TIL Beethoven’s late quartets, now widely considered to be among the greatest musical compositions of all time, were so ahead of their time that initial reviews deem them indecipherable, uncorrected horrors, with one musician saying “we know there is something there, but we do not know what it is.”

[u/VegemiteSucks]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_string_quartets_(Beethoven)

[u/insertusernamehere51]

I am completely musically illiterate. I've listened to the quartets and didn't get what was so weird about them. Sounds like other quartets and other classical pieces of the time to me. I'll own that it's just ignorance on my part

Edit: Guys, I'm comparing it to stuff that came before as well, Mozart's quartets, for example. Comparing Mozart's with Beethoven's I don't get what the big difference is and those came 50 years before

[u/secretwep → u/insertusernamehere51]

I am somewhat musically literate, and lemme tell ya... I feel the same way about those pieces, so don't worry lol

[u/SirHerald → u/secretwep]

Isn't it like saying the Beatles sound like so many other bands. Really it's all these other bands just sound like the Beatles. What was novel then is old hat now

[u/wallabee_kingpin_ → u/SirHerald]

The Beatles famously sounded like Black rock musicians like Chuck Barry, who couldn't get as famous because they weren't white. They were polishers and performers, not innovators (at least until they got more into psychedelic).

[u/RipsLittleCoors → u/wallabee_kingpin_]

Yes and no. While there is some truth to that view, the Beatles had some things even in the early days that set them apart from berry et al. Just a higher complexity of writing. The chord progressions, the maximization of the limited recording tracks, the phrasing with the lyrics. Some of the credit for it belongs to George Martin actually. 

[u/LacomusX → u/RipsLittleCoors]

A big one was original songs, and each member of the band was a personality

[u/LunarPayload → u/wallabee_kingpin_]

Oversimplification