The Habsburg Emperor Joseph II died on February 20, 1790. Amusingly but unfairly caricatured by Peter Shaffer in his play Amadeus, Joseph was an enlightened monarch who introduced many reforms. His brother Maximilian Franz, equally enlightened, was the Elector of Cologne; one of the musicians in his service at the court in Bonn was the young Beethoven. A few days after Joseph’s death, the composer was commissioned to write a funeral cantata for a memorial service on March 19. But the planned performance was abandoned two days before the service and the cantata wasn’t heard until it was rediscovered and performed in Vienna in 1884.

It consists of seven numbers: the opening chorus, which also concludes the work, is a fine early example of Beethoven in C minor, solemnity leading to gentler phrases in the relative major. Michael Tilson Thomas and what sounds like a large body of San Franciscans, both choral and orchestral, manage the dynamic contrasts very well. Andrew Foster-Williams gives a vivid account, ranging over nearly two octaves, of Joseph crushing the head of ‘the monster called Fanaticism’. Beethoven recycled the aria for soprano and chorus when he came to write ‘O Gott! O welch’ ein Augenblick’ in Leonore (and, less extensively, in Fidelio). The last aria, Adagio con affetto in E flat, breathes the air of The Magic Flute and The Creation, as yet unwritten. Sally Matthews sustains the long phrases with warm, consolatory tone.

The symphony is neatly done. I particularly enjoyed the horn’s top Es in the Larghetto. Apart from the applause, you wouldn’t know an audience was present.