Ode to Joy: Beethoven's 250th Birthday

On December 17, 2020, we will celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of the famous Ludwig Van Beethoven, a look back at the life of the composer of the 9th Symphony.

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Ludwig was born to Johann and Maria-Magdalena Keverich in Bonn, Rhineland, in December 1770, in the heart of a family of music lovers. He was the second of seven children and was raised between the brutality of an alcoholic father and the gentleness of his more discreet mother. 

From a very young age, Beethoven showed a talent for music, something his father quickly exploited. With the idea of making him the new Mozart, his father forced him to drop out of school at 11 to practice piano and violin. The anecdote goes that Beethoven’s father even lied about his son’s age (making him almost two years younger) to make his talent seem even more extraordinary. For years, Beethoven would therefore lie about his age by mistake. 

At just 13, Beethoven played the harpsichord and organ for the court orchestra. It was there that he caught the attention of Ferdinand von Waldstein, who took him to Vienna in 1787 to study. There, he met Mozart, who spoke of him in these terms: “Pay attention to this one, he will make a name for himself in the world.” Very soon, the young musician was forced to return to Bonn due to his mother’s death and his father’s retirement due to alcoholism. It was there that he had the chance to meet the composer Joseph Haydn, who convinced him once again to go to Vienna; he would never return to his hometown. There, he forged his reputation as a virtuosic pianist. 

Beethoven embarked on a concert tour in Vienna, Berlin, and Prague, where the public was more captivated by his music than by his strong temperament. At this point, the musician was already suffering from tinnitus. This deafness isolated him and gave him the image of a misanthrope. He then began to immerse himself in composition and wrote the Third Symphony, known as the “Heroic” because it is powerful, originally long, and characteristic of the few works to follow. Having become completely deaf in 1818, the artist never stopped working, composed the famous 9th Symphony, and set Goethe’s poems to music. 

Sick, deaf, and weakened, the composer died on March 26, 1827, at the age of 57, surrounded by his friends. Several thousand people attended his funeral. The first of the Romantic artists, he left behind globally renowned, strong, and powerful works.