question-about-beethoven
Write thorough, clear answers to the following questions. Your answers must be based on information provided in the assigned readings or viewing/listening materials. Some of these questions have multiple parts and require multi-part answers. If you quote directly from the reading, be sure to show that by using quotation marks. If you don’t use quotation marks when taking text from another source, you have committed plagiarism and will fail the assignment. Only use direct quotations when necessary: I want to see you using your own words. Get your information from the assigned materials, NOT from outside Googling.
- In response to the idea that Beethoven was black, Broyles thinks that the question “Is that true?” is less important than another question. What’s the other question that Broyles is more interested in, and why does he find this other question more important?
- “I Can” by Nas samples from Beethoven’s “Für Elise.” What is the song’s overall message, and how does it relate to specific concepts/important historical movements you read about in the chapter on Beethoven and blackness by Broyles? Specifically, consider the lyrics of the third verse, which begins at 2:39. Why do you think that Nas chose to sample “Für Elise” in this song?
- What does Broyles mean when he writes that “the twentieth century in effect witnessed two Ninth Symphonies”? Relate the concept of the “two Ninth Symphonies” to how the piece has been used for very different purposes in films from the 1990s to the present. Discuss a minimum of two specific films released between 1990 and the present in your answer. You may discuss films mentioned by Broyles, or you may discuss other films from 1990 and later that use music by Beethoven
