Come oh come ye tea-thirsty restless ones -- the kettle boils, bubbles and sings, musically. ~ Rabindranath Tagore
Beethoven at age 30, by Carl Traugott Riedel
Good evening, Kibitzers! I had long heard that December 16 is Beethoven's birthday. As it turns out, that's not exactly recorded anywhere,
per se.
What is recorded is that he was baptized on December 17, 1770, and babies were customarily baptized the day after birth, giving us the 16th as a birth date. Oh, apparently the 16th is also when his family and his piano teacher celebrated his birthday, which sounds like pretty good evidence to me. That makes him 244 today.
Since we're accustomed to seeing him as an older guy with crazy white hair and a rather stormy expression, I picked the portrait you see here, because everyone deserves to be remembered looking their hottest nicest. Music below the orange segno.
Rather than load up the diary with numerous YouTubes that slow the page down for many, I offer this handy "best of" hour-and-fifty-minute compilation, which has some good stuff. Contents below, with start times. If your favorite is missing, it's welcome in the thread!
Tracklist:
01. Symphony No 3 - Allegro con brio
02. Symphony No 5 - Allegro con brio ( 13:46 )
03. Symphony No 6 - Allegro ( 21:02 )
04. Symphony No 6 - Allegretto ( 26:04 )
05. Symphony No 7 - Allegretto ( 35:34 )
06. Symphony No 7 - Presto ( 38:56 )
07. Symphony No 9 "Ode to Joy" ( 42:24 )
08. Moonlight Sonata (Sonata al chiaro di luna) ( 1:07:38 )
09. Fur Elise (Per Elisa) ( 1:11:47 )
10. Rondò a Capriccio in G Major ( 1:14:24 )
11. Minuet in G ( 1:21:53 )
12. Duo for Clarinet and Bassoon ( 1:24:24 )
13. Piano Concerto No 5 Emperor movt. 2 ( 1:28:17 )
14. Piano Sonata Op. 13 Movement 2 Adagio ( 1:35:06 )
15. Concerto for Violin and Orchestra in D major ( 1:40:16 )
(Note that, if you allow cookies, playing this video from its YouTube page will save a cookie showing where you stopped playing it, and resume in the same spot if you go back to it later. Some may find that a feature.)
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Kitchen Table Kibitzing is a community series for those who wish to share part of the evening around a virtual kitchen table with kossacks who are caring and supportive of one another. So bring your stories, jokes, photos, funny pics, music, and interesting videos, as well as links—including quotations—to diaries, news stories, and books that you think this community would appreciate. Readers may notice that most who post diaries and comments in this series already know one another to some degree, but newcomers should not feel excluded. We welcome guests at our kitchen table, and hope to make some new friends as well.
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