# Why do I like Beethoven



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

In contrast to another thread titled "Why don't I like Beethoven" I am starting this thread for a more positive discussion (I hope). So, lets hear what you like about Beethoven. My write-up is limited by the fact that I mostly only listen to symphonies for instrumental works, but here goes:

I like Beethoven because his symphonies never cease to excite me and fulfil me, like no others. The give me a taste of a freedom that is otherwise unattainable in this life, limited by our physical world and its physical laws. I guess it is in a way that same freedom that people seek in taking certain drugs, at least freedom from our limitations, but obviously going in a different direction with drugs than with Beethoven. Ah Beethoven! The greatest drug because it has no harmful side effects.

I also like Beethoven's fiery temperament, how he would express his feelings to those in authority and and of social rank with little if any regard for the consequences, and his contemplative moods especially those with his country walks and the resulting music. And I like Beethoven's nobility of character and devotion to high moral ideas and his high view of women represented in his one opera Fidelio and in his disdain for some of the other opera subject matters.


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## clockworkmurderer (Apr 15, 2016)

I like Beethoven's power. I haven't studied his music extensively as it seems so many members here have. However, every piece of his I've listened to gets my blood pumping and my thoughts racing. His 6th symphony is sublime; I remember loving it as a kid without knowing what it was when I watched the movie _Fantasia_.

I for one am excited to listen to more of his pieces, though I often find myself struggling to hear every piece I want to hear due to time constraints. I can only make it a life goal to hear every piece of music I _need_ to hear, and I think that most of Beethoven's work will find its place there.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Florestan said:


> In contrast to another thread titled "Why don't I like Beethoven" I am starting this thread for a more positive discussion (I hope). So, lets hear what you like about Beethoven. My write-up is limited by the fact that I mostly only listen to symphonies for instrumental works, but here goes:
> 
> I like Beethoven because his symphonies never cease to excite me and fulfil me, like no others. The give me a taste of a freedom that is otherwise unattainable in this life, limited by our physical world and its physical laws. I guess it is in a way that same freedom that people seek in taking certain drugs, at least freedom from our limitations, but obviously going in a different direction with drugs than with Beethoven. Ah Beethoven! The greatest drug because it has no harmful side effects.
> 
> I also like Beethoven's fiery temperament, how he would express his feelings to those in authority and and of social rank with little if any regard for the consequences, and his contemplative moods especially those with his country walks and the resulting music. And I like Beethoven's nobility of character and devotion to high moral ideas and his high view of women represented in his one opera Fidelio and in his disdain for some of the other opera subject matters.


Well said Florestan .:tiphat:


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Beethoven is probably the composer that I have the most different reactions too (and I have heard most of his compositions over the years). Many of his most revered compositions leave me cold or I really dislike them, but there are also many compositions that I find exhilarating and awesome. And I find it difficult to see a pattern in these likes and dislikes.

I'll focus on the "likes/loves", in the spirit of the thread (and I'm glad to see a more positive approach).

Symphonies: the 6th stands out for me, one of my favourite symphonies overall. Next is the 5th, which is about as different from the 6th as you can get. Also essential for me are the 3d and 7th, and I have lately started to appreciate the 4th as well.

Concertos: here my pick is the violin concerto, ahead of the piano concertos 3 and 4. The violin concerto is among the best in that genre for me, even if in the end there is a handful of others I prefer.

Piano sonatas: with the proviso that solo piano music is not my favourite genre, I like most of his sonatas.

String quartets: from nice (early) to awesome (late). Overall probably the genre in Beethoven's music that has the most universal appeal to me.

Other chamber music: here I would pick a few violin sonatas, rather than the piano trios and the cello sonatas.

Vocal music: if there is one genre where Beethoven does not connect with me, it is here.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Like Beethoven? Never met him, so it's hard to say. His music is quite good.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Florestan, focusing on the symphonies ain't cutting it. Beethoven's domicile has many rooms.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

KenOC said:


> Like Beethoven? Never met him, so it's hard to say. His music is quite good.


I'm glad I never met him because I can enjoy the music without having known the pretty impossible guy who wrote it.


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Ukko said:


> Florestan, focusing on the symphonies ain't cutting it. Beethoven's domicile has many rooms.


Yep, I have the 87 CD complete Beethoven set and do need to start working my way further into it. I have been heavily into Fidelio, the masses and the Choral Fantasy at least. Was on a sidetrack of mostly opera for the past year or so.


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## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

For me Beethoven is the perfect balance between outrageous and tasteful. For example all those repeated notes or repeated power sforzandos, like hammer blows: BAM! Then again: BAM! Okay he means business -- but yet again: BAM! Okay we get it now. How many times must he repeat this? "Once more, you amateur:" *BAM!*. One more time would have just been ridiculous, but somehow he knows just the right amount of pummeling the listener can take and yet have it still come out sublime. At least for my tastes this is so.

Combine this controlled outrageous defiance with highly intelligent compositional acrobatics, ranging from the delicately introspective to slapstick humorous to bait-and-switch surprises to many other things, all still effective 200 years later, and you get a composer that is greater than the sum of his attributes. The Beethoven effect on my physiology is next to impossible to put into words.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

Flo - You like Beethoven because you are a person of impeccable musical taste and refinement. Need I say more?


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Beethoven is one of a handful of composers whose works I like to varying degrees - from profound love to virtual indifference - and still have to grant my highest respect. We may not always be comfortable cuddling up to the giants of art, but the task of trying to take their measure can occupy us endlessly. As often as any other composer, Beethoven leaves me in a state of amazement. When I've finished listening to one of his late quartets or sonatas, I know that I will never comprehend music, or life for that matter, and I'm content not to.


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## Samuel Kristopher (Nov 4, 2015)

His melodic choices and the direction he takes them is fascinating for me. He's not my most listened to composer, but he's probably the one I'll choose to come back to when I'm trying to study particular aspects of composition because I just get the feeling that his compositions were flawless. A bold and subjective statement to be sure, and sometimes I think it's the imperfections of other composers which draws me more towards them, but yeah, I hold Beethoven to that higher standard and there's a lot a composer can learn from studying his works. And by a lot, I mean... well... almost anything you could ever wish to know


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## kartikeys (Mar 16, 2013)

Beethoven is Melody.


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## DaveM (Jun 29, 2015)

Beethoven has been my 'companion' for most of my life. First came the Violin Concerto when I was about 9 years old. I became so familiar with it that I would hum the orchestral parts and whistle the violin part while working as a supermarket bag boy. From then on I absorbed almost all of his works with the exception of some of the string quartets. More recently, having thought that there was no more to learn from him, I realized that I had not given the Piano Sonata #32 Arietta due attention and was pleasantly surprised to find that this was perhaps a pinnacle of his works.


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## Boldertism (May 21, 2015)

I like Beethoven because he always says the right thing. "How'd he think of that?" was low in my vocabulary before I got into Beethoven.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Beethoven is one of the true greats of music. Almost everything he composed is touched with sheer genius. Every musical form he composed music for he expanded, with the possible exception of Opera. But even in that form which he was obviously not comfortable with, he showed immense genius in clothing a cardboard story with music that can move the heart. Elsewhere he produced works which are at the pinnacle of compositions written, the symphonies, The violin concerto, the wondrous set of piano concertos, and at the immense sonatas, String quartets and Missa Solemnis. He might have been very unsuccessful man but he was certainly right at the top when composing music was concerned.


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## Barbebleu (May 17, 2015)

The Symphonies, the String Quartets, the Piano Sonatas and the Piano Concertos are wonders of the western music canon.


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

I like Louis' music because his music sings to my soul. Pure and simple.


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## Xenakiboy (May 8, 2016)

The Grosso, The Ghost trio and the 7th symphony have been quite enjoyable  , though a lot of his music just doesn't appeal to me. :tiphat:
Though, Rage Over a lost penny is funny! :lol:


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## Euterpe (Apr 3, 2016)

KenOC said:


> Like Beethoven? Never met him, so it's hard to say. His music is quite good.


LMAO:lol::lol::lol:


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Barbebleu said:


> The Symphonies, the String Quartets, the Piano Sonatas and the Piano Concertos are wonders of the western music canon.


And the will be for a very long time to come.:tiphat:


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## Guest (Jun 19, 2016)

Well...dunno, really...not because he's great, that's for sure.

As I've said before, the music I most like usually has something to do with a combination of the music itself and being in the company of the person. It projects his personality and that makes me want to be with him. 

You might as well ask why I like the friends I choose.


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## Alydon (May 16, 2012)

Beethoven for me is the one composer whose music is a mirror to humanity and ourselves; he speaks for all our hopes and fears, joys and sorrows. Beethoven's music, whether symphony, concerto, chamber or piano never becomes diluted through constant hearings but becomes stronger. Whatever others think of Beethoven I find his music seems to have been there before time and will remain after; his is the voice that guides and comforts, celebrates and gives solace in the worst of times. I wish I could give a more definite answer as to why I like Beethoven, but life would be shallow and over-cast without his art in the world.


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## Reichstag aus LICHT (Oct 25, 2010)

Art Rock said:


> Vocal music: if there is one genre where Beethoven does not connect with me, it is here.


For me, Beethoven's greatest masterpieces are those which transform small motivic cells into works of staggering beauty and power. When it came to vocal music, therefore, perhaps he felt overly constrained by the need to stick to a text?

That said, when he gets it right, his vocal music certainly connects big-style with me.


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## Mandryka (Feb 22, 2013)

Towards the end of his life, in the final period, he showed he was very good at many of the things which matter in music.

There are singular and personal utterances (like the first movement of Op 95, Variation 10 of Op 120) and there are universal, transcendental utterances (like the slow movement of Op 132)

There's music with an improvised feel (the central suite like section of Op 131) and there's music which is refined (the arietta of Op 111)

There's music with coherent structure and unity (op 110) and there's music with original textures (Missa Solemnis)

The rhythms can be really catchy (The Eroica) and so can the melody (Spring Sonata) 

He worked well in inherited forms (like fugues) and he developed new forms (the 9th symphony)


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## billeames (Jan 17, 2014)

Yes I agree. For example Missa Solemnis to me is without peer. Symphonies since I was 24 years old (came to it late). Crescendos, repeated phrases but not too much. Well thought out variations. Deep harmony.


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## OffPitchNeb (Jun 6, 2016)

I like his late period (Sonata 30-32 and the string late quartets). Never got into his early and middle periods.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

OffPitchNeb said:


> I like his late period (Sonata 30-32 and the string late quartets). Never got into his early and middle periods.


People seem to favor different periods in his output. He really did evolve to an extraordinary degree. His early work seems mostly Classical in feeling, though already full of boldness. His middle period is defined by its Romantic-Revolutionary fervor and drama. Then his late period takes us to an extraordinary world which still defies description and stands in lonely eminence among the world's music, a testament to the creative spirit burrowing deep into itself and finding there an unfathomable well of inspiration.

I wonder: if we didn't know beforehand, would we recognize earliest and latest Beethoven as the same man? For that matter, would we identify all the piano sonatas as being by the same composer? Yet who else could have written them?

Beethoven is a mountain. You can't get around him without experiencing an immense journey, and if you're attentive you'll be changed by it.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> I wonder: if we didn't know beforehand, would we recognize earliest and latest Beethoven as the same man?


Berlioz thought not. Here's what he said about the first symphony. "This is admirably crafted music, clear, alert, but lacking in strong personality, cold and sometimes rather small-minded, as for example in the final rondo, which has the character of a musical amusement. In a word, this is not Beethoven."


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

KenOC said:


> Berlioz thought not. Here's what he said about the first symphony. "This is admirably crafted music, clear, alert, but lacking in strong personality, cold and sometimes rather small-minded, as for example in the final rondo, which has the character of a musical amusement. In a word, this is not Beethoven."


Spoken like a true opium-eater.

P.S. I like the First.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

OffPitchNeb said:


> I like his late period (Sonata 30-32 and the string late quartets). Never got into his early and middle periods.


Any particular reason why not?


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Beethoven is one of the true greats of music. Almost everything he composed is touched with sheer genius. Every musical form he composed music for he expanded, with the possible exception of Opera. But even in that form which he was obviously not comfortable with, he showed immense genius in clothing a cardboard story with music that can move the heart. Elsewhere he produced works which are at the pinnacle of compositions written, the symphonies, The violin concerto, the wondrous set of piano concertos, and at the immense sonatas, String quartets and Missa Solemnis. *He might have been very unsuccessful man* but he was certainly right at the top when composing music was concerned.


We are _all_ unsuccessful men. I've lost count of my failures to be all I might be. But to have reached the highest standards in any endeavor, especially music, is a kind of success most of us can't imagine, and sufficient for one life. I hope it was some consolation to him in his deafness and loneliness.


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## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Woodduck said:


> *We are all unsuccessful men.* I've lost count of my failures to be all I might be. But to have reached the highest standards in any endeavor, especially music, is a kind of success most of us can't imagine, and sufficient for one life. I hope it was some consolation to him in his deafness and loneliness.


Depends what we mean by success. What I meant was the success in the every day process of living which Beethoven appears not to have been very good at. My father was not a roaring success when it came to things like promotion and making money. But he was highly successful at being a good husband and father. We can only be sad for Beethoven that he never enjoyed these things. The reverse side is that if he had settled down happily we might not have had some of the greatest music ever written!


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## Guest (Jun 24, 2016)

Pugg said:


> Any particular reason why not?


Indeed,if You love Beethoven all his string quartets are a real must.:tiphat:


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## ArtMusic (Jan 5, 2013)

I think the SQ are the best examples of Beethoven transitioning from Classicism into Romanticism more than any other genre he wrote.


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## Truckload (Feb 15, 2012)

As a child, Beethoven's music was my entrée into loving music. Because of Beethoven I wanted to learn to play an instrument, understand musical theory, and explore other composers. Beethoven's music changed my life.

I was first attracted to the emotionalism of his music. The music appealed to me sensually with its power and beauty and perfection.

As I studied music theory and composition I became increasingly fascinated by Beethoven's use of harmony and form. The more one learns about theory, the more Beethoven's music inspires admiration. 

And Beethoven appeals to me because of his humanity. His struggles as a man and composer. Yet he achieved greatness despite (or because) of his imperfections and struggles. I love Beethoven even more than most other composers because he struggled to write great music. It was not easy for him. Yet he achieved the sublime. 

Musically, Mozart was far more facile and gifted than Beethoven. Mozart would sit at a desk and literally write great music as quickly as his pen could write the notes. And once Mozart completed a work, he never went back to make changes or corrections. Music flowed from Mozart like a natural spring welling up from the depths of the earth. 

Beethoven's sketch books (which thankfully have been preserved) reveal that Beethoven was not a born genius like Mozart. Beethoven sweated and toiled over every note, every harmony, and every phrase. I find Beethoven more inspirational because I know how hard he worked to craft his music.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

For me one of Beethoven's most irresistible qualities is his ability to build tension.

The incredible anticipation as he modulates from the third movement to the fourth movement of the 5th Symphony.

The tension before the ecstatic and triumphant release in the middle of the first movement of the Violin Concerto.

The tension building up just before the exhilarating coda of the Egmont overture.


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## beetzart (Dec 30, 2009)

Beethoven was the first composer I listened to when I was 9 or 10. I actually thought at the time that I was born with the first 4 bars of the 5th symphony in my head already. I collected his sonatas and any recordings i could get hold of. But why? What is it about Beethoven that seems to be streets ahead (apart from Bach, he is just a few feet ahead of Bach) of other composers? The power, the originality, the ideas, he never runs out of ideas yet they are so simple so I suppose it is what he does with them. I look at his piano sonatas and they nearly all start with an extremely rudimentary idea/motif. The Appassionata say just descending/ascending broken tonic chords yet it is turned into a masterpiece beyond words. And that doesn't even scratch the surface.


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## sprite (Jan 31, 2015)

Indomitable will. I was watching a short documentary about him on a plane ride, and this conductor said something about him that I thought was spot on. I wrote it down. 

She said, "There's this willpower in his music that I find extremely attractive. With Mozart there's a natural flow - one note follows another because it has to. With Beethoven, one note follows the next because he wants it to."


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

I love Beethoven because his music is like a building, snow-white, with very clean lines and not a single excessive element, beautiful and majestic.


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## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

Speaking mostly about the symphonies, I love how colorful his music is. I love how powerful it is. It is very inspiring music!


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## Jacred (Jan 14, 2017)

I like Beethoven because he always knows precisely what he wants to convey with each piece. Even when we as listeners get lost in the kaleidoscope of emotions and are mesmerized by the beauty of the music, there is always an underlying unity in everything that he writes--a silver thread that runs through each movement of his works, whether it's a wisp of a melody or just a passing feeling.

Beethoven was the first composer whose music I truly fell in love with. I personally like his piano sonatas the most, followed closely by his symphonies and string quartets.


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## Bettina (Sep 29, 2016)

I love Beethoven's approach to motivic development. His works often begin with a short motivic fragment, which often becomes gradually more majestic and complex as the piece progresses. There's something literary about Beethoven's motivic processes: he treated motives like protagonists who develop and grow throughout the course of a novel.


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## beetzart (Dec 30, 2009)

I can't believe Beethoven sometimes, his approach is quite something. He starts his 9th string quartet with a loud diminished chord and follows it up with this ethereal andante. It is like he is screaming out for someone to understand him. It is at moments like this where we see the potency of Beethoven's music and the power it has to reduce people to gibbering wrecks. I'd love to write a book about Beethoven but it would just be a hypomanic diatribe.


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## Totenfeier (Mar 11, 2016)

I tell you in advance that what I will say will not say what I want to say, but may - just may - illustrate it. Clear?

Classical music has, I think, a rep in the non-classical music mind of being high-class, snobbish, cold, and too intellectual, in a bad way. We good TCers and true know otherwise: that classical music is full of heart and passion. Sometimes classical music is stuffed with heart and passion. Sometimes the heart and passion strains the rivets, snaps fissures and cracks, and threatens to explode the entire composition in our faces (I'm looking at you, Mahler!).

But Beethoven - Beethoven _is_ the heart - the passion - the fire. It is on the _outside_, for everyone to see. He wears it on his dirty old sleeve, whether it is explosive anger, power, and elemental force - or heart-rending _com_passion, aching tenderness, and sublime love. In Beethoven's case, what is _inside_ is the steely discipline of musical structure - a firm skeleton for the warm flesh.

Beethoven can, and does, express everything that is humanly expressible - and can do it so powerfully because his musical _grammar_ is so flawless.

My zwei pfennigs, anyway.


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## Captainnumber36 (Jan 19, 2017)

Totenfeier said:


> I tell you in advance that what I will say will not say what I want to say, but may - just may - illustrate it. Clear?
> 
> Classical music has, I think, a rep in the non-classical music mind of being high-class, snobbish, cold, and too intellectual, in a bad way. We good TCers and true know otherwise: that classical music is full of heart and passion. Sometimes classical music is stuffed with heart and passion. Sometimes the heart and passion strains the rivets, snaps fissures and cracks, and threatens to explode the entire composition in our faces (I'm looking at you, Mahler!).
> 
> ...


Well stated! Good way of putting it I say!


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Totenfeier said:


> Beethoven _is_ the heart - the passion - the fire. It is on the _outside_, for everyone to see. He wears it on his dirty old sleeve, whether it is explosive anger, power, and elemental force - or heart-rending _com_passion, aching tenderness, and sublime love. In Beethoven's case, what is _inside_ is the steely discipline of musical structure - a firm skeleton for the warm flesh.


Well put indeed, and a telling and accurate description of his music.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Bettina said:


> I love Beethoven's approach to motivic development. His works often begin with a short motivic fragment, which often becomes gradually more majestic and complex as the piece progresses. There's something literary about Beethoven's motivic processes: he treated motives like protagonists who develop and grow throughout the course of a novel.


Such wise word spoken .:tiphat:


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## rice (Mar 23, 2017)

His piano sonatas are both fun to play and enjoyable to listen.
Plus many other masterpieces like symphonies, concertos etc.
He may not be my favorite composer but I don't understand how someone would dislike him


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## Totenfeier (Mar 11, 2016)

I humbly thank you all ("y'all," as we say around these parts) for your kind responses. Beethoven inspires _me_ mightily to do my best for him.


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## beetzart (Dec 30, 2009)

Some wonderful and inspiring words said here about our hero. In non-cyber life it is so hard to find Beethovian kindred spirits, for me anyway, so my life is insular in that respect. I try and get an interest from my immediate family, although I don't force it upon them (I listen through headphones most of the time) I would love them to enjoy Beethoven as much as I do. I don't think I can ever tire of Ludwig and even though he was a very irascible and difficult personality I don't think that any human has conveyed through art the emotions that he has. There is nothing better for me to be euphorically crying while l listen to the Eroica say.


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## yetti66 (Jan 30, 2017)

Beethoven's music is a singular expression of the divine across mankind's history of artistic expression. No painter, author, poet, or musical composer stands in the same light - humanity reaching for, if not touching, the heavens above.


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## beetzart (Dec 30, 2009)

yetti66 said:


> Beethoven's music is a singular expression of the divine across mankind's history of artistic expression. No painter, author, poet, or musical composer stands in the same light - humanity reaching for, if not touching, the heavens above.


Well put. Very well put!


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

The post is nicely expressed, but I don't agree with it, for two reasons:

1. It's a little confused. Either the music in question is an "expression of the divine" or it's "humanity reaching for the heavens above" - can't have it both ways. 

2. The idea that Beethoven, for all his undoubted greatness, is the only creative artist in any medium "reaching for the heavens above" would have come as a surprise to many others - including a few as great as Beethoven himself - who clearly and explicitly did the same.


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## yetti66 (Jan 30, 2017)

I do not suggest that LvB is the only creative artist that reached to the heavens - my opinion is that all other artists stand in the shadow of his hands. Also, I'm not sure why I can't have it both ways - my opinion is succinctly expressed. You may choose to see this as either/ or ...but that does not reflect my sentiment


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## gellio (Nov 7, 2013)

I love Beethoven because he lets us into his inner feelings through his works. You can hear the passion, drama, heartache, longing, desperation, sorrow, and joy in his music. I cannot listen to the first movement of the 5th Symphony without wanting to dance in wild joy. Then I cannot listen to the 2nd movement of the 5th Piano Concerto without weeping. Seriously, no piece of music impacts me about it. I can be in the most joyous mood and then I start weeping every time I listen to it. There's something so sorrowful about it, like this unfulfilled longing, heartbreak...all that stuff. I can say the same about the Moonlight Sonata. He could knock our socks off with power and make us fall to our knees at the same time. He's my guy.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Sounds like this is the "Ode to Beethoven" thread... Ahem... He was wonderfully human and humanly wonderful :angel:


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

Totenfeier said:


> I tell you in advance that what I will say will not say what I want to say, but may - just may - illustrate it. Clear?
> 
> Classical music has, I think, a rep in the non-classical music mind of being high-class, snobbish, cold, and too intellectual, in a bad way. We good TCers and true know otherwise: that classical music is full of heart and passion. Sometimes classical music is stuffed with heart and passion. Sometimes the heart and passion strains the rivets, snaps fissures and cracks, and threatens to explode the entire composition in our faces (I'm looking at you, Mahler!).
> 
> ...


I wouldn't contradict the essence of this eloquent encomium, or of the other heartfelt tributes to a musical giant who deserves them all abundantly. I would only pull you back a little on your statement that "Beethoven can, and does, express everything that is humanly expressible."

No artist can do that: not Beethoven in music, nor Shakespeare in literature. When Beethoven was gone, there was still a great deal of human experience yet to be expressed in music, utilizing harmonic and instrumental resources Beethoven never imagined. I'm very glad that music didn't have to end in 1827, but waited until 1882.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Woodduck said:


> ...I'm very glad that music didn't have to end in 1827, but waited until 1882.


And here I thought it was Schoenberg who killed music. But I guess he's innocent!


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

KenOC said:


> And here I thought it was Schoenberg who killed music. But I guess he's innocent!


He was merely the undertaker.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

BTW I’m a bit confused. I see that Jesse James, Charles Darwin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Mary Todd Lincoln all died in 1882. But the connection to the death of music in that year is unclear.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

KenOC said:


> BTW I'm a bit confused. I see that Jesse James, Charles Darwin, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Mary Todd Lincoln all died in 1882. But the connection to the death of music in that year is unclear.


PARSIFAL..............

"There were only him [Beethoven] and Richard [Wagner]. After that, nobody." - Gustav Mahler


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Ah. But that guy died in 1883...the obersturmbannführer uniform found under his bed was bequeathed to his estate.


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

KenOC said:


> Ah. But that guy died in 1883...the obersturmbannführer uniform found under his bed was bequeathed to his estate.


His work was finished in 1882. So what if he outlived music by a year?

Ummm... Back to Beethoven? Wagner worshipped him, btw.


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

For me personally, music has been a source of emotional renewal. I come to music because it makes me feel like I am having a conversation with a mature, kind and intelligent person - who is not judging me, but allowing me to be myself. Although other composers cheer me up, stoke my curiosity and engage my intelligence, Beethoven is the one who seems to "understand" me. Everything in his music seems to be aimed towards releasing some deep seated grief, accepting it and turning bitterness to gratitude. It's like all our pain gets washed away if only we can experience that one moment of intense and complete catharsis.

Plus, I like his music also because I discovered classical music through him.


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## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Very nicely put if I may say so. There are a few other composers to whose music I feel closer than I do to Beethoven's, but you capture very well the magic of which great music is capable. :tiphat:


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

Woodduck said:


> PARSIFAL..............
> 
> "There were only him [Beethoven] and Richard [Wagner]. After that, nobody." - Gustav Mahler


What about Mahler himself?


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

SiegendesLicht said:


> What about Mahler himself?


He was being modest.


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## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

shangoyal said:


> For me personally, music has been a source of emotional renewal. I come to music because it makes me feel like I am having a conversation with a mature, kind and intelligent person - who is not judging me, but allowing me to be myself. Although other composers cheer me up, stoke my curiosity and engage my intelligence, Beethoven is the one who seems to "understand" me. Everything in his music seems to be aimed towards releasing some deep seated grief, accepting it and turning bitterness to gratitude. It's like all our pain gets washed away if only we can experience that one moment of intense and complete catharsis.
> 
> Plus, I like his music also because I discovered classical music through him.


What a wonderful description. :tiphat:


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

I enjoy Beethoven's aggressiveness; his brash assertiveness. One can tell from his music, here's a dude that can't be pushed around! And he wasn't! His music is rough and gruff and only mellowed a bit when he reached his 50's and composed the great slow movement of the A minor String Quartet and the second movement of Piano Sonata 32.

His musical sense of humor was equalled perhaps only by Haydn. His 32 piano sonatas and Diabelli Variations are full of brilliant musical humor.


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

shangoyal said:


> For me personally, music has been a source of emotional renewal. I come to music because it makes me feel like I am having a conversation with a mature, kind and intelligent person - who is not judging me, but allowing me to be myself. Although other composers cheer me up, stoke my curiosity and engage my intelligence, Beethoven is the one who seems to "understand" me. Everything in his music seems to be aimed towards releasing some deep seated grief, accepting it and turning bitterness to gratitude. It's like all our pain gets washed away if only we can experience that one moment of intense and complete catharsis.
> 
> Plus, I like his music also because I discovered classical music through him.


Nice post. Missed your presence on TC!!


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## shangoyal (Sep 22, 2013)

hpowders said:


> Nice post. Missed your presence on TC!!




Good to come back and find you still around! :tiphat:


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## hpowders (Dec 23, 2013)

shangoyal said:


> Good to come back and find you still around! :tiphat:


My contract doesn't expire for another few days, thanks!


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## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

hpowders said:


> He was being modest.


I would say realistic, if hyperbolic.


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