[Homer_J_Simpson]

[Continued from January 19 (reply #87).]

Tuesday night Eisfeld’s third concert. The Quartette in F, Beethoven’s Opus 19, was not intelligible to me, but admirable in the better informed judgment of others (for example, J.J. Post, who had heard it before). Eckart’s trio, Opus 18 – Hoffman at the piano, as extemporized substitute for the great Gottschalk, who was ill; clear, fluent, and pretty, particularly the scherzo manifestly the germ of the old “Gaily the Troubadour” melody. Haydn’s Quartette in G, No. 63, very familiar and genial. Last night a big, slow, splendid ball at Mrs. Peter Schermerhorn’s in University Place.

The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas

Theodore Eisfeld’s Wikipedia page

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[Tax-chick]

I can just picture the big, slow, splendid ball.

[Seizethecarp]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Eisfeld

“On Eisfeld’s return trip from a visit to Europe in September 1858, he was one of the few survivors of the burning of the steamship SS Austria where he was lashed to a platform and so drifted on the ocean, without food, for nearly two days and nights. Eisfeld never recovered from this extraordinary prostration, returning to Germany in 1866, and remained there until his death in Wiesbaden at 66.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Austria

“...a decision was made[by whom?] to fumigate steerage by dipping a red-hot chain into a bucket of tar; the chain became too hot for the boatswain to hold, and it was dropped onto the deck, which immediately burst into flames; although the ship was traveling at only half speed it was impossible to stop the engines as the engine crew had become asphyxiated. When the helmsman abandoned the wheel, the ship swung into the wind, spreading the flames down the length of the ship, racing through the mahogany veneer and varnished bulkheads, as passengers jumped into the sea. The passing barque, Maurice of France rescued most of the survivors, and the Catarina of Norway picked up more the next morning. As the blackened hulk was left to sink, all but 65 of 538 passengers were lost.”

[BroJoeK]

Strong: "The Quartette in F, Beethoven’s Opus 19, was not intelligible to me, but admirable in the better informed judgment of others..."

Those words "not intelligible" I'd apply to something from, say, John Cage, never to Beethoven.
And, I can't find a quartet for Beethoven's Opus 19, leading me to wonder if Strong doesn't mean some other Opus 19 quartet?
But if he is referring to the following Opus 19 concerto, I think it's delightful and you can judge for yourselves:

Bethoven's Opus 19, Piano concerto

Here is another quartet in F, Opus 19, but not by Beethoven.
Also delightful.

[Homer_J_Simpson]

Continued from January 22 (reply #91).

The Diary of George Templeton Strong, Edited by Allan Nevins and Milton Halsey Thomas

Francis Lieber Wikipedia page