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LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN

Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer. He was born in 1770 at Bonn and died in 1827. At a very early stage his father sensed his talent and forced piano and violin lessons on him in the hope of creating a prodigy who would keep the family in luxury. When the widowed and frequently drunken father was dismissed from his post, Ludwig at the age of nineteen found himself responsible for the upkeep of his father, two brothers, and a sister who died while young. He gave lessons and played viola in the Opera orchestra until, under the patronage of Count Waldstein, and possibly with a recommendation from Joseph Haydn, he was given introductions to contacts in Vienna, where he spent most of the rest of his life. Other distinguished patrons were, in the fashion and necessity of the time, to receive dedications from Beethoven in subsequent years, though his wayward and often boorish temperament led him to quarrel with many of them and with many musicians, relatives and friends. A key figure within the Romantic movement,

Beethoven broke with all previous traditions of patronage and servitude. Not for him the steady employment of Joseph Haydn, the humiliations of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart at the hands of archbishops, or the deference of composer and player to petty princelings: he believed that a great artist should be free to create without the constraints of regular employment. He accepted a small regular income from three noblemen without ever deigning to bow to their dictates; and when an audience failed to treat him with the adoration to which he felt entitled, as when they laughed after he had knocked over a couple of candles while performing one of his own concertos at a concert, he was capable of storming off the stage and refusing to reappear. In his own time he was more highly regarded as a pianist than as a composer, especially as an improviser in aristocratic houses and the concert hall. It was not unreasonable that during such highly acclaimed recitals he should introduce piano and chamber works of his own.

The passion of his playing, his compositions, and his rough speech entranced many wealthy listeners and patrons; but at the same time the mere whiff of such patronage was enough to enrage the composer. He met many attractive and well-to-do women, and seems to have fallen in love with quite a number; but his gaucheness made it impossible for him ever to pursue these desires, and he never married. In 1801 he started to go deaf and by 1819 it was impossible for anyone to hold a conversation with him. He composed five piano concertos, a violin concerto, sonatas, nine symphonies, chamber music and other pieces.
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