The great composers: Ludwig van Beethoven

The inventor of Romantic music. Beethoven began his career by imitating the styles of Mozart and Haydn; and he is considered as the third greatest Classical composer after them. With his 3rd Symphony, nicknamed “Eroica”; and his 4th and 5th Piano Concerti, the world of music entered its Romantic Era, out of which it may not yet have emerged. The advent of film required that Romantic music not be done away with, as the more modern music of Schoenberg, Berg, Webern, etc., was not suitable for the enhancement of drama. Thus, as film’s musical lineage goes directly back to Wagner, it goes back farther, to Beethoven, who influenced Wagner the most. It was Beethoven’s temperament that created his finest and most idiosyncratic works, among them his 3rd to 9th symphonies, his last three of five piano concerti, his violin concerto, the finest ever written, two masses, one of which is the Missa Solemnis, the second greatest mass ever written, his chamber music, especially his string quartets, the last 6 of which, the Late Quartets, are universally considered to be among the greatest musical works in history. Of these, Igor Stravinsky deemed the Grosse Fuge of the second to last quartet the greatest piece of music ever written. Beethoven’s 5th Symphony (video below) begins with the single most famous melody in music history. People that don’t even know who he was hum it every day. Beethoven’s finest works are also the finest works of their kind in music history, although this last work is not quite as glorious. And he achieved all this despite being completely deaf for the last 25 years or so of his life!

source listverse.com/

Beethoven - Symphony No 5 in C minor, Op 67 - Thielemann