The Life & Times of Beethoven

The First Angry Man

By: Robert Greenberg, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Robert Greenberg

In The Life & Times of Beethoven, celebrated composer and music historian Professor Robert Greenberg of San Francisco Performances gives you a unique perspective on a musical genius the likes of which the world had never seen before - or since.

Blending biography, history, and music appreciation, these 10 lectures portray Beethoven’s extraordinary (and still modern-sounding) music as a direct outgrowth of his life, environment, and interior emotional landscape. What makes Beethoven’s anger so special is that he was the first composer to portray his own raw (sometimes even violent) emotions directly in his music. As a result, for more than 200 years, works like his later quartets, his Hammerklavier sonata, and his Symphony No. 9, have moved, touched, and sometimes even frightened listeners in a manner almost primal.

Professor Greenberg lays bare the links between Beethoven’s life and his incredible output of music. Listeners will learn:

• How the crisis involving Beethoven’s hearing became a catalyst for his musical creativity and originality,
• How Beethoven’s infatuation with Napoleon helped him change the language of Western music,
• How Beethoven’s “Heroic Music” helped the composer symbolically overcome his pain and unhappiness,
• How six factors contributed to Beethoven’s crushing fall from popular grace in 1815,
• How Beethoven revolutionized the genre of string quartets during the last two years of his compositional life, and much more!

These lectures give an unforgettable perspective of an angry, alienated composer, who, nevertheless, translated personal defeats into musical triumphs.

©2019 Audible Originals, LLC (P)2019 Audible Originals, LLC.

Just brilliant

I feel like I actually knew Beethoven, personally, and knew him well, even smelled him, after listening to this brilliant series. Great job, Professor Greenberg.

A Renowned Genius

I found this narrative very informative and interesting. Dr. Greenburg brought Beethoven to life, with all his sufferings and triumphs, and made him human. How could one not feel with him all of his pain and tragedies, mostly his deafness? And in spite of it all, what a genius!

Beethoven

Fascinating. As a musician myself, I Learned so much about the man and his many agonies.

The life behind, and within, the music

I liked what I always like about Robert Greenberg - his erudition, his eloquence, his humor and his not being shy about expressing his opinion.
I listened to this in parallel to reading Edmund Morris's biography of Beethoven, which I learned here was one of the three main sources Greenberg leaned on, in composing this biography. if I were to listen to it again, I would do so in parallel to listening to various compositions of Beethoven's, in time with the progress of the story.

Interesting

This very short book is an interesting biography of Beethoven. It does not go in depth into his music (the author apparently has other, much longer works for that). I had no idea that Beethoven was such a troubled man, with many, many, many flaws. Were it not for his moving music, it would be easy to despise him. Perhaps there's a lesson in that. Anyway, the lecturer does his best to make it entertaining, dropping in his own jokes to keep the listener engaged.