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- Beethoven: The First Rock Star
- Sophie Uses Her Feet
- Micro Harassment
- T To-Do-List - It Takes A Team To Get All His Errands Done
- The Perfectly-Timed Villain
- Classy Yet Goofy Animal Furniture
- Adulting
- Emergency Crews Twice Called to "Homeless Jesus" Statue
- This Supercut Will Make You Jump
- The Pizza Sofa
- Documentary Series About Guys Who Like To Dress Up Like Dogs
- Hurt Feelings
- Prank: The Old Man at Muscle Beach
- The “Nature Man” of 1913
- Amazon Fitness - Sweat Until You're Superhuman
- Jimmy Fallon & Paul Rudd Perfectly Recreate Styx Music Video
- Adding Injury and Insult to Injury
- Bruce Springsteen Invites a 4-Year Old Girl on Stage to Sing with Him
- Meet the Fan Favorite of the US Olympic Trials
- Dad Trolls His Daughter By Recreating Her Selfies
- Why Slavs wear Adidas
- Strange Early Prototypes Of Stan Lee's Iconic Characters
- A Metal Music Video for <i>Watership Down</i>
| Beethoven: The First Rock Star Posted: 08 Jul 2016 05:00 AM PDT Thumbing his nose at authority and whipping crowds into a frenzy, he changed music forever. Ludwig van Beethoven was often mistaken for a vagrant. With wads of yellow cotton stuffed in his ears, he stomped around 1820s Vienna, flailing his arms, mumbling as he scribbled on scraps of paper. Residents would frequently alert the police. Once, he was tossed in jail when cops refused to believe he was the city’s most famous composer. “You’re a tramp!” they argued. “Beethoven doesn’t look like this.” The city was crawling with spies—they lurked in taverns, markets, and coffeehouses, looking to suss out anti-aristocratic rebels. Since Beethoven seemed suspect, these spies followed him and eavesdropped on his conversations. But authorities didn’t consider him a real threat. Like the rest of Vienna, they thought he was crazy. It had been nearly 10 years since he wrote his Symphony No. 8, and just as long since he’d last given a public concert. “He is apparently quite incapable of greater accomplishments,” the newspaper Allgemeine Musikalische Zeitung concluded. Little did they know, Beethoven was composing like a man possessed. At his apartment, he stomped out tempos and pounded his piano keys so hard the strings snapped. Sweat-stained manuscripts littered the room. He was so focused, he often forgot to empty the chamber pot under his piano. The piece would be his grandest yet: Symphony No. 9 in D minor. With it, he planned to give those spies reason to worry—not only would the piece be political, but he intended to play it for the largest audience possible. The music, he hoped, would put the nobility in its place.
A decade earlier, 7-year-old Mozart had toured Europe, playing music for royal courts and generating income for his family. Johann dreamed of a similar course for his son. He lied about Ludwig’s age to make him appear younger, and for a time, even Ludwig didn’t know his real age. But the Beethovens saw neither fame nor fortune. Johann’s drinking debts were so deep his wife had to sell her clothes. When Ludwig turned 11, his family pulled him from elementary school to focus on music full-time. The truncated education meant he never mastered spelling or simple multiplication. By the time he was 22, Beethoven’s world had changed. His parents passed away, and he left Bonn for Vienna, where Mozart, the aristocracy’s most cherished entertainer, had recently died too. The nobles were desperate to find his replacement, and Beethoven, who improvised at the piano for royal soirees, quickly became regarded as one of Vienna’s most talented musicians—and Mozart’s heir. But the more Beethoven hobnobbed with aristocrats, the more he despised them. Musicians were treated like cooks, maids, and shoe shiners—they were merely servants of the court. Even Mozart had to sit with the cooks at dinnertime. Beethoven refused to be put in Most musicians would have been fired for this behavior, but Beethoven’s talent was too magnetic. “He knew how to produce such an effect upon every hearer that frequently not an eye remained dry, while many would break into loud sobs,” Carl Czerny wrote in Cocks’s Musical Miscellany. So Archduke Rudolph made an exception: Beethoven could ignore court etiquette. But Beethoven wasn’t alone in his resentment. A few hundred miles to the west, in France, aristocrats were being queued up for the guillotine, and a stiff anti-royalist air was sweeping in toward Vienna. While not a fan of bloodshed, Beethoven supported the Revolution. He loved the free thought it encouraged, and he toyed with the idea of setting music to Friedrich Schiller’s poem “Ode to Joy,” a call for brotherhood and liberty. But he never wrote the piece. Harboring revolutionary sentiments left him in a pickle: His career depended on the people he wanted to see uprooted. So he kept quiet. As the decade wore on, Viennese nobility continued to lionize him—he rose to be one of the city’s biggest celebrities. Then his ears began to ring. It started as a faint whistle. Doctors advised him to fill his ears with almond oil and take cold baths. Nothing worked. By 1800, his ears were buzzing day and night. Beethoven sank into depression, stopped attending social functions, and retreated to the countryside, where loneliness drove him to consider suicide.
Artistically, isolation had its benefits. Every morning, he woke at 5:30 a.m. and composed for two hours until breakfast. Then he wandered through meadows, a pencil and notebook in hand, lost in thought. Sketching ideas, he mumbled, waved his arms, sang, and stomped. One time, he made such a ruckus that a yoke of oxen began to stampede. He often forgot to sleep or eat, but did pause to make coffee—counting precisely 60 beans for each cup. He sat in restaurants for hours, scribbling music on napkins, menus, even windows. Distracted, he’d accidentally pay other people’s bills. He started grumbling more openly about politics. He admired Napoleon and planned on publicly naming his third symphony for the general. It was a daring move: Napoleon was imperial Austria’s enemy. But when Napoleon declared himself Emperor of the French, Beethoven was disgusted. “Now he will trample on all human rights and indulge only his own ambition. He will place himself above everyone and become a tyrant,” he wrote, ditching the dedication. In 1809, Napoleon’s troops stormed into Vienna. The booming of his cannons hurt Beethoven’s eardrums so much he retreated to the cellar and buried his head under pillows. In 1814, Napoleon’s empire collapsed and Austria’s nobility attempted to restore order. Within a few years, Prince Klemens von Metternich had established the world’s first modern police state. The press was banned from publishing without the state’s blessing. The government removed university professors who expounded “harmful doctrines hostile to public order.” Undercover cops infested Vienna. Beethoven’s contempt for power grew. Although he still had royal patrons, Beethoven had fewer friends in high places. Many were missing or dead, and his ordinary friends were just as unlucky—briefly jailed or censored. Thankfully, Beethoven wrote instrumental music. For years, listeners considered it an inferior, even vulgar, art form compared to song or poetry. But as tyrants returned to power, Romantic thinkers like E.T.A. Hoffmann and Goethe praised instrumental music as a place for solace and truth. “The censor cannot hold anything against musicians,” Franz Grillparzer told Beethoven. “If they only knew what you think about in your music!” That’s when the composer made the brash decision to return to Schiller’s “Ode to Joy.” Censors in Vienna had banned Schiller’s works in 1783, then reauthorized it 25 years later only after some whitewashing. (The original says, “Beggars will become the brothers of princes.” Beethoven had stronger feelings, writing in his notebook, “Princes are beggars.”) Adding words to a symphony would destroy the safety net of ambiguity that instrumental composers enjoyed, spelling Beethoven’s motives out for all to hear. On May 7, 1824, Vienna’s Karntnertor Theater was packed. Beethoven had spent months preparing for this moment, corralling nearly 200 musicians and dealing with censors who quibbled over a religious work on the program. They did not, however, complain about Symphony No. 9. No one had heard it yet. Beethoven took the co The piece was four movements long and lasted a little more than an hour. The first three movements were purely instrumental; the last contained Schiller’s ode. But when one of the movements finished, the hall exploded with applause. Modern audiences would scold such behavior, but during Beethoven’s lifetime, a public concert was more like a rock show. People spontaneously clapped, cheered, and booed mid-performance. As the audience hollered for more, Beethoven continued waving his arms, oblivious to the cheering and sea of waving handkerchiefs behind him. The applause was so loud, and lasted for so long, that the police had to yell for silence. When the performance finished, a teary-eyed Beethoven almost fainted. The Ninth was a hit. But not with the aristocracy, who never showed up. Undeterred, Beethoven kept with tradition and dedicated the Symphony to a royal, King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia. He sent the King a copy of the score and, in return, the King sent Beethoven a beautiful diamond ring. It appeared to be a gift of gratitude, but when Beethoven took the ring to a jeweler to sell it, the jeweler had bad news: The diamond was fake. Beethoven had clearly pushed some buttons. The Ninth would be Beethoven’s last, and most famous, symphony. When he died in 1827, some 20,000 people filled the streets for his funeral. Schools were closed. Soldiers were called to ensure order. Five years later, people suggested erecting a Beethoven monument in Bonn. In the 1840s, Bonn celebrated its first “Beethoven Festival.” Salespeople hawked Beethoven neckties, Beethoven cigars, and even Beethoven pants. All of it was groundbreaking. Never before had a musician garnered so much attention. It indicated a larger cultural sea change: A society that reveres artists and makes them celebrities. In a way, Beethoven was the world’s first rock star.
And, of course, his influence on classical music is vast. The bigger, stronger modern piano emerged partly to accommodate his pieces. The first professional orchestras appeared in his wake, many with the goal of preserving his work. He was one of the first musicians to be canonized. Some argue the movement to immortalize his work eventually made classical music turn stale. Before Beethoven, the works of dead composers were rarely played. But by the 1870s, dead composers owned the concert hall. They still do today. Aaron Copland would complain that “musical art, as we hear it in our day, suffers if anything from an overdose of masterworks.” John Cage bemoaned that “[Beethoven’s] influence, which has been as extensive as it is lamentable, has been deadening to the art of music.” Indeed, attending a classical music concert can be like visiting a museum. It’s often forgotten that the piece that secured Beethoven’s status as an icon and reshaped the course of classical music was, at its heart, a powerful work of politics. In concentration camps during World War II, prisoners took solace in Beethoven’s message of freedom. In one heartbreaking tale, a children’s choir rehearsed “Ode to Joy” in Auschwitz’s latrines. It’s been sung at every Olympic Games since 1956. When the Berlin Wall fell, Leonard Bernstein conducted the Ninth with musicians from both sides of the divide. Today, it’s the national anthem of the European Union, and the message remains relevant. The same problems that plagued Vienna nearly 200 years ago—war, inequality, censorship, surveillance—have not disappeared. Perhaps it’s naive to believe that “all men will become brothers,” as the piece proclaims. But Beethoven, who never heard his own symphony, didn’t write it for himself. He wrote it for others. It’s our job to not only hear his message, but also to truly listen. __________________________
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| Posted: 08 Jul 2016 04:00 AM PDT Sophi Green was born without arms, so she uses her feet of everything. While other children learned to eat and dress themselves, she did, too -with her feet. Now that she’s seven years old, it’s all second nature to her. Think you accomplished something by learning to use chopsticks? Try that with your feet! -via Viral Viral Videos | ||||||||
| Posted: 08 Jul 2016 02:00 AM PDT She earned her sexy doctoral hood and gown, so, yes, she's a real scientist. And she won't take your snide remarks in the lab. Respect the science. -via Tastefully Offensive | ||||||||
| T To-Do-List - It Takes A Team To Get All His Errands Done Posted: 08 Jul 2016 12:00 AM PDT Mr. T found himself with one too many projects on his to-do list, so he pulled out his trusty golden pencil and started crossing stuff off. His gold was looking plenty shiny, so a trip to the jewelry store could be crossed off, but there was no way T was going to miss his weekly trip to the barber shop to trim up his mohawk. He checked his gun collection and discovered Murdock had already cleaned and polished them all, including T's favorite M60, so that was crossed off the list, and the van was in the shop so there was no way T could wax it. But there was one thing he couldn't bring himself to cross off, one problem that had to be addressed as soon as possible- Mr. T's fear of flying... Show the world what an action superstar from the 80s does on his day off with this T To-Do-List by Louisros, and pity the fools who don't make a list before they run errands! Visit Louisros's Facebook fan page, Twitter and Tumblr, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more ridiculously cool designs:
Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama! | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 11:59 PM PDT You seen that scene many times, when the super villain turns in his chair to confront our hero. Maybe you’ve wondered why a guy in such a position would be sitting with his back to the door. The only logical reason would be to make the grand gesture of turning around. With perfect timing. How elegant! But if we saw what happened before our hero arrived, we might think differently. This sketch is from the comedy duo Chris and Jack. -via Digg | ||||||||
| Classy Yet Goofy Animal Furniture Posted: 07 Jul 2016 10:00 PM PDT Tapazeria Rocchetti, a furniture and upholstery design firm in Rome, produces stately pieces of luxury furniture that you would be proud to have in your home. Now it's true that not everything that comes from the studio looks like an animal. These are just the best that the Rocchetti family offers. -via Dornob | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 08:59 PM PDT We’ve all seen stories of people our own age who’ve achieved amazing things, and they always serve to make us feel inadequate in comparison. But every step toward full adulthood is still a step forward. Be proud of your accomplishments! Because each step makes the next step a little easier. The bad news is that the process never ends. This is the latest from Dingo at Electric Bunny Comics. -via Geeks Are Sexy | ||||||||
| Emergency Crews Twice Called to "Homeless Jesus" Statue Posted: 07 Jul 2016 08:00 PM PDT
A month ago, the First Lutheran Church in Fargo, North Dakota erected a statue showing a homeless man wrapped inside a blanket and lying on a bench. It's a copy of Timothy P. Schmalz's statue called "Homeless Jesus," an emotionally powerful image inspired by the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats. The statue has already inspired responses from passersby. The Fargo Fire Department has been summoned to the scene twice by people who thought that the statue was a real person in need. WDAY 6 reports:
-via Nothing to Do with Aborath | ||||||||
| This Supercut Will Make You Jump Posted: 07 Jul 2016 07:00 PM PDT Be warned that this supercut of the 40 greatest jump scares in cinema history contains scenes from scary movies that are designed to make you jump out of your seat. You have probably already seen them, but watch this video at your own risk. It will take you back to the moment you first saw those films. Honestly, these are much less scary in small clips, because you don’t have the suspenseful buildup of the original. And if you care, it contains spoilers. Duh. I watched the whole thing, even though I haven’t seen most of the movies, just to see if the ones I remember most would be there. When I first saw the final scene of Carrie, I jumped into my boyfriend’s lap. Which was memorable, because we were sitting in an MG Midget. Yeah, it’s there. -via Tastefully Offensive | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 06:00 PM PDT
Domino's Pizza UK commissioned this sofa. The design is a bit cheesy but the crust is soft and comfortable. It was on display at the recent Isle of Wight music festival in June, but will end up in the home of a lucky contest winner. It would be ideal for an evening with friends, then for breakfast the next morning. -via Brand Eating | ||||||||
| Documentary Series About Guys Who Like To Dress Up Like Dogs Posted: 07 Jul 2016 05:00 PM PDT Some people are no longer content with simply being strange humans, so they look for ways to take their strangeness to whole new levels and shed their human skin in favor of something stranger, like a dog suit. For some this is a fetish, for others simply a way to deal with the fact that they feel uncomfortable in their own skin, and I imagine a few dress up like dogs just for the fun of it. Secret Life Of The Human Pups recently aired on the UK's Channel 4, exposing viewers to this bizarre subculture with roughly 10,000 "secret pups" in the UK alone. It's a dog's life indeed! -Via Dangerous Minds | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 04:00 PM PDT I’ve been through this, and I’m sure you have. “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but you better lay off someone I care about or you’ll get what’s coming to you!” Webcomic artist Sarah Andersen illustrates this feeling well in her latest comic. | ||||||||
| Prank: The Old Man at Muscle Beach Posted: 07 Jul 2016 02:59 PM PDT Kenneth Leverich is a champion weightligter and CrossFit competitor. He's young and in fantastic physical condition. He doesn't look young in this video, though. That's because makeup artists hired by Thrillist spent 4 hours transforming him into an octogenarian. Then Leverich went to the famous Muscle Beach outdoor exercise area at Venice Beach, California. He stunned the younger men with his displays of strength. | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 01:59 PM PDT In 1913, Joseph Knowles boasted that he could survive in the wilderness alone with no tools or weapons. He was willing to demonstrate that by staying in Maine’s Dead River Wilderness for 60 days alone, naked, without equipment or supplies. He bid goodbye to a crowd of journalists and onlookers, wearing only a jockstrap -and that was just because there were photographers. The stunt was catnip to newspapers of the time. Knowles was a middle-aged middle-class man who wasn’t in particularly good physical shape, but had a background of world travel in his youth and convinced everyone he had picked up amazing survival skills. He assured the crowd that he would have plenty to eat, and clothing of animal skins before he returned.
Knowles became famous nationwide for his stunt. At the time, both Teddy Roosevelt and Tarzan were popular images of men conquering the forces of nature, and Knowles joined them in the mind of the public. But soon rumors of fakery began to circulate about Knowles. In order to prove his skills, he had to repeat his stunt. Read the story of Joseph Knowles, also known as “Nature Man,” at Atlas Obscura. | ||||||||
| Amazon Fitness - Sweat Until You're Superhuman Posted: 07 Jul 2016 01:00 PM PDT You don't have to be born with super powers to turn your body into a lean, mean fighting machine, all you have to do is train like an Amazon and fight the flab like it's a supervillain threatening your life. Wonder Woman was lucky enough to have been born with her fabulous physique, but that doesn't mean you can't shape your body into a powerhouse. Just don't go trying to lift any cars.... Unleash your inner superhero with this Amazon Fitness t-shirt by BazNet, it's the perfect way to show the world that not all princesses wear fancy dresses. Visit BazNet's NeatoShop for more mighty geeky designs:
Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama! | ||||||||
| Jimmy Fallon & Paul Rudd Perfectly Recreate Styx Music Video Posted: 07 Jul 2016 12:59 PM PDT Jimmy Fallon has never claimed to be a comedic genius, but there's one comedy arena in which his skills really shine- the funny song. He's pretty good at playing guitar and really good at doing impressions of famous singers, so funny songs are naturally his forte. And when he teams up with Paul Rudd, an actor who's good at acting like he plays guitar and equally good at acting like a person in a band, you've got the perfect ingredients for a funky Styx music video recreation. The Fallon/Rudd version is so close to the original it's hard to decide which one's better...just kidding, Paul Rudd wins every time! -Via Laughing Squid | ||||||||
| Adding Injury and Insult to Injury Posted: 07 Jul 2016 11:59 AM PDT
Irish jockey Chris Meehan was riding in a hurdle race in Merano, Italy, when his horse threw him, and he was kicked in the face as he fell. The kick broke his nose and bloodied his jaw. But help was on the way!
It’s bad enough to be thrown and kicked without an ambulance driving over you, too. Meehan was flown back to Ireland and is expected to have surgery on both his jaw and leg. He won’t be able to ride again for at least two months. -via Arbroath | ||||||||
| Bruce Springsteen Invites a 4-Year Old Girl on Stage to Sing with Him Posted: 07 Jul 2016 10:59 AM PDT The Boss was performing "Waitin' on a Sunny Day" at a concert in Oslo, Norway. A 4-year old girl named Hope was in the front row, thoroughly enjoying the music. She caught his attention. Springsteen invited Hope on stage and sang to her, then let her give a solo performance. When they were done, he lifted Hope onto one of his shoulders and carried her around. Before she left, Springsteen gave Hope his harmonica. I hope that he wrote her a tardy note, too! -via Tastefully Offensive | ||||||||
| Meet the Fan Favorite of the US Olympic Trials Posted: 07 Jul 2016 10:00 AM PDT
Noah Droddy was captain of his track team in college, but didn’t stick with it afterward. That was three years ago. Now the 25-year-old considers himself a track fan, and even bought tickets to watch the Olympic track events in Rio. But then he got a chance to train with a prestigious coach, sponsored by a running club that was looking for out-of-the ordinary athletes. And he qualified for the US Olympic trials in the 10K, by the skin of his teeth. That race was last weekend. Droddy had never run in front of so many people. He said he’d never even seen that many people.
Droddy did not win the race, nor did he make the Olympic team. But he became a social media darling, and says he hasn’t paid for his own beer since that day. | ||||||||
| Dad Trolls His Daughter By Recreating Her Selfies Posted: 07 Jul 2016 08:59 AM PDT Parents may not understand their child's selfie obsession, they may not get why their kid stares at that screen all day or why they feel the need to post pics of themselves on a daily basis. But one thing parents do "get"- how to make fun of their teens for posting stupid pictures of themselves online, just to keep the kid's swollen head from eclipsing the sun. Proud father Burr Martin wasn't afraid to poke some fun at his daughter Cassie's selfie obsession by recreating her pics with dear old dad as the subject, but he may have gone too far. Not because young Cassie disliked his take on her pics, because that was the point, but because Burr appears to have become a bit selfie obsessed himself! You know what Nietzche said about "He who fights with monsters" Burr... See more from Dad Trolls His Daughter By Recreating Her Selfies here | ||||||||
| Posted: 07 Jul 2016 08:00 AM PDT You’ve been dying to know why people from the Slavic countries wear Adidas. Did you even know this was a thing? That’s pronounced “oddy-DAHS.” And he’s not talking about just the shoes, but the whole tracksuit and shoes. Boris is here to explain to explain this Slav fashion choice. It’s part of his series of videos explaining life in the Slavic nations. You can see more at the YouTube channel Life of Boris. -via reddit | ||||||||
| Strange Early Prototypes Of Stan Lee's Iconic Characters Posted: 07 Jul 2016 07:00 AM PDT Stan Lee is the undisputed mastermind of the comic book world, a man who brought so many iconic Marvel superheroes to life that his smilin' face has come to represent the company. But his beautiful mind often worked in weird ways, and before many of his iconic characters could really take shape they had to go through a rough sketchy stage. Complex characters like Magneto and the X-Men started out as simple characters with simple goals- the early Magneto was an alien being called the Metal Master who wanted to rule Earth but got clobbered by the Hulk instead. The early X-Men were a mutant cult of sorts who lived in Tibet and used mental projection to contact a young mutant named Tad Carter, offering to protect him because "humans fear what they don't understand." And if you think Tad looks a lot like Peter Parker your spidey sense is tingling true, because both characters were drawn by Steve Ditko, who obviously liked the look of the character so he passed it on to Peter. Read 6 Bizarre Stan Lee Prototypes Of Famous Marvel Characters here http://www.dorkly.com/post/77943/stan-lees-weird-prototype-versions-of-6-famous-marvel-characters | ||||||||
| A Metal Music Video for <i>Watership Down</i> Posted: 07 Jul 2016 06:00 AM PDT On long car trips, Richard Adams made up stories about rabbits to entertain his daughters. Then he wrote them into his first novel, Watership Down, published in 1972. Other people picked up the story, contributed to it, and let it go. There was a movie, a television show, role-playing games, and art. This is fitting, for Adams sees the collective unconscious as an unbroken web of stories that all of humanity shares. Now the power metal band Trick or Treat retells and shares the Watership Down story. Their music video for "The Great Escape" recounts Bigwig's raid on Efrafa and the subsequent battle at the Watership warren. Humans dressed as lop-eared rabbits vividly display the courage of Bigwig, the savagery of Woundwort, and the intensity of Fiver. Content warning: violence and gore. General Woundwort wouldn't have it any other way. |
Born to a family of Flemish court musicians in 1770, Beethoven had no choice but to take up music. His grandfather was a well-respected music director in Bonn, Germany. His father, Johann, was a not-so-well-respected court singer who gave young Ludwig piano lessons. Some nights, Johann would stagger home from the tavern, barge into Ludwig’s room, and make him practice until dawn. The piano keys were routinely glazed with tears.
his place. He demanded to be seated at the head table with royalty. When other musicians arrived at court wearing wigs and silk stockings, he came in a commoner’s clothes. (Composer Luigi Cherubini said he resembled an “unlicked bear cub.”) He refused to play if he wasn’t in the mood. When other musicians performed, he talked over them. When people talked over him, he exploded and called them “swine.” Once, when his improvisations moved listeners to tears, he chastised them for crying instead of clapping.
Music kept him going. “It seemed to me impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt was within me,” he wrote. At 31, he was known as a virtuoso, not as a composer. But it seemed he had little choice. He snuffed his performing career and dedicated himself to writing.
nductor’s baton, beating time for the start of each movement. The musicians’ eyes were glued to his every move, but in reality, none of them followed his lead. They had been ordered not to. Stone deaf, Beethoven was an unreliable conductor, so a friend actually led the orchestra.
Beethoven-worship changed the course of art history. Isolated. Autonomous. Rebellious. Sublime. He was Romanticism’s posterboy, and his stature elevated the meaning of artist: No longer a skilled craftsman, like a cook or carpenter, an artist became a person who suffered to express emotions, genius, or—in drippier language—their soul. Beethoven’s success helped cement ideas that now define Western art.
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The above article by Lucas Reilly is reprinted with permission from the July-August 2015 issue of mental_floss magazine.
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