560.Beethoven

Reader86

In his mid-20s, Beethoven began to lose his hearing. The grand and lively compositions turned more melancholy. His work became more introspective. Unable to converse, he withdrew from a public that had no way of accommodating the deaf. Beethoven retreated to the countryside.

“How delighted I shall be to ramble for a while through bushes, woods, under trees, through grass, and around rocks,” he wrote of his migration. Nature made no requirements of him. His senses were filled with the colors, the breezes and shadows, the changing seasons and temperatures. He composed what he was feeling straight from the heart, relying on his brilliance as a technician to pen whole symphonies without being able to hear a single note.

In his soul, he could feel what he was writing. And he could see the reaction of those who heard it. Perhaps the deafness awakened in him a deeper sense of what music can do for our souls, how it connects us, uplifts and inspires, teaches and consoles.

The last piece Beethoven composed before he died was Symphony No. 9 in D Minor: Ode to Joy. It begins with a simple refrain, a summer sun crowning the horizon. Each instrument picks up the refrain, adds to it, lifts it higher, a chorus of strings bursting into full daylight, full fields of flowers, dew rising to the heavens, the mist parted by the sun, the full joy of life in concert, each worthy of a note, a story, our complete attention.

https://gazette.com/life/ludwig- ... 3-0bda7dd6099e.html