Ferdinand Hérold ~ Piano Concerto No. 3 in A major

Image via la Wik

The Nineteenth Century was the golden age of Classical music.  A revolution of lyricism had swept away the older, more mathematical style of Bach and even Mozart.  Now music was expected to connect with the emotions, a shift in appeal from left brain to right brain that's never been reversed.

Beethoven is best known as the flag bearer of this revolution at the very beginning of the century.  He famously tore up the dedication for his Third Symphony - originally an homage to Napoleon - when he found that the First Consul had crowned himself Emperor.  That fixes the date nicely for musicologists.

But Beethoven was by no means alone. Ferdinand Hérold who dies young from tuberculosis on this day in 1833 is one of the most lyrical composers of that most lyrical age.  He, too, composed for the Napoleon family, and had to scramble to find new patrons after 1815.  But find them he did, and one can only wonder what marvellous music he would have composed had be not been struck down in his prime.