Beethoven composed his Romance in F Major for solo violin accompanied by a small orchestra consisting of flute, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 horns, and strings. It dates from 1798 but wasn’t published until 1805, when it acquired the chronologically deceptive label of Opus 50.
It’s possible that Beethoven’s Romance in F Major originated as a slow movement to the Violin Concerto that Beethoven was working on in Bonn in the early 1790s. A fragment of the first movement of that concerto was later catalogued as WoO 5 (Day 24).
#Beethoven250 Day 109
Romance in F Major for Violin and Orchestra (Opus 50), 1798
French violinist Renaud Capuçon (@RCapucon) performs with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, conducted by Kurt Masur.
Beethoven’s Opus 50 Romance in F Major is sometimes called his “Romance No. 2” because his Romance in G Major was composed in 1801 and published in 1803 as Opus 40. Hence the G Major Romance became “No. 1” despite being composed later than the F Major.
#Beethoven250 Day 109
Romance in F Major for Violin and Orchestra (Opus 50), 1798
In a version with just piano accompaniment, the Romance in F Major becomes a showcase for young violinists, such as New Zealander Geneva Lewis.
In Beethoven’s day, the word “Romance” more commonly described slow movements of larger works (as in both Haydn and Mozart) rather than independent compositions. Later in the 19th century, many composers wrote works they called “Romances.”
#Beethoven250 Day 109
Romance in F Major for Violin and Orchestra (Opus 50), 1798
The Opus 50 Romance is also performed by flutists. I believe this arrangement is by Theobald Böhm, the famous creator of the modern flute fingering system.
Here's Kant on the French Revolution:
The revolution which we have seen taking place in our own times in a nation of gifted people may succeed, or it may fail. It may be so filled with misery and atrocities that no right-thinking man would ever decide to make the same experiment again at such a price, even if he could hope to carry it out successfully at the second attempt. But I maintain that this revolution has aroused in the hearts and desires of all spectators who are not themselves caught up in it a sympathy which borders almost on enthusiasm, although the very utterance of this sympathy was fraught with danger. It cannot therefore have been caused by anything other than a moral disposition within the human race. — from “The Contest of Faculties” (1798)