Beethoven, born in Bonn, Germany, was the second-oldest child of the court musician and tenor singer Johann van Beethoven who drilled him on the piano to help him become a child prodigy. Ludwig first performed publicly when he was eight years old. At age 11, he began study with organist and court musician Christian Gottlob Neefe. 
     In 1792 he moved to the musical center of Vienna and took lessons from Schenck, Albrechtsberger, Salieri, and Haydn. By 1795 he became well known as a pianist. He was particularly admired for his brilliant improvisations.
     Several years later, Beethoven realized that he was having difficulty hearing. He withdrew into increasing seclusion from the public and from his few friends and eventually became deaf. 
     Around 1803, Beethoven said to Wenzel Krumpholz: “I am not satisfied with the works I have written so far. From now on I am taking a new path.” The result was his third Symphony, the Eroica.
     It is difficult to envision today the tremendous effect that Beethoven’s music had on the society in Vienna during his day. The introduction of this symphony, the Eroica, created a great turning point in the history of music. Up to the time of this great work, Beethoven’s music was stylistically in the vein of the music from the previous century, that of Mozart and Hadyn among others.
     The Eroica Symphony was performed, at first privately, in 1804. Beethoven’s music issued in a new era of music: the Romantic Era. Never had there been such music, filled with joy, rapture, and sadness in a manor not expressed before in music. This was a clear voice of greatness beginning to speak and to move on to further glory.
     Beethoven’s fifth Symphony was first performed four years later, in 1808. A remarkable work of power, strength, and grandeur, while the wonderful sixth symphony, featured in the Disney movie Fantasia, is a healing journey of gentleness and pastoral beauty.
      Beethoven’s piano sonatas and concertos are among the very greatest compositions ever written for piano. Among the finest are the Appassionata, the Temptest, the Pathetique, and the Hammerklavier. Beethoven’s two masses, the Masses in C and D, the latter known as the Missa Solemnis, are great works of Art. The earlier Mass in C is beautiful, but the latter in D is a powerful work of spiritual grandeur, the likes of which have never been equaled by another composer. Beethoven’s last utterances, the great “late” string quartets and piano sonatas were not understood by his contemporaries. They are personal reflections of the deepest kind.