Biography and episodes of life Ludwig van Beethoven. When born and died Ludwig van Beethoven, memorable places and dates of important events in his life. composer quotes, Photo and video.
Ludwig van Beethoven's years of life:
born December 16, 1770, died March 26, 1827
Epitaph
“On the very day when your consonances
Overcome the difficult world of work,
The light overpowered the light, the cloud passed through the cloud,
Thunder moved on thunder, a star entered the star.
And furiously seized by inspiration,
In the orchestras of thunderstorms and the thrill of thunders,
You climbed the cloudy steps
And touched the music of the worlds.
From a poem by Nikolai Zabolotsky dedicated to Beethoven
Biography
His own father did not see the talent in him, and Haydn considered him too gloomy a composer, but when Beethoven died, twenty thousand people followed his coffin. The last years of his life, the composer was absolutely deaf, but this did not prevent him from creating his most brilliant works at that time. Perhaps Beethoven really was not mistaken when he said that he was creating with God's help.
Ludwig van Beethoven was born into a musical family. From childhood, his father worked with the boy and taught him to play various musical instruments. But the first performance of little Beethoven was without much success, and his father decided that he had no talent, and entrusted his son to other teachers. Beethoven, contrary to the disappointing forecasts of his father, already at the age of 12 received the position of assistant organist at court. And when his mother died, he took over the duties of the breadwinner and supported his younger brothers, working in the orchestra.
Beethoven's first fame was brought not by his own compositions, but by his virtuoso performance. Soon the works of Beethoven himself began to be published. Especially successful for the composer was the period of Beethoven's life, which he lived in Vienna. Despite the fact that the composer had a rather sharp temper, high conceit, refused to bow before ranks and influential people, it was impossible not to recognize the genius of Beethoven. And yet the composer always had many friends - tough and proud in public, he was very generous and friendly towards his loved ones, ready to give them the last money or help in solving problems.
But Beethoven's main passion was music. Perhaps that is why he never married, he was so passionate about himself and his ability to create. Only illness could prevent him from composing, and therefore it seems like an evil irony that the brilliant composer began to lose his hearing at such a young age. But even this did not stop him, and his music became even more perfect and monumental.
The last years of his life, Beethoven worked with particular zeal, creating one great work after another. But illness and worries about the nephew, whom Beethoven took in, significantly shortened his life. Beethoven's death came on March 26, 1827. Beethoven's funeral was held with great honors. Beethoven's grave is located in Vienna's Central Cemetery.
life line
December 16, 1770 Date of birth of Ludwig van Beethoven.
1778 Beethoven's first public performance in Cologne.
1780 Beginning of classes with organist and composer Christian Gottlob Nefe.
1782 Admission to the position of assistant to the court organist, publication of the first work of the young composer - variations on the theme of Dressler's march.
1787 Admission to the position of violist in the orchestra.
1789 Attending lectures at the university.
1792-1802 The Vienna period in Beethoven's life - classes with Haydn, Salieri, Beethoven's fame as a virtuoso performer, the publication of Beethoven's works.
1796 The onset of hearing loss.
1801 Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata"
1803 Beethoven writing the Kreutzer Sonata.
1814 Staging of Beethoven's only opera Fidelio.
1824 Performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9.
March 26, 1827 Date of Beethoven's death.
March 29, 1827 Beethoven's funeral.
Memorable places
1. Beethoven's house in Bonn, where he was born.
2. Beethoven's house-museum in Baden, where he lived and worked.
3. Theater An der Wien ("Theater on the River Vienna"), which premiered such works by Beethoven as the opera "Fidelio", the Second, Third, Fifth and Sixth Symphonies, the Violin and the Fourth Piano Concertos.
4. A memorial plaque to Beethoven on the house "At the Golden Unicorn" in Prague, where the composer stayed.
5. Monument to Beethoven in Bucharest.
6. Monument to Beethoven, Haydn and Mozart in Berlin.
7. Vienna Central Cemetery, where Beethoven is buried.
Episodes of life
Like Bach, Beethoven was sure that there was a divine element in his music. But if Bach believed that his talent was the merit of God, then Beethoven claimed that he communicated with God while writing music. It is known that he had a slightly arrogant character. One day, a musician complained about a difficult and uncomfortable passage in Beethoven's work, to which the composer replied indignantly: "When I wrote this, the Lord Almighty guided me, do you really think that I could think of your little part when He spoke to me?"
Beethoven had many oddities. For example, before starting to compose music, Beethoven dipped his head into a container of ice water, and at moments when difficulty arose in work, he began to pour water on his hands. Very often he walked around the house in wet clothes, without even noticing it and immersed in his thoughts. Beethoven's neighbors often complained about water pouring from the ceiling.
Once Beethoven was walking with the German poet Hermann Goethe, and he was indignant that he was tired of the endless greetings of passers-by. To which Beethoven condescendingly replied: “Don't let that bother you, Your Excellency. Perhaps the greetings are meant for me."
Covenant
"People make their own destiny!"
Biography of Ludwig van Beethoven in the Encyclopedia project
condolences
"Haydn and Mozart, the creators of new instrumental music, were the first to show us art in its unprecedented splendor, but only Beethoven peered into it with great love and penetrated into its essence."
Ernst Theodor Amadeus Hoffmann, writer, composer, artist
"The true reason for the success of Beethoven's music is that people study it not in concert halls, but at home, at the piano..."
Richard Wagner, composer
"Before the name of Beethoven, we must all bow in obeisance."
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi, composer
One of the most famous musical works of the great, unsurpassed Beethoven in history, called the Moonlight Sonata, was dedicated to the young Juliet Guicciardi.
The girl won the heart of the young composer and then brutally broke him. But it is to Juliet that we owe the fact that we can listen to the music of the best sonata of a brilliant composer that penetrates so deeply into the soul.
Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) was born in the German city of Bonn. The years of childhood can be called the most difficult in the life of the future composer. It was difficult for a proud and independent boy to survive the fact that his father, a rude and despotic man, noticing his son's musical talent, decided to use him for selfish purposes.
Forcing little Ludwig to sit at the harpsichord from morning till night, he did not think that his son needed childhood so much. At the age of eight, Beethoven earned his first money - he gave a public concert, and by the age of twelve the boy was playing the violin and organ freely. Together with success, isolation, a need for solitude and unsociableness came to the young musician.
At the same time, Christian Gottlieb Nefe, his wise and kind mentor, appeared in the life of the future composer. It was he who instilled in the boy a sense of beauty, taught him to understand nature, art, to understand human life.
Nefe taught Ludwig ancient languages, philosophy, literature, history, and ethics. Subsequently, being a deeply and broadly thinking person, Beethoven became an adherent of the principles of freedom, humanism, equality of all people.
In 1787 the young Beethoven left Bonn for Vienna.
Beautiful Vienna - a city of theaters and cathedrals, street orchestras and love serenades under the windows - won the heart of the young genius. But it was there that the young musician was struck by deafness: at first the sounds seemed muffled to him, then he repeated the unheard phrases several times, then he realized that he was finally losing his hearing. “I lead a bitter existence,” Beethoven wrote to his friend. - I'm deaf. With my craft, nothing can be more terrible ... Oh, if I got rid of this disease, I would embrace the whole world.
But the horror of progressive deafness was replaced by happiness from a meeting with a young aristocrat, an Italian by birth, Giulietta Guicciardi (1784-1856). Juliet, daughter of the wealthy and noble Count Guicciardi, arrived in Vienna in 1800. Then she was not even seventeen, but the love of life and charm of a young girl conquered the thirty-year-old composer, and he immediately confessed to his friends that he fell in love passionately and passionately.
He was sure that the same tender feelings arose in the heart of a mocking coquette. In a letter to his friend, Beethoven emphasized: "This wonderful girl is so much loved by me and loves me that I observe a striking change in myself precisely because of her."
A few months after their first meeting, Beethoven invited Juliet to take some free piano lessons from him. She gladly accepted this offer, and in return for such a generous gift, she presented her teacher with several shirts embroidered by her. Beethoven was a strict teacher.
When he didn’t like Juliet’s playing, he was annoyed and threw notes on the floor, defiantly turned away from the girl, and she silently collected notebooks from the floor. Six months later, at the peak of his feelings, Beethoven began to create a new sonata, which after his death will be called "Moon". It is dedicated to the Countess Guicciardi and was started in a state of great love, delight and hope.
He, angry, asked the young countess not to come to him anymore. “I despised her,” Beethoven recalled much later. “For if I wanted to give my life to this love, what would be left for the noble, for the higher?” And the aristocratic student, having become Countess Gallenberg, left Vienna and went to Italy.
In an emotional turmoil in October 1802, Beethoven left Vienna and went to Heiligenstadt, where he wrote the famous "Heiligenstadt Testament": you do not know the secret reason for what you think. Since childhood, I have been predisposed in my heart and mind to a tender feeling of kindness, I have always been ready to do great things.
But just think that for six years now I have been in an unfortunate state ... I am completely deaf ... "
Fear, the collapse of hopes give rise to thoughts of suicide in the composer. But Beethoven gathered his strength and decided to start a new life and, in almost absolute deafness, created great masterpieces.
Several years passed, and Juliet returned to Austria and came to Beethoven's apartment. Crying, she recalled the wonderful time when the composer was her teacher, talked about the poverty and difficulties of her family, asked to forgive her and help with money. Being a kind and noble man, the maestro gave her a significant amount, but asked her to leave and never appear in his house.
Beethoven seemed indifferent and indifferent. But who knows what was going on in his heart, torn by numerous disappointments. At the end of his life, the composer will write: “I was very loved by her and more than ever, was her husband ...”
Trying to permanently erase his beloved from his memory, the composer met with other women. Once, when he saw the beautiful Josephine Brunswick, he immediately confessed his love to her, but in response he received only a polite, but unequivocal refusal.
Then, in desperation, Beethoven proposed to Josephine's older sister Teresa. But she did the same, inventing a beautiful fairy tale about the impossibility of meeting with the composer.
The genius repeatedly recalled how women humiliated him. One day, a young singer from the Viennese theater, when asked to meet with her, replied with a sneer that “the composer is so ugly in appearance, and besides, it seems too strange to her” that she did not intend to meet with him.
Ludwig van Beethoven really did not look after his appearance, often remained untidy. It is unlikely that he could be called independent in everyday life, he needed the constant care of a woman.
When Giulietta Guicciardi, while still a student of the maestro, and noticing that Beethoven's silk bow was not so tied, tied it up and kissed him on the forehead, the composer did not remove this bow and did not change clothes for several weeks, until his friends hinted at his not quite fresh look suit.
Too sincere and open, contemptuous of hypocrisy and servility, Beethoven often seemed rude and ill-mannered. Often he expressed himself obscenely, which is why many considered him a plebeian and an ignorant boor, although the composer simply spoke the truth.
In the autumn of 1826, Beethoven fell ill. Exhausting treatment, three complex operations could not put the composer on his feet. Throughout the winter, without getting out of bed, he was completely deaf, tormented by the fact that ... he could not continue to work. On March 26, 1827, the great musical genius Ludwig van Beethoven died.
After his death, a letter "To the immortal beloved" was found in a desk drawer.<Так Бетховен озаглавил письмо сам (авт.)>: “My angel, my everything, my self ... Why is there deep sadness where necessity reigns?
Can our love endure only at the cost of sacrifice by refusing to be full, can't you change the situation in which you are not wholly mine and I am not wholly yours? What a life! Without you! So close! So far! What longing and tears for you - you - you, my life, my everything ... ".
Many will then argue about who exactly the message is addressed to. But a small fact points precisely to Juliet Guicciardi: next to the letter was kept a tiny portrait of Beethoven's beloved, made by an unknown master.
Ludwig van Beethoven is an outstanding German composer of world significance. He is the latest representative of the "Viennese classical school". Beethoven's creative heritage includes works of various genres: sonatas and concertos for various instruments - violins, pianos, cellos, overtures, symphonies, operas, etc. The composer's work influenced the development of musical art not only in the nineteenth, but also in the twentieth century.
Childhood and youth
The probable date of Beethoven's birth is December 16, 1770. It is known for certain that he was baptized in Bonn on December 17 of the same year. Ludwig's father, a court chapel singer, began to teach his son music from an early age. The boy learned to play the violin, organ, harpsichord and flute.
The young musician was greatly influenced by his teacher Christian Gottlob Nefe. With his help, the first work of the twelve-year-old Ludwig was published - “Variations on the Theme of the March by E. Dressler”. Then the young Beethoven began working as an assistant to the court organist.
At the age of seventeen, Ludwig travels to Vienna to take lessons from V.A. Mozart. However, due to the death of his mother, he was forced to return to take care of his younger brothers.
The most famous of the works of the early period is the song "Marmot" to the verses of I.V. Goethe.
Young years and the heyday of musical creativity
Again, the young musician returns to Vienna in 1792 and settles there forever. Initially takes composition lessons from Joseph Haydn. However, the teacher and student do not find mutual understanding and part. Beethoven continued his studies with the teacher and musicologist I.G. Albrechtsberger and composer Antonio Salieri.
Very soon, the young man won recognition as a virtuoso pianist - improviser. His manner of performance was fundamentally different from the generally accepted in those years. Beethoven actively uses the pedal, the extreme registers of the instrument and often uses chords. In fact, they were a fundamentally new style of piano performance was created.
Possessing a fantastic capacity for work, Beethoven created in his younger years (up to 35 years old) a number of works that later became world classics of musical art:
- Piano Sonata in C-sharp minor ("Lunar") - 1801
- "Kreutzer Sonata" for violin and piano - 1803
- "Heroic" symphony No. 3 - 1804
- Sonata for piano "Apassionata" - 1805
- Opera "Fidelio" - 1804
Despite universal recognition and the successful publication of musical compositions, Beethoven's life was overshadowed by a tragic illness from the age of twenty-seven. The composer began to rapidly lose his hearing. It soon became apparent that the disease was irreversible. Despite this, Beethoven tried for many years to hide his misfortune from others.
mature years
Deafness makes Beethoven withdrawn and unsociable. Many contemporaries noted his heavy, quarrelsome character. The disease exacerbated these traits. Since 1819, the composer has been able to communicate with others only through recordings, many of which have survived to this day.
Despite the misfortune, the inner ear allowed the genius to create a number of outstanding musical masterpieces in his later years. The most significant compositions of mature years are the Ninth Symphony with Choir and the Solemn Mass.
The Ninth Symphony is the composer's last work in this genre. For the first time in a symphonic work, a choir with soloists was involved along with the instruments of the orchestra.
The Mass, written for organ, orchestra, choir and soloists, was created over four years (from 1019 to 1823). The first performance took place in St. Petersburg, which was facilitated by Prince Nikolai Golitsyn, who provided patronage to Beethoven. Only after the death of the composer, in 1830, the work was performed within the walls of the church.
In the same period, the last piano sonatas (Nos. 28 - 32), the vocal cycle "To a Distant Beloved", works for string quartet were written.
Despite fame and recognition during his lifetime, Beethoven died at the age of fifty-six, in March 1827. It is believed that this was facilitated by worries about the unlucky nephew, to whom the composer was strongly attached and took part in the arrangement of whose fate.
The grave of Ludwig van Beethoven is located in Vienna, in the Central Cemetery.
Composer's legacy
The most significant works included in the number of world cultural heritage:
- Nine symphonies
- Five Piano Concertos
- Thirty-two sonatas for piano
- Solemn Mass in five movements
Beethoven was also a talented teacher, raising a number of talented students, among them the later famous composer and pianist Karl Czerny.
The composer's works are still being actively performed in prestigious concert halls around the world.
Portrait from 1820
Joseph Karl Stieler
Ludwig van Beethoven. The exact date of the birth of Ludwig van Beethoven is unknown, but the estimated date of birth is December 16, 1770. This assumption is put forward based on the exact date of his baptism - December 17th. The permanent homeland for Ludwig was the city of Bonn.
The Beethoven family were highly educated and musical people. It was there that from an early age Ludwig was taught to play the organ, flute, violin and harpsichord.
Ludwig van Beethoven received his first serious experience in musical education from the composer Christian Gottlob Nefe.
The first work in the art of music dates back to 1782, when the young Beethoven was only 12 years old. Then he began his career as an assistant organist at court. However, Beethoven's activities cannot be limited to one work, besides her, he studied several languages and tried to write musical works.
Beethoven loves to spend time with a book. His favorite authors were Greek representatives such as Plutarch and Homer, as well as the more modern Shakespeare, Goethe and Schiller.
The year 1787 becomes tragic for Ludwig and his entire family. The mother dies, and Beethoven undertakes to take over all material responsibilities. In the same year, he begins to work, playing in an orchestra, while simultaneously combining studies and university lectures.
At home, Beethoven accidentally meets the great composer Joseph Haydn, where he asks him to take art lessons. But, in order to study music with Haydn, Beethoven had to move to Vienna. Even while still unknown, the great Mozart, listening to the musical improvisations of Ludwig Beethoven, says that he still has time to make the whole world talk about himself. After several classes, Haydn sends Beethoven to be educated by Johann Albrechtsberger. The next person to pass on the mastery to Beethoven was Antonio Salieri.
Everyone who knew Beethoven's work noted that his musical improvisations were filled with gloom, melancholy and strangeness. However, it was they and the unsurpassed piano playing that brought Beethoven its former glory. Being in Vienna and inspired by its nature, Beethoven wrote the Moonlight Sonata and the Pathetic Sonata. All musical works are significantly different from the classical methods of playing harpsichords.
Ludwig van Beethoven has always been like an open book to friends, while at the same time remaining rude and selfish in public.
The following years of Beethoven's life are filled with illness. Having become very ill, Ludwig gets a complication in his ear - tinitis.
Strongly tormented, Beethoven decides to retire to Heiligenstadt, where he begins to work on the Heroic Symphony. Often and fruitfully working and constantly tired, Beethoven completely loses his hearing, moves away from people and society, and remains lonely. But, even having lost his hearing, Ludwig did not force himself to leave his beloved art.
The last decade of his life, until 1812, was a real discovery for Beethoven. It was during this period of time that he began to create with a particularly strong desire, creating notorious works - the Ninth Symphony, as well as the Solemn Mass.
Biographical information of this time period was for Ludwig filled with special popularity, fame and vocation. Despite the fact that the policy of the authorities was on a fairly strict position in relation to all the creators of great art, no one dared to offend Ludwig Beethoven.
But, unfortunately, the excessive worries of Beethoven, who took care of his nephew, aged the musician too quickly.
So, on March 26, 1827, Ludwig Beethoven passes away due to severe liver disease.
Beethoven's music is known to all lovers of the classics. His name is considered iconic for those who dream of becoming a real musician. How did one of the most popular composers live and work?
Beethoven: childhood and youth of a little genius
The exact birth date of Ludwig van Beethoven is not known for certain. The year of his birth is 1770. December 17 is called the day of baptism. Ludwig was born in the German city of Bonn.
The Beethoven family was directly related to music. The boy's father was a famous tenor. And his mother, Maria Magdalene Keverich, was the daughter of a chef.
The ambitious Johann Beethoven, being a strict father, wanted to make a great composer out of Ludwig. He dreamed that his son would become the second Mozart. He put in a lot of effort to achieve his goal.
At first, he himself taught the boy to play various instruments. Then he passed the training of the child to his colleagues. From childhood, Ludwig mastered two complex instruments: the organ and the violin.
When the young Beethoven was only 10 years old, the organist Christian Nefe arrived in his city. It was he who became the true mentors of the boy, as he saw in him a great ability for music.
Beethoven was taught classical music based on the works of Bach and Mozart. At the age of 12, the talented child began his career as an assistant organist. When a tragedy occurred in the family, and Ludwig's grandfather died, the finances of the venerable family were greatly reduced. Despite the fact that the young Beethoven never completed his studies at school, he managed to master Latin, Italian and French. Throughout his life, Beethoven read a lot, was curious, intelligent and erudite. He easily understood any scholarly treatises.
The youthful works of the future composer were later revised by him. The sonata "Marmot" has reached our days unchanged.
In 1787, Mozart himself gave the boy an audition. The great contemporary of Beethoven was pleased with his playing. He highly appreciated the improvisation of the young man.
Ludwig wanted to learn from Mozart himself, but fate decreed otherwise. Beethoven's mother died that year. He had to return to his hometown to take care of his brothers. In order to earn money, he got a job in a local orchestra as a violist.
In 1789, Ludwig again begins to attend classes at the university. The revolution that broke out in the French state inspires him to create the Song of a Free Man.
In the autumn of 1792, another idol of Beethoven, composer Haydn, happened to be passing through Bonn, his hometown of Beethoven. Then the young man decides to follow him to Vienna to continue his music studies.
Beethoven's mature years
The collaboration between Haydn and Beethoven in Vienna can hardly be called fruitful. An accomplished mentor considered the creations of his student beautiful, but too gloomy. Haydn later left for England. Then Ludwig van Beethoven found himself a new teacher. It turned out to be Antonio Salieri.
Thanks to Beethoven's virtuoso playing, a piano style of playing was created, where extreme registers, loud chords and the use of a pedal on the instrument became the norm.
This style of playing is fully reflected in the composer's popular Moonlight Sonata. In addition to innovation in music, Beethoven's lifestyle and character traits also deserved considerable attention. The composer practically did not look after his clothes and appearance. If in the hall during his performance someone dared to talk, Beethoven refused to play and went home.
With friends and relatives, Ludwig van Beethoven could be harsh, but he never refused them the necessary assistance to relatives. During the first decade that the young composer worked in Vienna, he managed to write 20 sonatas for classical piano, 3 full-fledged piano concertos, many sonatas for other instruments, one oratorio on a religious theme, as well as a full-fledged ballet.
The tragedy of Beethoven and his later years
The fateful year 1796 for Beethoven becomes the most difficult in life. The famous composer begins to lose his hearing. Doctors diagnose him with chronic inflammation of the inner ear canal.
Ludwig van Beethoven suffered greatly from his illness. In addition to pain, he was haunted by ringing in his ears. On the advice of doctors, he goes to live in the small and quiet town of Heiligenstadt. But the situation with his illness is not changing for the better.
Over the years, Beethoven increasingly despised the power of emperors and princes. He believed that equal human rights were the ideal good. For this reason, Beethoven decided not to dedicate one of his works to Napoleon, calling the Third Symphony simply "Heroic".
During the period of hearing loss, the composer withdraws into himself, but continues to work. He writes the opera Fidelio. Then he creates a cycle of musical works called "To a Distant Beloved".
Progressive deafness did not become an obstacle to Beethoven's sincere interest in what is happening in the world. After the defeat and exile of Napoleon, a strict police regime was introduced in the Austrian lands, but Beethoven, as before, continued to criticize the government. Perhaps he guessed that they would not dare to touch him and throw him in jail, because his fame had become really grandiose.
Little is known about Ludwig van Beethoven's personal life. It was rumored that he wanted to marry one of his students, Countess Juliette Guicciardi. For some time, the girl reciprocated the composer, but then she preferred another. His next student Teresa Brunswick was a devoted friend of Beethoven until her death, but the true context of their relationship is shrouded in mystery and is not known for certain.
When the composer's younger brother died, he took custody of his son. Beethoven tried to instill in the young man a love of art and science, but the guy was a gambler and a reveler. Once losing, he tried to commit suicide. This upset Beethoven greatly. On nervous grounds, he developed liver disease.
In 1827 the great composer died. The funeral procession included over 20,000 people. The famous musician was only 57 years old when he passed away and was buried in the Vienna cemetery.
