need little known facts about beethoven

[razorback_student]

hello to all on this great day.
I ask this question to all of you for whom know more about this great composer than i do myself. I have a research lecture that i am to give on Beethoven and I am looking for so tidbits or other little strange facts about him. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Amalie]

Why is it that students only want to know about 'strange' facts about Beethoven,
instead of intelligent information that helps appreciate his art??


I trust you will find the following page of interest. -> http://www.kingsbarn.freeserve.co.uk/anecdotes.htm


Here also I have found for you;

~ BEETHOVEN'S USE OF TIME ~

Beethoven rose at daybreak, no matter what season, and went at once to his work-table.
There he worked until two or three o'clock, when he took his midday meal. In the interim he usually ran out into the open two or three times, where he also "worked while walking". Such excursions seldom exceeded a full hours time, and resembled the swarming out of the bee to gather honey. They never varied with the seasons and neither cold nor heat were noticed.
The afternoons were dedicated to regular promenades; and at a later hour was wont to hunt up for some favourite Beer-House, in order to read the news of the day, if he had not already satisfied this need at some cafe. At the time when the English Parliment was sitting, however, the Allgemeine Zeitung was regularly read at home for the sake of debates. It will be easily understood that our politico was arrayed on the side of the Opposition. Nor was his great predilection for Lord Broughman, Hume, and other Opposition orators necessary to this end.
Beethoven always spent his winter evenings at home, and devoted them to serious reading. It was but seldom that one saw him busy with music-paper in the evening, since writing music was too taxing for his eyes. In former years this may have been the case; yet it is quite certain that at no time did he employ the evening hours for composition (creation). At ten o'clock at the latest he retired to bed.

Anton Schindler, Life of Beethoven - 1840

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~ THE DISASTROUS CHEF ~

Sometimes in the frenzy of composing Beethoven would forget to eat until eventually he was famished with urgent hunger pangs. Seyfried related the amusing tale of Beethoven's disastrous attempt to cook dinner for a few invited friends. The beef soup was cold, the likewarm vegetables were swimming in water and grease, while "the roast meat was burnt to a cinder".

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[This message has been edited by Amalie (edited April 09, 2004).]

[Amalie]

BEETHOVEN AS CONDUCTOR


In order to gain expertise in conducting, Beethoven made a detailed study of Johann Mattheson's , THE PERFECT CONDUCTOR, a copy of which was retained in his library.
Though he was not a gifted conductor, his perpetual motion of extravagant, eccentric gestures on the podium was colorful to witness. In a diminuendo passage he indicated the most gradual decrease possible, by crouching down on his knees as low as possible during the pianissimo.
To the contrary, during a crescendo he would rise up gradually into the air, so that on a fortissimo he would stand on his toes and reach up with his arms to their full extent. Beethoven often gave a downbeat on the false accent of the bar, and frequently lost tempo with the orchestra, so that he was forced to find his way back by observing the bowing of the strings.
Ludwig Spohr noted that during an expressive heart-rending passage Beethoven would cross his arms upon his breast, only to tear them apart on a sforzando. Spohr also observed that on the forte Beethoven would sometimes shout as he jumped into the air.
Little wonder then that musicians would tremble at the thought of partaking in a performance with Beethoven, who was not only deaf and eccentric, but also stubborn, absent-minded, forgetful, and spiced with a volatile temper.

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HIS COMPOSITIONAL PROCESS

An essential part of his process of learning composition was the traditional method of imitating and emulating the outstanding achievements of earlier masters, with a view, where possible,to integrating their resources for use as a springboard for further development in the discovery of new meanings.
A practical way of achieving this goal was to copy out such passages as had won his admiration. The three composers whose works he copied out most were Mozart, J.S.Bach, and Handel. Such a method was readily adapted to his peculiar habit of composing with sketches, a technique acquired early in his life; "The bad habit I formed in childhood of feeling obliged to write down my first idea immediately".
While such a method was an essential component of his compositional process, it also insured against the absent-minded composer forgetting such sublime inspirations emanating from his genius.
Thayer emphasized that he was the first scholar ever to use Beethoven's sketchbooks for a study of chronology, though Gustav Nottenbohm was the true pioneer of sketch research. Some 8,000 surviving pages of Beethoven's sketches divided into over 400 sources, are now scattered throughout the world.
The Kafka Notebook in the British Library of autograph miscellany from circa 1786 to 1799 is famous for its sketches and drafts of early Beethoven compositions. It also includes rough copies of intended works, copies of music by Mozart and Handel, and numerous other sketches, exercises, studies, and musical memoranda. In addition there are those mysterious notations of isolated fragments in piano score, abstract studies in dance form, and "improvisations on paper". The twenty-odd Bonn sheets are especially fascinating to contrast with their Viennese counterparts. The use of sketches was more important to Beethoven than to any other composer, and with the passage of time he used them increasingly. He often continued sketching until the continuous melodic line of a large section of a movement was attained. Keen to explore all manner of permutations and combinations of musical idea, he would at times sketch as many as twenty or thirty variants of a theme. Sometimes when his inspirations overflowed in abundance, his jottings spilled over onto the backs of letters, or pages of the conversation-books, or blank staves of completed autograph scores, or dinner bills-of-fare,or window shutters.
For example, in early December 1823, a sketch from the finale of the Ninth Symphony was entered in a conversation -book. Beethoven sometimes also jotted down drafts of difficult letters, on the title pages of dedications, lists of errata, or odd calculations and sums. Woe betide the maid who touched any of his sketches while cleaning his room!!
Ignatuis von Seyfried also related that Beethoven never appeared in the streets without a notebook in which he would jot down his musical ideas instantly.

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From - The Character of a Genius, by, Peter J. Davies