'Only in the world of ideals'

Beethoven is courting and has marriage on the mind. He might be slowing up creatively, but reviews and images of the composer begin to build up a romantic mythology of the composer.

This week, Donald Macleod explores Ludwig van Beethoven’s life through the years of 1810-1812. This was a period of great financial hardship for all of Vienna in the aftermath of Napoleon’s second occupation of the city. Beethoven struggled through this economic depression, composing his Seventh and Eighth Symphonies with little hope of getting performances. The financial crisis wasn’t the only thing to afflict the composer either; alongside an increase in physical ailments, Beethoven also suffered a great emotional crisis which culminated in the letter he wrote to his unnamed ‘Immortal Beloved’.

Composer of the Week is returning to the story of Beethoven’s life and music throughout 2020. Part of Radio 3’s Beethoven Unleashed season marking the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth.

String Quartet No 10 in E flat major, Op 74 “Harp” (4th movement)
Endellion Quartet

Bagatelle in A minor, WoO 59 “Für Elise”
Vladimir Ashkenazy, piano

Symphony No 5 in C minor, Op 67 -(2nd movement)
Vienna Philharmonic
Carlos Kleiber, conductor

String Quartet No 11 in F minor, Op 95
Busch Quartet

Symphony No 7 in A major, Op 92 (4th movement)
Wiener Philharmoniker
Rafael Kubelik, conductor

Producer: Sam Phillips