“This is an elegant, delightful, concise and richly informative introduction to Beethoven, the man and his music, written by a distinguished scholar whose breadth of learning and measured judgment are present on every page.” —Leon Botstein, music director and principal conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra and president of Bard College Born in Bonn, Germany, Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827) showed musical talent from an early age and was first taught by his musician father, Johann, an alcoholic who often beat his son. At the age of 21, Beethoven moved to Vienna, where he studied with composer Joseph Haydn, and quickly became renowned as a pianist and conductor, as well as a composer. He continued to perform until 1811 when increasing deafness made it impossible, but until his death in 1827, he continued to create timeless works, including such masterpieces as the Ninth Symphony and the late string quartets. Plagued by illness and repeatedly thwarted in love, Beethoven rarely achieved personal happiness; yet he transcended the many setbacks and disappointments in his life to produce some of the greatest music ever written, which has come to be identified with the indomitableness of the human spirit. In Simply Beethoven, Professor Leon Plantinga offers the lay reader a fascinating account of Beethoven’s life and music in its singular historical context, a time that saw the upheaval of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic conquests, as well as the rise of the European middle class. It was in this milieu that Beethoven composed the groundbreaking, highly individual works that changed the course of music and have continued to inspire and delight listeners for more than two centuries. For anyone who is interested in knowing more about the extraordinary music that has become an integral part of Western culture, as well as the troubled genius who created it, Simply Beethoven is a perfect introduction to the man and his work.

Simply Beethoven is a collection of the most famous masterpieces by Ludwig van Beethoven. These have been carefully selected and arranged by Jerry Ray for Easy Piano, making them accessible to pianists of all ages. Phrase markings, articulations, fingering and dynamics have been included to aid with interpretation, and a large print size makes the notation easy to read. Titles: * Bagatelle, Op. 33, No. 6 * Ecossaise, WoO 83 * Fí_r Elise * German Dance, WoO 42, No. 6 * Minuet in G * Piano Concerto No. 5 ("Emperor") * Piano Sonata No. 8 in C Minor, Op. 13 ("Pathí©tique") * Rondo a capriccio, Op. 129 ("Rage Over the Lost Penny") and many more!

The definitive book on the life and music of Ludwig van Beethoven, written by the acclaimed biographer of Brahms and Ives.

This 1990 book is a survey of the critical reaction to Beethoven's music as it appeared in the major musical journals, French as well as German, of his day, and represents the first published history of Beethoven reception. The author discusses the philosophical and analytical implications of these reviews and reassesses what has come to be the accepted view of a nineteenth-century musical aesthetics rooted in Romantic Idealism. Wallace sees Beethoven's critics as in fact providing a link between two apparently antithetical approaches to music: the eighteenth-century emphasis on expression and extra-musical interpretation and the nineteenth-century emphasis on 'absolute' music and formal analysis. This book thus provides, in addition to a carefully documented study of Beethoven's critical reception, a re-evaluation of his oeuvre and its significance in music history. An index of all reviews cited is provided, and a further appendix contains the quoted material in its original language.

Presents critical reading concepts used in the SAT in an informal manner, along with interactive drills in the style of test questions.

The day after Beethoven’s death on March 26, 1827, his friends found, in a secret drawer of his desk, together with his will and two miniature portraits of two young women, a ten-page letter dated “July 6 in the morning,” that began with the intriguing incantation “My angel, my all, myself.” It included no address and no name of the addressee, except for the now famous my immortal beloved hyperbole, containing passionate declarations of love and was signed, “L., forever yours, forever mine, forever us.” Thus was born a biographical mystery of the artistic canon of the Western World, second only in tantalizing appeal to the identity of the person signing as William Shakespeare. Two hundred years later, biographers still have not come to a consensus on the mystery. Of the many candidates advanced in the meantime, only a few have survived in biographical literature. Stefan Romanó’s book brings the controversy to a close. It clarifies the existing evidence that has often been muddled, and at times reached the absurd, during almost two centuries of scholarly speculations. He also adds some new insights into the analysis of the evidence, thus making it easier for readers to draw their own conclusions, hopefully not different from his, namely, that only one of the candidates proposed so far fits the evidence. He also provides a substantially modified scenario from the one advanced by her proponents. Born in Romania during WWII and immigrated to the U.S.A. in 1989, Stefan Romanó is not a musician nor a musicologist. He is an engineer by formation, a man of exactitude and clear and logical thinking, qualities that served him thoroughly when he became an amateur Beethoven scholar. A long-time member of American Beethoven Society and of its French counterpart, Association Beethoven France et Francophonie, he has published in their professional journals, bringing valuable contributions to understanding Beethoven’s life and creation. His “Ending the Fifth” article answered a question that had puzzled musicians, scholars and music lovers alike for two hundred years: why does Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony end with that apparently interminable series of C major chords? He took up the pen by force of circumstance for his Beethoven’s Immortal Beloved when he realized that all the proposed solutions to the mystery relied on wild speculation and sometimes even falsifying the existing evidence.