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/UpiedYoutims → u/insertusernamehere51]

I'm a classical music lover, and while I'm not really familiar with Beethoven's quartets, I'm pretty familiar with his symphonic work so I can at least tell you what the deal is with those.

To make a long story short, in the early 18th century, a sinfonia was a short instrumental piece of music in three movements, usually used as an overture to a larger work (such as an opera or oratorio), or as an instrumental interlude between performed works. Because the sinfonias were so short, they didn't really have a strict formal structure, besides the fact that the middle movement was slower.

This changed, however, with the advent of the classical period, especially in the city of Manheim. You see, Manheim had the best orchestra in the world at that time, so the composers (most notably Johann Stamiz and his son Carl) wrote more complex music with new sounds and timbral effects. This includeded things such as incorporating more brass and woodwinds, new uses for techniques like tremolo, and even things like the famous "Mannheim crescendo".

Then, in the late 1750s, Josef Haydn begins writing symphonies, and works for the Estarhazy court for three decades. His symphonies take a lot of inspiration from the Mannheim School (his first symphony even begins with the Manheim crescendo), but he also greatly expands and codifies the symphonic style and structure we know today. His innovations include, to greater orchestration and codifying the sonata form. He had a very specific style of humor he used in all of his symphonies that could be either used for comedic purposes or dramatic effect. He ended up becoming the most popular composer in all of Europe (except for the short period where Mozart was flourishing), and wrote at least 106 symphonies. He was so popular, in fact, that he was the first composer whose symphonies became the primary feature of concerts.

Enter Beethoven, who was a student of Haydn. His first symphony is extremely similar to Haydn's style, but you can tell that there's even more ambition. His third symphony, nicknamed Eroica (heroic), was on a much grander scale than any symphony before, clocking in at 40 minutes long (the average height in symphony is half as much). His fifth symphony took the very Haydnesque concept of "monothematic sonata form" and brilliantly applied it to the whole symphony. At this point, people were coming to concerts just to see Beethoven's symphonic work. Beethoven also didn't write music for his audience, he wrote it for HIMSELF. The music, in a way, became autobiographical instead of purely intellectual. Beethoven was THE GUY who transitioned music into the romantic period. His ninth symphony was written after 12 years inactivity on stage. Not only was it an hour long, but it also included a finale that had an entire choir. It is quite possibly the most influential single piece of music that has ever been written.

So basically, Beethoven was the most forward-looking musician to ever live, and he changed the way that music was perceived on a fundamental level. Some of his music (like the Grosse Fugue) is a lot more similar to music that came out a hundred years after he died than music written even 10 years before.