths of Wikipedia -- we have a separate document about every concept, so that you can learn about Beethoven's Fifth without having to read a book about music theory first. I'm still developing my opinions on this, though; I'm very open to debate. -- Creidieki 23:54, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
        • I think that this criticism is bizarre. Leaving aside "lyrical", which I would hope is a part of any remotely educated person's vocabulary, defining terms like "rondo" would be patronising and redundant- we must have hundreds of articles which mention rondos, so it surely makes more sense to define it once in one article than to do so a hundred times in a hundred articles. Mark1 00:40, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
          • Whoa! I consider myself "remotely educated", and I'm even a musician, though I admit I have serious gaps in my knowledge of music history. And I don't know what it actually means for a symphonic piece to be "lyrical". Something vague about a flowing melody comes to mind, but I don't know any criterion for saying that one piece is lyrical and another isn't. Including this kind of term without at least a cursory explanation is creating an unnecessary barrier to entry in reading this article. rspeer 00:31, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
            • "Lyrical" here is not a term of art (which is why it's such a poor example of the point); it just means "in the manner of a lyric" (roughly, in an expressive, singing style). Mark1 00:42, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
          • I couldn't agree with Creidieki's comment more, as in: The perfect article...is nearly self-contained; includes and explains all essential terminology required in the article, such that someone could completely understand the subject without having to read many other articles. When I read an article, I want to come out understanding something with a feeling of completion, not a more or less vague, "oh, I get the general idea, um, maybe I'll do some more reading...sometime." This is largely a function of the quality of the writing, which is more than proper grammar and syntax and a spellcheck, it's how the topic is presented. A simple recounting of the facts just doesn't do it, unless the reader is only rushing to look up some trivia or a date or something, not for understanding. Terms very common to a subject area (like, I take it, rondo) don't have to be explained, if they are properly put in context. A well-written piece has the "average" reader (here, the target is a GENERAL audience, I believe) thinking along, supplying connections, getting into the flow, not stumbling on unfamiliar terminology. I don't this is being overly detailed, and I'm not thinking of some theoretical LCD test dummy reader. For example, I read the comment about the four-note motif, with the two measure, 8-note illustration -- I hadn't registered that as a negative, because I have a small degree of musical literacy, and a familiarity with the 5th (so I hummed the two bars). But that's already way too much knowledge to require someone to bring to the piece: if I just had a vague idea of "notes" and counted to eight, I'd personally be confused. This, uh (no insult to anyone intended) presumptuous type of error is measured as the writing style and quality. I've read a few FAs that REALLY BOTHER ME, because they are "good" but they still don't work (except maybe for more specialized audiences, who probably don't need 'em). The stuff that jumped so easily out at me from other pages regarding this article (as noted in my objection), probably did so because I didn't feel I was catching the full story here. --Tsavage 01:02, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
          • If movement was an unfortunate example, so was rondo, at least, regarding internal links. Here is what the Wikipedia stub leads with: Rondo, and its French equivalent rondeau, is a word that has been used in music in a number of ways, most often in reference to a musical form, but also in reference to a character-type that is distinct from the form. Huh? I can figure out the rest of the article, but it's not good... There are, according to Google, "about 264" instances of rondo in Wikipedia (which include a few references to a Japanese video game called Demon Castle Dracula X: Rondo of Blood). --Tsavage 01:39, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
          • I don't presume to lecture anyone here, simply to hopefully fully clarify my point about how the writing style can (and, here, should) put things in context. This example is from the FAC Ido lead; it is a basic writing device (an example, but worded more as an explanation that works into the flow) that presents a not-so-common-term in a context that makes it accessible to contextual understanding (and it has an internal link; also, the preceding sentences of the lead describing Ido support this understanding):
This is much in the same way that English is often used as a lingua franca at present in various international gatherings, , but Ido was made to be grammatically regular, phoenetic, and as the first language of none, to favour no one who might otherwise have an advantage in expression with his or her native language. (contrast this with something like, "Ido is a type of lingua franca. Onwards..."; compare with the use of rondo, or other terms in this FAC) --Tsavage 14:48, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Minor Objection Much like User:Creidieki, I am completely non-musical and hence I probably can't glean as much from this article as a musician. I have no problem with using detailed, concise terminology further into the article, but I think the introduction should be "dumbed" down a bit, in particular the picture of the notes in the introduction replaced/supplanted by a description. As for making the entire article accessable to everyone- it would probably require something the length of a book for me to understand the "Form" section (not to mention that I'm not really interested in that, but rather the other sections like "History" and "Popular Culture", which I find perfectly accessable). Sortan 04:06, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment: Several users have responded to my complaint that it's difficult for a person without musical education to read this article. I'd propose adding two sections (or subsections) at the beginning of the article -- "Symphonies" and "Beethoven". The "Symphonies" section would present historical background and context on symphonies, talking about how they were a common type of music in the time, and what their common musical features usually were. The "Beethoven" section would mention who Beethoven is, and talk about the features of his music. These two sections would give the reader a much clearer picture of the setting for this article, and would allow you to define some of the common terminology without being intrusive. I would imagine each of those sections being perhaps two paragraphs in length.
And I do feel strongly that having this material in the article leads to a better article than simply letting internal links do the trick. These kind of background sections make the article easier to read from start to finish, and allow us to only talk about the *relevant* parts of the background material. -- Creidieki 07:35, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • SUSUSU-PORT SUSUSU-PORT It is incredably difficult to adequtely describe in words any musical masterpiece. I believe it was another composer, Elvis Costello who said "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture". The difficulty of this task is further compounded by the need to reach both general and specialized audiences of readers. I think this article does about as good a job as any in rising to the challenge and doing justice to Ludwig Van's best known work.--R.D.H. (Ghost In The Machine) 20:04, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Oppose. There are a number of positive aspects: the focus on a prominent work by a famous composer; the use of two good images (although more would be welcome); the inclusion of a full recording of the symphony; and the use of music notation to illustrate two motifs from the work. However, the article falls significantly short of several FA requirements.
    • The lead fails to succinctly summarise the entire topic (Criterion 3a).
    • Much of the writing is clumsy, even sloppy, rather than ‘compelling, even brilliant’ (Criterion 2a).
      • The disjointed paragraphing damages the flow in a text that purports to cover a serious and multifaceted topic. The insistence on one- and two-sentence paragraphs would be suitable for a narrow-column newpaper article, where the visual impact is much less intrusive, and a lower level of concentration and a shorter time commitment by readers is expected. Here, the staccato paragraphing makes it hard for both non-musicians and musicians to read, and looks untidy on the screen.
    • The language of almost every sentence needs work. Here are some examples at random from the first two sections.
      • ‘is one of the most’ occurs twice in the second sentence.
      • ‘and achieved its prodigious reputation soon afterwards’—shouldn’t that be simply ‘and soon achieved its prodigious reputation’?
      • We have ‘four-note’ and in the following sentence ‘4-note’—which is it to be?
      • ‘It is in the usual four movements’—usual for what? Throughout much of the previous century, three movements were ‘usual’.
      • In the final sentence/paragraph of the lead, ‘it has resurfaced numerous times’—first, does ‘it’ refer to the motif, the whole symphony, or (more likely) excerpts from the symphony; second, ‘resurfaced’ assumes that it’s been submerged (please explain to the poor reader, or use a better word).
      • 'date back as early as’—Do you mean 'date back to as early as'?
      • 'Eroica'—it’s usually expressed as the Eroica.
      • ‘began to make fragmentary sketches on the "C-minor symphony"’—‘on’ should be ‘for’.
      • as a ‘catharsis’ in relation to what? (This word is unnecessarily erudite here, and in any case is not entirely appropriate.) The use of ‘also’ later in the sentence introduces a layer of fog.
      • There are many redundancies; for example: ‘Because of the length of time it took for Beethoven to compose the 5th Symphony’.
      • There are typos (such as ‘charcter’ and ‘tacity’).
  • There are problems with balance, logical flow, and control of detail, and in places the article fails to ‘stay tightly focused on the main topic’. The History section doesn’t start by locating the work within the classical style, and within Beethoven’s stylistic development—this would be standard fare for concert program notes, aimed at giving music lovers a bird’s eye view. Instead, we’re asked to wade through a long list of the many other works that occupied the composer around this time, before much is said about the Fifth Symphony itself. It might have been useful if these other works had cast some musical light on his composition of the Fifth, but here, it’s an obstruction to engaging the reader in the excitement of the work itself. There’s a historical divergence that doesn’t flow smoothly from or to anything: ‘At the end of that year, Napoleon and Austria signed a treaty dissolving the Holy Roman Empire, of which Austria had been a part. As a result, the modern Austrian Empire was created.’ Yet there’s no mention of the military references in the work. Why not conflate the History subsections, make it flow smoothly and cogently, and remove some of the less important material?
  • The section on Form is superficial and far from comprehensive (Criterion 2b), and ends up being a wandering list of points rather than flowing prose. The ‘storybook’ approach of trying to describe in words what happens in the music just dabbles at the edges; why is it necessary at all when the recording is included?
  • Some of the quotes are over the top (Criterion 2d) and unsupported by specific evidence (Criterion 2c).
  • Can the saturation or sharpness or exposure of the second image be adjusted so that the print is easier to discern?
  • The recording: I’ve heard more characterful readings, but the recordings and the performance are amazingly good under the circumstances (see Fulda Symphonic Orchestra), and we should be pleased to have them when audio copyright is so difficult to obtain. Most of the shortcomings can't be blamed on the high proportion of amateurs in the orchestra. For example, it’s a pity that the conductor clips short most of the dramatic rests in the first movement, like a nervous round at a gymkhana. The recording lacks clarity—and even booms—in the mid-to-low range, which you might be able to minimise with the Audacity program; it would have been so easy to adjust at the time of the recording. Can you remove the excessively long silences at the start of each movement (10 seconds for the first movement)?

It's not good enough this time round. Tony 15:54, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

  • Comment That was an awfully polite and precise way to tear an article to shreds...
  • Losing "control of detail" is a cool concept, it sounds alarming (I love learning new special terms...).
  • The quality of the interpretation is a major point. My frame of musical reference is basically "pop", and by ears aren't finely tuned, so this consideration was only peripheral for me. Now, however, I don't think I could comfortably listen to this version with visions of a "nervous round at a gymkhana" twitching in my head. For classical music, where interpretation is a particularly big factor, there should be more of an accounting for the choice of samples. We wouldn't expect tribute band covers as samples for pop songs, at least, not without a lot of explanation; this is not exactly the same situation, but seems similar enough. Are there not accepted "reference" recordings (for example, that would be used in a music appreciation course)? Might well-selected 30-second samples of such do a better (fair and balanced) job than a full recording that does not adequately represent the material? --Tsavage 18:37, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Support: Seems like an in-depth and accurate article. The page has been significantly improved by the reaction to comment here. Its FA material. Giano | talk 10:49, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Questions: From the article, can you answer these two questions: 1. How is the Fifth positioned in the history of classical music?; 2. What stage in Beethoven's musical development does the Fifth represent? 3. This is Beethoven's fifth symphony—how many symphonies did he compose in all? My objections, and some of the others above, in part address the absence of what seems to me like basic information, and they haven't been answered or remedied as far as I can see. --Tsavage 19:07, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Since the nomination has now closed, it's probably best to take it to the talk page (if you're interested in the article rather than the nomination per se). Mark1 19:19, 6 December 2005 (UTC)