Beethoven's Ninth - a Political History

In this remarkable history of one of the most popular symphonic works of the modern period, Esteban Buch traces the complex and contradictory uses - and abuses - of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony since its premiere in 1824. Sensitive and fascinating, this account of the tangled political existence of the symphony is a rare book that explores the life of an artwork through time, as it is shifted and realigned with the currents of history.