How Did Beethovens Attitude About Art Influence How Many Compositions He Wrote?

Forth with Mozart, Beethoven is probable 1 of the all-time known composers, and his 5th symphony is undoubtedly one of the best known works of classical music. Of the three composers we report in the Classical era, Beethoven exerted the greatest influence on the composers of the Romantic menstruum that followed. Beethoven's music represents a transition from Classical to Romantic style.

Biography

Background and early life

Figure 1. Beethoven's birthplace at Bonngasse 20, now the Beethoven House museum

Beethoven was the grandson of Lodewijk van Beethoven (1712–73), a musician from Mechelen in the Southern Netherlands (at present part of Belgium), who at the age of twenty moved to Bonn. Lodewijk (the Dutch cognate of High german Ludwig) was employed every bit a bass singer at the court of the Elector of Cologne, eventually rising to become Kapellmeister (music director). Lodewijk had one son, Johann (1740–1792), who worked as a tenor in the aforementioned musical establishment and gave lessons on piano and violin to supplement his income. Johann married Maria Magdalena Keverich in 1767; she was the daughter of Johann Heinrich Keverich, who had been the caput chef at the courtroom of the Archbishopric of Trier.

Beethoven was built-in of this spousal relationship in Bonn. At that place is no authentic record of the appointment of his birth; notwithstanding, the registry of his baptism, in a Roman Catholic service at the Parish of St. Regius on 17 December 1770, survives. As children of that era were traditionally baptised the solar day later on nativity in the Catholic Rhine state, and it is known that Beethoven's family and his instructor Johann Albrechtsberger celebrated his birthday on 16 December, virtually scholars accept xvi Dec 1770 as Beethoven'south engagement of birth. Of the 7 children born to Johann van Beethoven, only Ludwig, the second-born, and two younger brothers survived infancy.Caspar Anton Carl was born on viii April 1774, and Nikolaus Johann, the youngest, was born on two Oct 1776.

Beethoven's first music teacher was his male parent. Although tradition has information technology that Johann van Beethoven was a harsh teacher, and that the child Beethoven, "made to stand at the keyboard, was often in tears," the Grove Lexicon of Music and Musicians claimed that no solid documentation supported this, and asserted that "speculation and myth-making have both been productive." Beethoven had other local teachers: the court organist Gilles van den Eeden (d. 1782), Tobias Friedrich Pfeiffer (a family friend, who taught Beethoven the pianoforte), and Franz Rovantini (a relative, who instructed him in playing the violin and viola).Beethoven'southward musical talent was obvious at a immature age. Johann, enlightened of Leopold Mozart's successes in this expanse (with son Wolfgang and daughter Nannerl), attempted to exploit his son every bit a kid prodigy, claiming that Beethoven was six (he was 7) on the posters for Beethoven's get-go public performance in March 1778.

Some fourth dimension afterwards 1779, Beethoven began his studies with his most important instructor in Bonn, Christian Gottlob Neefe, who was appointed the Court'southward Organist in that year. Neefe taught Beethoven limerick, and by March 1783 had helped him write his kickoff published composition: a set of keyboard variations (WoO 63). Beethoven shortly began working with Neefe as assistant organist, at outset unpaid (1781), and then as a paid employee (1784) of the court chapel conducted by the Kapellmeister Andrea Luchesi. His offset three piano sonatas, named "Kurfürst" ("Elector") for their dedication to the Elector Maximilian Friedrich (1708–1784), were published in 1783. Maximilian Frederick noticed Beethoven'due south talent early, and subsidised and encouraged the young man's musical studies.

Figure ii. A portrait of the xiii-year-old Beethoven by an unknown Bonn main (c. 1783)

Maximilian Frederick'due south successor as the Elector of Bonn was Maximilian Franz, the youngest son of Empress Maria Theresa of Austria, and he brought notable changes to Bonn. Echoing changes made in Vienna by his brother Joseph, he introduced reforms based on Enlightenment philosophy, with increased support for teaching and the arts. The teenage Beethoven was almost certainly influenced by these changes. He may besides take been influenced at this time by ideas prominent in freemasonry, as Neefe and others around Beethoven were members of the local affiliate of the Society of the Illuminati.

In March 1787 Beethoven traveled to Vienna (possibly at another's expense) for the get-go time, apparently in the hope of studying with Mozart. The details of their relationship are uncertain, including whether they actually met. Having learned that his mother was ill, Beethoven returned almost ii weeks after his arrival. His mother died shortly thereafter, and his male parent lapsed deeper into alcoholism. Every bit a result, Beethoven became responsible for the care of his two younger brothers, and spent the next 5 years in Bonn.

Beethoven was introduced in these years to several people who became important in his life. Franz Wegeler, a young medical student, introduced him to the von Breuning family (one of whose daughters Wegeler eventually married). Beethoven often visited the von Breuning household, where he taught piano to some of the children. Here he encountered German and classical literature. The von Breuning family surround was less stressful than his own, which was increasingly dominated past his father's turn down. Beethoven likewise came to the attending of Count Ferdinand von Waldstein, who became a lifelong friend and financial supporter.

In 1789 Beethoven obtained a legal order by which one-half of his father's salary was paid directly to him for back up of the family. He as well contributed further to the family unit's income by playing viola in the courtroom orchestra. This familiarised Beethoven with a multifariousness of operas, including three by Mozart that were performed at courtroom in this period. He also befriended Anton Reicha, a flautist and violinist of about his own historic period who was a nephew of the court orchestra'southward conductor, Josef Reicha.

Establishing his career in Vienna

From 1790 to 1792, Beethoven composed a significant number of works (none were published at the time, and most are at present listed as works without opus) that demonstrated his growing range and maturity. Musicologists have identified a theme similar to those of his Third Symphony in a gear up of variations written in 1791. Beethoven was probably get-go introduced to Joseph Haydn in tardily 1790, when the latter was traveling to London and stopped in Bonn around Christmas time. A twelvemonth and a half later they met in Bonn on Haydn'southward render trip from London to Vienna in July 1792, and it is probable that arrangements were made at that time for Beethoven to written report with the old master. With the Elector's help, Beethoven left Bonn for Vienna in November 1792, amongst rumors of war spilling out of French republic; he learned soon after his arrival that his father had died. Mozart had likewise recently died. Count Waldstein, in his farewell note to Beethoven, wrote: "Through uninterrupted diligence you will receive Mozart's spirit through Haydn's easily." Over the adjacent few years, Beethoven responded to the widespread feeling that he was a successor to the recently deceased Mozart by studying that primary's piece of work and writing works with a distinctly Mozartean flavor.

Beethoven did not immediately set up out to plant himself as a composer, but rather devoted himself to study and performance. Working under Haydn's management, he sought to master counterpoint. He also studied violin nether Ignaz Schuppanzigh. Early in this period, he likewise began receiving occasional didactics from Antonio Salieri, primarily in Italian vocal limerick style; this human relationship persisted until at least 1802, and mayhap 1809. With Haydn's departure for England in 1794, Beethoven was expected by the Elector to return dwelling. He chose instead to remain in Vienna, continuing his education in counterpoint with Johann Albrechtsberger and other teachers. Although his stipend from the Elector expired, a number of Viennese noblemen had already recognised his ability and offered him financial support, among them Prince Joseph Franz Lobkowitz, Prince Karl Lichnowsky, and Businesswoman Gottfried van Swieten.

By 1793, Beethoven had established a reputation equally an improviser in the salons of the nobility, oftentimes playing the preludes and fugues of J. S. Bach'southward Well-Tempered Clavier. His friend Nikolaus Simrock had begun publishing his compositions; the first are believed to be a set of variations (WoO 66). By 1793, he had established a reputation in Vienna every bit a piano virtuoso, just he apparently withheld works from publication and so that their publication in 1795 would take greater impact. Beethoven's kickoff public performance in Vienna was in March 1795, a concert in which he commencement performed 1 of his piano concertos. Information technology is uncertain whether this was the First or 2nd. Documentary prove is unclear, and both concertos were in a similar state of most-completion (neither was completed or published for several years). Shortly subsequently this performance, he arranged for the publication of the first of his compositions to which he assigned an opus number, the three piano trios, Opus i. These works were dedicated to his patron Prince Lichnowsky, and were a fiscal success; Beethoven's profits were nearly sufficient to cover his living expenses for a twelvemonth.

Musical maturity

Beethoven composed his first six string quartets (Op. eighteen) between 1798 and 1800 (deputed by, and defended to, Prince Lobkowitz). They were published in 1801. With premieres of his Showtime and 2nd Symphonies in 1800 and 1803, Beethoven became regarded as one of the about important of a generation of young composers post-obit Haydn and Mozart. He also continued to write in other forms, turning out widely known piano sonatas like the "Pathétique" sonata (Op. 13), which Cooper describes as "surpass[ing] any of his previous compositions, in strength of character, depth of emotion, level of originality, and ingenuity of motivic and tonal manipulation." He as well completed his Septet (Op. 20) in 1799, which was one of his virtually popular works during his lifetime.

For the premiere of his First Symphony, Beethoven hired the Burgtheater on two April 1800, and staged an extensive program of music, including works by Haydn and Mozart, too as his Septet, the Kickoff Symphony, and i of his piano concertos (the latter three works all then unpublished). The concert, which the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung described every bit "the most interesting concert in a long time," was not without difficulties; among the criticisms was that "the players did not bother to pay any attention to the soloist."

Mozart and Haydn were undeniable influences. For instance, Beethoven'southward quintet for piano and winds is said to bear a strong resemblance to Mozart'southward work for the same configuration, albeit with his own distinctive touches. But Beethoven's melodies, musical development, use of modulation and texture, and characterization of emotion all set him apart from his influences, and heightened the touch some of his early works made when they were start published. By the end of 1800 Beethoven and his music were already much in demand from patrons and publishers.

Fogure 3. Ludwig van Beethoven: detail of an 1804–05 portrait by Joseph Willibrord Mähler. The complete painting depicts Beethoven with a lyre-guitar

In May 1799, Beethoven taught piano to the daughters of Hungarian Countess Anna Brunsvik. During this time, Beethoven brutal in love with the younger daughter Josephine who has therefore been identified as one of the more likely candidates for the addressee of his letter to the "Immortal Dear" (in 1812). Soon afterward these lessons, Josephine was married to Count Josef Deym. Beethoven was a regular company at their business firm, continuing to teach Josephine, and playing at parties and concerts. Her marriage was by all accounts happy (despite initial financial problems), and the couple had four children. Her relationship with Beethoven intensified subsequently Deym died of a sudden in 1804.

Beethoven had few other students. From 1801 to 1805, he tutored Ferdinand Ries, who went on to become a composer and later wrote Beethoven remembered, a book about their encounters. The young Carl Czerny studied with Beethoven from 1801 to 1803. Czerny went on to become a renowned music instructor himself, instructing Franz Liszt, and gave on xi February 1812 the Vienna premiere of Beethoven'southward fifth piano concerto (the "Emperor").

Beethoven's compositions between 1800 and 1802 were dominated by ii large-calibration orchestral works, although he continued to produce other important works such as the piano sonata Sonata quasi una fantasia known as the "Moonlight Sonata." In the jump of 1801 he completed The Creatures of Prometheus, a ballet. The work received numerous performances in 1801 and 1802, and Beethoven rushed to publish a piano arrangement to capitalise on its early popularity. In the leap of 1802 he completed the 2d Symphony, intended for performance at a concert that was canceled. The symphony received its premiere instead at a subscription concert in April 1803 at the Theater an der Wien, where Beethoven had been appointed composer in residence. In addition to the 2nd Symphony, the concert as well featured the First Symphony, the Tertiary Piano Concerto, and the oratorio Christ on the Mount of Olives. Reviews were mixed, only the concert was a financial success; Beethoven was able to charge 3 times the cost of a typical concert ticket.

Beethoven's business dealings with publishers as well began to meliorate in 1802 when his brother Carl, who had previously assisted him casually, began to assume a larger function in the management of his affairs. In improver to negotiating higher prices for recently composed works, Carl also began selling some of Beethoven'south before unpublished works, and encouraged Beethoven (against the latter'due south preference) to likewise make arrangements and transcriptions of his more than pop works for other instrument combinations. Beethoven acceded to these requests, every bit he could not foreclose publishers from hiring others to do similar arrangements of his works.

Loss of Hearing

Around 1796, past the age of 26, Beethoven began to lose his hearing. He suffered from a severe form of tinnitus, a "ringing" in his ears that made it hard for him to hear music; he too tried to avoid conversations. The crusade of Beethoven's deafness is unknown, but it has variously been attributed to typhus, machine-allowed disorders (such every bit systemic lupus erythematosus), and fifty-fifty his addiction of immersing his head in cold water to stay awake. The explanation from Beethoven's dissection was that he had a "distended inner ear," which developed lesions over time.

Figure 4. Beethoven in 1815 portrait past Joseph Willibrord Mähler

As early as 1801, Beethoven wrote to friends describing his symptoms and the difficulties they caused in both professional person and social settings (although it is likely some of his close friends were already aware of the problems). Beethoven, on the advice of his doctor, lived in the small Austrian town ofHeiligenstadt, just outside Vienna, from April to October 1802 in an effort to come to terms with his condition. There he wrote his Heiligenstadt Attestation, a letter to his brothers which records his thoughts of suicide due to his growing deafness and records his resolution to keep living for and through his art. Over time, his hearing loss became profound: at the stop of the premiere of his Ninth Symphony in 1824, he had to be turned around to run across the tumultuous applause of the audition because he could hear neither information technology nor the orchestra. Beethoven's hearing loss did not foreclose him from composing music, simply it made playing at concerts—a lucrative source of income—increasingly difficult. After a failed attempt in 1811 to perform his ownPiano Concerto No. 5 (the "Emperor"), which was premiered by his student Carl Czerny, he never performed in public once again until he conducted the Ninth Symphony in 1824.

A large collection of Beethoven'south hearing aids, such as a special ear horn, can be viewed at the Beethoven House Museum in Bonn, Germany. Despite his obvious distress, Czerny remarked that Beethoven could still hear speech and music ordinarily until 1812. Effectually 1814 however, by the historic period of 44, Beethoven was almost totally deafened, and when a group of visitors saw him play a loud arpeggio of thundering bass notes at his piano remarking, "Ist es nicht schön?" (Is it non cute?), they felt deep sympathy considering his courage and sense of humor (he lost the ability to hear college frequencies first).

As a upshot of Beethoven's hearing loss, his conversation books are an unusually rich written resource. Used primarily in the last ten or so years of his life, his friends wrote in these books and so that he could know what they were saying, and he then responded either orally or in the book. The books incorporate discussions about music and other matters, and give insights into Beethoven's thinking; they are a source for investigations into how he intended his music should be performed, and also his perception of his human relationship to fine art. Out of a full of 400 conversation books, it has been suggested that 264 were destroyed (and others were altered) after Beethoven'due south death by Anton Schindler, who wished only an idealised biography of the composer to survive. Yet, Theodore Albrecht contests the verity of Schindler's destruction of a large number of chat books.

Patronage

While Beethoven earned income from publication of his works and from public performances, he as well depended on the generosity of patrons for income, for whom he gave private performances and copies of works they commissioned for an exclusive period prior to their publication. Some of his early patrons, including Prince Lobkowitz and Prince Lichnowsky, gave him annual stipends in addition to commissioning works and purchasing published works.

Perhaps Beethoven's most important aristocratic patron was Archduke Rudolph, the youngest son of Emperor Leopold 2, who in 1803 or 1804 began to study piano and composition with Beethoven. The cleric (Central-Priest) and the composer became friends, and their meetings continued until 1824.Beethoven defended fourteen compositions to Rudolph, including the Archduke Trio (1811) and his swell Missa Solemnis (1823). Rudolph, in plough, dedicated one of his own compositions to Beethoven. The letters Beethoven wrote to Rudolph are today kept at the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna.Another patron was Count (later Prince) Andreas Razumovsky, for whom the String Quartets Nos. vii–9, Op. 59, Rasumovsky were named.

In the Autumn of 1808, after having been rejected for a position at the royal theatre, Beethoven received an offering from Napoleon's brother Jérôme Bonaparte, then rex of Westphalia, for a well-paid position equally Kapellmeister at the court in Cassel. To persuade him to stay in Vienna, the Archduke Rudolph, Prince Kinsky and Prince Lobkowitz, after receiving representations from the composer'due south friends, pledged to pay Beethoven a pension of 4000 florins a year. Simply Archduke Rudolph paid his share of the pension on the agreed appointment. Kinsky, immediately chosen to military duty, did not contribute and soon died afterwards falling from his equus caballus. Lobkowitz stopped paying in September 1811. No successors came forwards to continue the patronage, and Beethoven relied mostly on selling composition rights and a small pension later on 1815. The effects of these financial arrangements were undermined to some extent by war with French republic, which caused significant inflation when the government printed money to fund its state of war efforts.

The Centre Flow

Beethoven'due south return to Vienna from Heiligenstadt was marked by a modify in musical style, and is now designated as the showtime of his middle or "heroic" period. According to Carl Czerny, Beethoven said, "I am not satisfied with the piece of work I have washed and so far. From now on I intend to take a new way." This "heroic" stage was characterised past a large number of original works equanimous on a 1000 scale. The first major work employing this new style was the Third Symphony in East flat, known equally the Eroica. This piece of work was longer and larger in scope than any previous symphony. When it premiered in early 1805 information technology received a mixed reception. Some listeners objected to its length or misunderstood its structure, while others viewed it as a masterpiece.

Listen: Symphony No. v

Please listen to the following audio file to hear Symphony No. 5, Op. 67 (1st movement), equanimous during Beethoven's middle catamenia.

The "heart period" is sometimes associated with a "heroic" manner of composing, but the employ of the term "heroic" has become increasingly controversial in Beethoven scholarship. The term is more than frequently used as an alternative proper name for the middle menses. The appropriateness of the term "heroic" to describe the whole eye period has been questioned as well: while some works, similar the 3rd and Fifth Symphonies, are easy to describe as "heroic", many others, like his Symphony No. six,Pastoral, are not.

Some of the middle period works extend the musical language Beethoven had inherited from Haydn and Mozart. The middle period work includes the Third through 8th Symphonies, the Rasumovsky, Harp and Serioso string quartets, the "Waldstein" and "Appassionata" pianoforte sonatas, Christ on the Mount of Olives, the opera Fidelio, the Violin Concerto and many other compositions. During this time Beethoven's income came from publishing his works, from performances of them, and from his patrons. His position at the Theater an der Wien was terminated when the theater changed direction in early 1804, and he was forced to motion temporarily to the suburbs of Vienna with his friend Stephan von Breuning. This slowed work onFidelio, his largest work to appointment, for a fourth dimension. It was delayed over again by the Austrian censor, and finally premiered in November 1805 to houses that were almost empty because of the French occupation of the city. In addition to being a fiscal failure, this version of Fidelio was besides a critical failure, and Beethoven began revising it.

During May 1809, when the attacking forces of Napoleon bombarded Vienna, according to Ferdinand Ries, Beethoven, very worried that the noise would destroy what remained of his hearing, hid in the basement of his brother's house, roofing his ears with pillows.

The work of the eye catamenia established Beethoven as a master. In a review from 1810, he was enshrined past E. T. A. Hoffmann as one of the three groovy "Romantic" composers; Hoffman chosen Beethoven's Fifth Symphony "ane of the most important works of the age."

Personal and family difficulties

Beethoven's love life was hampered by class issues. In late 1801 he met a young countess, Julie ("Giulietta") Guicciardi through the Brunsvik family unit, at a fourth dimension when he was giving regular piano lessons to Josephine Brunsvik. Beethoven mentions his love for Julie in a November 1801 letter to his boyhood friend, Franz Wegeler, but he could not consider marrying her, due to the class divergence. Beethoven subsequently dedicated to her his Sonata No. fourteen, now unremarkably known as the "Moonlight sonata" or "Mondscheinsonate" (in German).

His human relationship with Josephine Brunsvik deepened after the death in 1804 of her aristocratic kickoff hubby, the Count Joseph Deym. Beethoven wrote Josephine 15 passionate dear messages from tardily 1804 to around 1809/x. Although his feelings were obviously reciprocated, Josephine was forced by her family to withdraw from him in 1807. She cited her "duty" and the fact that she would have lost the aegis of her aristocratic children had she married a commoner.After Josephine married Businesswoman von Stackelberg in 1810, Beethoven may have proposed unsuccessfully to Therese Malfatti, the supposed dedicatee of "Für Elise"; his status as a commoner may again have interfered with those plans.

In the spring of 1811 Beethoven became seriously ill, suffering headaches and loftier fever. On the communication of his doctor, he spent vi weeks in theBohemian spa town of Teplitz. The post-obit winter, which was dominated by work on the Seventh symphony, he was again ill, and his doctor ordered him to spend the summer of 1812 at the spa Teplitz. Information technology is certain that he was at Teplitz when he wrote a beloved alphabetic character to his "Immortal Beloved." The identity of the intended recipient has long been a subject field of debate; candidates include Julie Guicciardi, Therese Malfatti, Josephine Brunsvik, and Antonie Brentano.

Beethoven visited his brother Johann at the end of October 1812. He wished to end Johann's cohabitation with Therese Obermayer, a woman who already had an illegitimate kid. He was unable to convince Johann to terminate the relationship and appealed to the local civic and religious regime. Johann and Therese married on 9 November.

In early 1813 Beethoven apparently went through a hard emotional flow, and his compositional output dropped. His personal advent degraded—it had generally been great—as did his manners in public, especially when dining. Beethoven took care of his brother (who was suffering from tuberculosis) and his family, an expense that he claimed left him penniless.

Beethoven was finally motivated to begin meaning limerick again in June 1813, when news arrived of the defeat of one of Napoleon's armies atVitoria, Spain, by a coalition of forces nether the Duke of Wellington. This news stimulated him to write the battle symphony known as Wellington's Victory. It was get-go performed on 8 December, along with his Seventh Symphony, at a clemency concert for victims of the war. The work was a popular hitting, probably because of its programmatic mode, which was entertaining and easy to understand. Information technology received repeat performances at concerts Beethoven staged in January and February 1814. Beethoven's renewed popularity led to demands for a revival of Fidelio, which, in its tertiary revised version, was also well received at its July opening. That summer he composed a piano sonata for the first time in five years (No. 27, Opus 90). This work was in a markedly more Romantic style than his earlier sonatas. He was also one of many composers who produced music in a patriotic vein to entertain the many heads of state and diplomats who came to the Congress of Vienna that began in November 1814. His output of songs included his just song bicycle, "An die ferne Geliebte," and the extraordinarily expressive 2d setting of the poem "An die Hoffnung" (Op. 94) in 1815. Compared to its start setting in 1805 (a gift for Josephine Brunsvik), it was "far more than dramatic … The entire spirit is that of an operatic scena."

Custody Struggle and Illness

Between 1815 and 1817 Beethoven's output dropped again. Beethoven attributed part of this to a lengthy disease (he called it an "inflammatory fever") that afflicted him for more than a year, starting in Oct 1816. Biographers take speculated on a variety of other reasons that also contributed to the decline, including the difficulties in the personal lives of his would-exist paramours and the harsh censorship policies of the Austrian regime. The disease and death of his brother Carl from tuberculosis may also have played a role.

Carl had been ill for some time, and Beethoven spent a small fortune in 1815 on his care. Afterwards Carl died on 15 November 1815, Beethoven immediately became embroiled in a protracted legal dispute with Carl's married woman Johanna over custody of their son Karl, then nine years one-time. Beethoven, who considered Johanna an unfit parent because of her morals (she had an illegitimate child by a unlike father before marrying Carl and had been bedevilled of theft) and financial direction, had successfully practical to Carl to accept himself named sole guardian of the male child. A belatedly codicil to Carl'southward will gave him and Johanna joint guardianship. While Beethoven was successful at having his nephew removed from her custody in February 1816, the case was not fully resolved until 1820, and he was oft preoccupied by the demands of the litigation and seeing to Karl'due south welfare, whom he first placed in a individual school.

The Austrian court organisation had one court for the nobility and members of the Landtafel, the Landrechte, and many other courts for commoners, among them the Civil Court of the Vienna Magistrate. Beethoven disguised the fact that the Dutch "van" in his proper name did not denote nobility equally does the German "von" and his example was tried in the Landrechte. Owing to his influence with the court, Beethoven felt bodacious of the favorable outcome of being awarded sole guardianship. While giving evidence to the Landrechte, however, Beethoven inadvertently admitted that he was not nobly born. On 18 December 1818 the instance was transferred to the Magistracy, where he lost sole guardianship.

Beethoven appealed and regained custody. Johanna's appeal to the Emperor was non successful: the Emperor "washed his hands of the matter." During the years of custody that followed, Beethoven attempted to ensure that Karl lived to the highest moral standards. Beethoven had an overbearing manner and frequently interfered in his nephew's life. Karl attempted suicide on 31 July 1826 by shooting himself in the head. He survived and was brought to his mother's house, where he recuperated. He and Beethoven were reconciled, but Karl insisted on joining the army and last saw Beethoven in early 1827.

Late works

Beethoven began a renewed study of older music, including works by J. S. Bach and Handel, that were then being published in the commencement attempts at complete editions. He composed the overture The Consecration of the House, which was the first work to attempt to comprise these influences. A new style emerged, now called his "late period". He returned to the keyboard to etch his first pianoforte sonatas in almost a decade: the works of the late menstruum are normally held to include the last five piano sonatas and the Diabelli Variations, the concluding two sonatas for cello and piano, the tardily string quartets (see beneath), and two works for very large forces: the Missa Solemnis and the Ninth Symphony.

Effigy 5. A mod medallion bearing the face of Beethoven

Past early 1818 Beethoven'due south wellness had improved, and his nephew moved in with him in January. On the downside, his hearing had deteriorated to the indicate that conversation became difficult, necessitating the use of chat books. His household management had likewise improved somewhat; Nanette Streicher, who had assisted in his care during his illness, continued to provide some support, and he finally found a skilled cook. His musical output in 1818 was still somewhat reduced, simply included song collections and the "Hammerklavier" Sonata, too as sketches for two symphonies that somewhen coalesced into the epic Ninth. In 1819 he was again preoccupied by the legal processes around Karl, and began work on the Diabelli Variations and the Missa Solemnis.

For the next few years he continued to work on the Missa, composing piano sonatas and bagatelles to satisfy the demands of publishers and the need for income, and completing the Diabelli Variations. He was ill once again for an extended time in 1821, and completed the Missa in 1823, three years after its original due date. He also opened discussions with his publishers over the possibility of producing a complete edition of his work, an idea that was arguably non fully realised until 1971. Beethoven'south blood brother Johann began to take a manus in his business affairs, much in the way Carl had earlier, locating older unpublished works to offer for publication and offer the Missa to multiple publishers with the goal of getting a higher price for it.

2 commissions in 1822 improved Beethoven's financial prospects. The Philharmonic Society of London offered a commission for a symphony, and Prince Nikolas Golitsin of St. petersburg offered to pay Beethoven's cost for 3 string quartets. The starting time of these commissions spurred Beethoven to end the Ninth Symphony, which was outset performed, forth with the Missa Solemnis, on 7 May 1824, to swell acclaim at the Kärntnertortheater. The Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung gushed, "inexhaustible genius had shown us a new world," and Carl Czerny wrote that his symphony "breathes such a fresh, lively, indeed youthful spirit … and so much ability, innovation, and beauty as always [came] from the head of this original human, although he certainly sometimes led the onetime wigs to milk shake their heads." Unlike his more lucrative earlier concerts, this did non make Beethoven much money, as the expenses of mounting it were significantly college. A second concert on 24 May, in which the producer guaranteed Beethoven a minimum fee, was poorly attended; nephew Karl noted that "many people [had] already gone into the country." Information technology was Beethoven's last public concert.

Mind: Piano Sonata No. 32

Please heed to the following audio file to hear Piano Sonata No. 32 in C small-scale, Op. 111 (1st movement), written between 1821 and 1822, during Beethoven's belatedly period.

Beethoven then turned to writing the string quartets for Golitsin. This serial of quartets, known every bit the "Tardily Quartets," went far across what musicians or audiences were set up for at that time. Ane musiciancommented that "we know there is something there, but we do not know what information technology is." Composer Louis Spohr called them "indecipherable, uncorrected horrors." Opinion has changed considerably from the fourth dimension of their get-go bewildered reception: their forms and ideas inspired musicians and composers including Richard Wagner and Béla Bartók, and continue to do so. Of the belatedly quartets, Beethoven's favorite was the Fourteenth Quartet, op. 131 in C♯ modest, which he rated equally his nigh perfect unmarried work. The last musical wish of Schubert was to hear the Op. 131 quartet, which he did on fourteen Nov 1828, five days before his death.

Beethoven wrote the last quartets amidst failing health. In April 1825 he was crippled, and remained ill for most a month. The affliction—or more precisely, his recovery from it—is remembered for having given rise to the deeply felt slow movement of the Fifteenth Quartet, which Beethoven called "Holy song of thanks ('Heiliger Dankgesang') to the divinity, from one made well." He went on to complete the quartets now numberedThirteenth, Fourteenth, and Sixteenth. The last work completed past Beethoven was the substitute final motility of the Thirteenth Quartet, which replaced the difficult Große Fuge. Shortly thereafter, in December 1826, illness struck again, with episodes of airsickness and diarrhea that nearly ended his life.

In 1825, his ix symphonies were performed in a wheel for the first fourth dimension, past the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Johann Philipp Christian Schulz. This was repeated in 1826.

Illness and death

Figure 6. Beethoven's grave site, Vienna Zentralfriedhof

Beethoven was bedridden for well-nigh of his remaining months, and many friends came to visit. He died on 26 March 1827 at the age of 56 during a thunderstorm. His friend Anselm Hüttenbrenner, who was present at the fourth dimension, said that there was a peal of thunder at the moment of death. An autopsy revealed pregnant liver damage, which may have been due to heavy alcohol consumption. It also revealed considerable dilation of the auditory and other related nerves.

Beethoven'south funeral procession on 29 March 1827 was attended by an estimated 20,000 Viennese citizens. Franz Schubert, who died the post-obit year and was buried next to Beethoven, was i of the torchbearers. Beethoven was cached in a dedicated grave in the Währing cemetery, north-westward of Vienna, after a requiem mass at the church of the Holy Trinity (Dreifaltigkeitskirche). His remains were exhumed for study in 1862, and moved in 1888 to Vienna's Zentralfriedhof. In 2012, his catacomb was checked to see if his teeth had been stolen during a series of grave robberies of other famous Viennese composers.

At that place is dispute near the cause of Beethoven's death: alcoholic cirrhosis, syphilis, infectious hepatitis, lead poisoning,sarcoidosis and Whipple'south disease have all been proposed. Friends and visitors before and after his expiry clipped locks of his hair, some of which accept been preserved and subjected to additional analysis, as have skull fragments removed during the 1862 exhumation. Some of these analyses have led to controversial assertions that Beethoven was accidentally poisoned to death past excessive doses of lead-based treatments administered under instruction from his physician.

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Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/atd-epcc-musicappreciation/chapter/ludwig-van-beethoven/

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