Beethoven jako aktor historyczny. Perspektywa mikrohistoryczna w muzykologii
Beethoven as a Historical Actor. Microhistorical Perspective in Musicology

Summary/Abstract: The article focuses on issues of microhistory and the usefulness of this historiographical practice in musicological research. The au-thor begins by presenting the key issues relating to microhistory, referring extensively to the book What Is Microhistory? by István M. Szijártó and Sigurður Gylfi Magnússon. She then quotes and briefly discusses the most significant musicological works which employed microhistorical strategy. These are Mark Everist’s book Music Drama at the Paris Odéon, 1824–1828,Tamara Levitz’s Modernist Mysteries: Perséphone and Peter J. Schmelz’s article “Shostakovich” Fights the Cold War: Reflections from Great to Small. The main part of the text is devoted to Mark Ferraguto’s monograph Beethoven 1806. That pub-lication is wholly based on the microhistorical approach, thus open-ing a new perspective in reflection on the instrumental works by the Master from Bonn. Ferraguto analyses Beethoven’s works from 1806 and early 1807 in the context of the people and the instruments for which they were composed; he also explores the nature of and reasons for the composer’s retreat from the „heroic phase”, analysing various aspects of contemporary musical, social and political life in Vienna. He does so while concentrating on selected, characteristic moments which define the given opus. Unlike the earlier musicological works based on the microhistor-ical strategy, Ferraguto’s monograph is not overburdened with detail, but makes an excellent job of linking contextual issues with analysis of musical composition. In this way it enriches musicological research by providing it with a new, interesting dimension

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