Word: beethovenã
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Thursday morning, as students skied across the Yard, “some invisible person threw open a second-floor window…and blasted the finale of Beethoven??s Fifth Symphony into the crisp air,” Morris writes. “So why, after the music ended 10 minutes later, with 48 thunderclaps of C major, were some of the listeners crying...
...Regardless of his musical talent—or perhaps lack thereof—Morris’ “Beethoven?? is a leisurely masterpiece that tells the story of the man behind the music with contagious enthusiasm. Undoubtedly, the music is important, and Morris lovingly describes the most moving compositions, right down to the “spasmodic disjunction between right hand and left” in “Piano Sonata, Opus 31, No. 1.” However, the beauty of Beethoven??s music often makes it easy to forget that the great composer...
...These formidable accomplishments, though, came against a backdrop of persistent family problems. Beethoven??s father was chronically short of money, and he found too much comfort at the end of the bottle. His mother, who saw seven of her 10 children die young, suffered from depression, and she neglected Beethoven??s dress and hygiene. Nevertheless, Beethoven loved her deeply. He cut short his stay in Vienna – where he was studying under Mozart – when he learned that his mother was dying...
...Beethoven??s celebrity was rising against the backdrop of unprecedented upheaval in Europe, and Napoleon Bonaparte captured the composer’s imagination. In 1804, Beethoven wrote a symphony meant to be dedicated to Bonaparte. But after Napoleon shed all pretenses of democracy and crowned himself emperor, the Third Symphony was renamed the “Sinfonia Eroica”—to heroism...
...Beethoven??s greatest moment of glory, however, was still to come with the public performance of his Ninth Symphony in May 1824. For anyone that has heard it before (or at least seen the unspeakably horrible Starz movie network commercial that uses it), the music is undeniably majestic. Morris writes that “for the rest of the century, symphonic composers would struggle in vain to write anything that sounded bigger.” Beethoven, deaf and facing the orchestra, did not realize the audience was enthusiastically clapping until a teenage soprano turned him around...