The Emotional Creativity Of Ludwig Van Beethoven

Ludwig van Beethoven has been called one of the greatest composers to ever live. His emotionally charged creations of poetry in music are world renown for their ability to spark feeling into the hearts of those listening. It is often wondered what emotional tragedy in Beethoven s life provoked him to write such awe-inspiring music. Beethoven had many distressing things occur in his life time that could be applied to his music but a major factor has always been his abusive father. As a result of the abuse of his alcoholic father Ludwig van Beethoven became one of the greatest composers by applying the emotions he felt when his father beat him to the music that he wrote.

Ludwig van Beethoven was born on December 17th, 1770 in Bonn, Germany in a downtown alleyway(cowell). During the time of Beethoven s birth all life in Bonn was centered around the palace of the Elector of Cologne(Burke 32). His father, Johann van Beethoven, was a court tenor there(Burke 32). Ludwig s mother, Marie Magdalene Kerverich van Beethoven, bore two other children besides Ludwig. Kasper Anton Karl who was born on April 18th, 1774 and Nicholas Johann who was born on October 2nd, 1776 were the only other surviving children of Maria s six births besides Ludwig(Burke 32).

Ludwig began taking music lessons from his father at a very young age. By the age of five he was playing both the clavier and the violin(Solomon 16). Beethoven had few friends and spent little time playing with other children, although he did play with his brothers from time to time(Burke 33). Young Beethoven was extremely withdrawn from the world around him. Outside of music he understood nothing of a social life. (Solomon 20). Besides being uninterested in friends, young Ludwig was a poor student. His grasp of spelling and arithmetic was insubstantial, but he did learn Latin for the purpose of writing masses(Burke 34).

During this time in Beethoven s life his father was obsessed with making young Ludwig a musician. Johann Beethoven …conducted his son s musical education in a brutal and willful manner. (Solomon 16). Ludwig hated his father and his lessons hung over him like a threat. (Burke 34). A childhood companion of Beethoven s reported that Beethoven s father used violence when it came to making him start his musical studies, and…there were few days when he was not beaten in order to compel him to set himself at the piano. (Solomon 16). The father was not merely strict, but cruel. He treated him [Ludwig] harshly wrote court counselor Krupp and sometimes shut him up in the cellar. (Solomon 16). Beethoven s father was an alcoholic. When he wasn t doing music he was drinking(Burke 35). The beginnings of Ludwig s musical education were unhappy in as much as they were stringently based on his fathers ideas of what a genius should be and, what society s expectations of a musician were in the late 18th century. (Mason http://www.altusdesign.com/beethoven/bio/essay.html). The incredibly cruel part of Johann s plan was that ….his [Johann s] goal was to train his son as a competent court musician while simultaneously limiting his attainments so as to prevent Beethoven from surpassing him-which is to say, from rising to the level of his own father. (Solomon 17).

After several years Johann could not teach Ludwig anymore due to his lack of knowledge. So in the summer of 1779 eccentric actor and musician Tobias Pfeiffer came to Bonn and was invited to stay at the Beethoven s apartment(Solomon 17). Pfeiffer s main connection to the Beethoven family was that he was Johann s drinking partner(Mason http://www.altusdesign.com/beethoven/bio/essay.html). M uer, a cellist in Bonn at the time relates the story …often, when Pfeiffer had been boozing with Beethoven s father in a wine tavern until 11 or 12 o clock, he went home with him, where [they found] Ludwig…in bed sleeping. The father roughly shook him awake, the

boy gathered his wits and, weeping, went to the piano, where he remained, with Pfeiffer seated next to him, until morning. (Solomon 17). Sometimes when Ludwig made mistakes his father and Pfeiffer would beat him on his ears(Mason http://www.altusdesign.com/beethoven/bio/essay.html). This is said to be the cause of Beethoven s deafness later in life.

During the next couple of years young Beethoven began improvising on the piano. When his father saw him doing this he kept him on the violin, but he improvised on that too(Burke 36). Johann tried desperately to subdue his son s attempts at composition and improvisation. What silly trash are you scraping away at now. You know I cant bear that! Scrape according to the notes; otherwise your scraping wont be of much use. he would shout at his son(Solomon 16). Mastery of the art of Improvisation was the Hallmark of the 18th century viruoso and

composer. (Solomon18). When improvising and composing Beethoven set his feelings to music, indicating that he was unprepared to explore his emotions. Johann could see that his son was surpassing him and was not happy about this, but he had to let go.(Solomon 20)

Throughout his second decade young Ludwig began to establish a place for himself in his community(Solomon 20). At the age of eleven he began taking lessons from court organist Christian Gottolo Neefe(Funk and Wagnalls). Ludwig played his first concert when he was twelve, but his father said he was nine(Immortal Beloved). During this time in Ludwig