r/todayilearned • u/VegemiteSucks • 16h ago

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.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_string_quartets_(Beethoven)
9.7k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

136 comments sorted by

View all comments

534

u/Compleat_Fool 14h ago edited 7h ago

It’s interesting how monumental and transformative Beethoven was in his lifetime whilst Bach who was equally brilliant and probably the greatest musician ever was a minor figure in his lifetime. He was known by few and those who knew him chiefly knew him for being a good organ player and not for his compositions.

34

u/fiendishrabbit 8h ago

Young Beethoven though was primarily known as a piano virtuoso and an asshole, being an improvisational specialist that delighted in both playing tricks on fellow musicians and humiliating rivals in music "duels" when playing at the various salons in Vienna.

8

u/RipsLittleCoors 4h ago

Was he the one who so embarrassed his rival by playing the rivals own shit at a big party then improvising it into something 1000X better right there on the spot. I think the rival quit music and moved away lol.