Beethoven His Greatest Creations Were The Ones

Beethoven: His Greatest Creations Were The Ones He Would Never Hear Essay, Research Paper

Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany, and was baptized on Dec. 17, 1770. There is no record of his actual birth date. He came from a family of musicians. His father and grandfather worked for the Elector of Cologne. Beethoven’s grandfather, Lodewyk van Beethoven came from Belgium and joined the court orchestra in Bonn as a bass player and eventually became its conductor. Beethoven’s father Johann was a professional tenor at the court in Bonn and also played piano and violin. Johann was an ambitious, yet unstable man who drank excessively and had a volatile temper. Beethoven began to exhibit his outstanding musical talent at a young age. Because of this his father’s ambition, Beethoven was pushed to become a child prodigy. Johann eventually gave up on this prospect when Beethoven‘s recitals were only marginally successful. When he turned 11, he left school and became an assistant organist to Christian Gottlob Neefe at the court of Bonn. Beethoven learned much from him and the other musicians at court. In 1783 he joined the Bonn opera and accompanied their rehearsals on keyboard. In 1787, he was sent to Vienna to take further lessons from Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Two months later, however, he was called back to Bonn by the death of his mother. His mother’s death exasperated his fathers drinking Johann soon become a very abusive alcoholic. Beethoven was forced to undertake the bulk of the family’s support by the age of 18. These circumstances of his youth might have contributed to Beethoven’s eccentric personality and to the perfection that he placed on himself and his music. “His idiosyncratic working methods, his mournful isolation through deafness and the nobility of his total dedication to his art was what endowed him as almost a mythical figure” (Hopkins, 1986). He started to play the viola in the Opera Orchestra in 1789, while also teaching in composing. Upon meeting Franz Joseph Haydn in 1790 Beethoven moved to Vienna permanently when Haydn who agreed to instruct him in Vienna. He received financial support from Prince of Vienna Karl Lichnowsky, to whom he dedicated his Piano Sonata in C minor (The Path.tique).

It was around this time that Beethoven’s began the first of his three major periods of work. Most critics and scholars divide Beethoven’s work into three general periods, omitting the earliest years of his apprenticeship in Bonn. Although some pieces do not fit exactly into the scheme, these divisions can be used to broadly categorize the composer’s work. The first period is know as his Viennese (or High) Classical period it lasted from about 1792 to about 1800 and consists of music whose most salient features are typical of the classical era. This first period is influenced heavily by Haydn’s instruction as well as Mozart’s. This is evident in Beethoven’s early chamber music, as well as in his first two piano concerti and his first symphony. Beethoven individuality and style gradually developed in this first period but in general the much of the music was based in many of Haydn’s methods such as the use of dramatic silence (Solomon, 1998). Beethoven added his own subtle additions, including sudden changes of dynamics, but for the most part was constructed and adhered to the sensibilities of the classical period. He composed mainly for the piano during this period. These works include Symphony no. 1 in C (1800), his first six string quartets, and the Path.tique (1799). Arguably Mozart was first to master the Viennese Classical style. However Beethoven can be given credit for extending it. He composed sonatas for the cello that in combination with the piano opened the era of the Classic-Romantic cello sonata. In addition, his sonatas for violin and piano became the cornerstones of the sonata duo repertory. By about 1800 his experimentation with additions to the standard forms made it apparent that he had mastered and reached the limits of Viennese Classical style (Solomon, 1998).

Beginning in the late 1790’s, an increasing buzzing and humming in his ears sent Beethoven into a panic, searching doctor after doctor for a cure. He would continue to search the rest of his life for a cure even after he had become completely deaf. By 1802 Beethoven was convinced that the condition not only was permanent, but also was getting progressively worse. This lead him write a document that would later be know as the “Heiligenstadt Testament” in October of that year. The Testament was intended to be read by his two brothers. In it Beethoven expressed his certainty of his growing deafness, his consequent despair, and suicidal considerations. He speaks of suicide in the same breath as a reluctance to die, expressing his helplessness against the inevitability of death (Solomon, 1998). He also states he would not surrender to that “jealous demon, my wretched health” before proving to himself and the world the extent of his skill. Beethoven keeping faith in his art and ability and coming to terms with his condition moves on to “develop all my artistic capacities.” Beethoven leaves what is beyond his control to what must be and tries to make a fresh start. However, despite it all, he reveals in the Testament a determination, though weak and exhausted, to carry on-”I would have ended my life …it was only my art that held me back”. He has set his tired old self (the almost-deaf and