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We listen to the music of Beethoven not only for its ability to transcend time and to experience visceral emotional fulfillment, but also to gain insight into the composer and his mythologized life. Music came to occupy a privileged role within Romanticism because of its ability to present feeling and emotion directly, without the intervention of words or depicted objects. Cook touches on the idea that listening to Beethoven “was in some sense to be in direct communion with the composer himself”. 

Beethoven’s music can speak directly to each listener as an individual, acting as a direct auditory representation of abstract emotions that can transport us into a soundscape or scene. This capability transcends time and can be observed when closely listening to the first movement of Quartet No. 2, which pays a certain homage to the elegant high lifestyle (sometimes referred to as Komplimentier-Quartett). The movement is abundant in melodic “flourishes,' exquisite elegance of pauses, and 'dotted' rhythms. It is in a way, an imitation of Mozart and Haydn, and an attempt at the comedy of manners. The succession of 2-bar members at the start of this quarter, all of them bound to tonic and dominant, seems to conjure up images of courtly bowing. This image is somewhat subverted in the recapitulation. Beethoven plays with the reversed accents most harshly at the recapitulation, where the original quiet first-theme material returns in a resounding forte. Thanks to an off-beat pattern derived from the bridge, and clarified beyond any doubt by marked sforzandi D’s, the original 2-bar “bow” backs into a kick in the rear. A new bass line contributes to the indignity; and when a moment later little one-bar canons emerge, confusion is raucously normalized. Perhaps the scene the music creates is a satirical take on music etiquette in an age of class and convention.

While we should continue to listen to Beethoven’s music for its ability to dramatize a scene and transport us there, people also continue to listen because it traces his tragic mythology and provides insight into his psyche. More importantly, his music may attempt to reflect questions that are posed to humanity as a whole. 

Musicians and listeners alike have romantic tendencies. Certain tragic aspects of his life feed into the compelling romantic narrative, including his loss of hearing, his failure to marry, and his solitary condition at death. He abandons the public spheres of the symphony and concerto at the end of his life and embarks on the more intimate, personal journey of the string quartet, a genre in which he could express his deepest emotions and desires. The “Muss es sein?” theme from String Quartet No. 16, Op. 135, is initially presented in Grave by viola and cello, and repeated in increasing intensity before the short introduction quietens down and is suspended on the dominant in a pianissimo. In a terrific and sudden change of mood the violins set off with the “Es muss sein!” motif (an inversion of the “Muss es sein?”), now Allegro in the parallel major key. In the recapitulation, the “Es muss sein!” motif appears after a gradual loss of energy, piano, at a point where the music seems uncertain where to go, before regaining confidence. The coda is a version of the second theme, now pizzicato and pianissimo, before the “Es muss sein!” motif reappears, first hesitantly, and then in a triumphant fortissimo. This must be placed in the historical context of his nephew Karl's suicide attempt. It sharpens our awareness of Beethoven's ability to seemingly deflect psychological pain from his artistic life, to cover the pain through creative work, and to close the door against Death. We should continue to listen to this movement because it addresses the great Beethovenian problem of destiny and acceptance. Here, he treats the old question with lightness in a way that makes him seem settled and familiar with the issue. There is no real conflict depicted in this last movement. The profound question is met with a jovial, almost exultant answer, and the ending is one of perfect confidence. The question raised here is seen in the light of the profound peace which dominates the slow movement of this quartet. It would appear that at the end of his life, the inner Beethoven who expressed himself in music was content.

Although much is lost engaging with Beethoven today, the 200-year gap itself may not be relevant, as music is uniquely positioned as a timeless medium. However, modern musical tendencies in the form of recordings may have distorted its original form. His music suffers based on its historical position, as the progression away from instrumental music and intimate concerts towards a recorded commercialized product. Beethoven’s music is not simply meant to be listened to in isolation, but rather as a live experience. Compelling elements of the music are lost through recording. Steinhardt of the Guarneri String Quartet describes the process of “continuous, repeated triangulation of playing, listening, and readjustment…which began to approach a recorded sound that was realistic”. The inherent character of Beethoven’s music may be partially lost, as Steinhardt recounts his positive reaction to the released recording which “had even managed to retain some of the energy one expects in the concert hall” (139). Listening at a concert is an inherently public encounter with the music. With the rise of the ideology of silence, the act of listening would become less compromised. The concert hall would be situated as a musical technology designed to mediate attentive listening. Johnson describes how concert music at the time “employed no outside ornaments to help it and consequently required the greatest attention,” and “were careful to stress their aim of cultivating talent ‘for the sole interest of the art.’ Whenever spectators acted otherwise they were chided” (262). The social pressure described is lost when listening to Beethoven casually today, especially in a non-concert setting. A seasoned concertgoer of the past would have presumably heard the great contemporary works. He or she would have been strongly compelled by how Beethoven played with form and the types of “moments” he was able to create within pieces. One moment that is lost with most modern listeners comes from the fourth movement of String Quartet No. 9 in C major, Op. 59, No. 3. Beethoven starts this movement with a fugato and the viola presents the initial ten-measure statement of the fugal subject. After the initial statement of the fugue subject, the following statements occur in the second violin followed by the cello and lastly the first violin. The standard expectation is that the primary theme occurs in the first violin at the beginning of the exposition section of a movement. In this case, Beethoven not only replaced the primary theme with a fugato but he also saves the expected primary voice for the last statement of the fugue subject. This deviation would have been delightful. During the fugue, the musicians’ body language, expressions, and demeanor would have provided information about the movement itself and certainly enhanced the listening experience. A recording could emphasize the competing voices within the fugue because of the clarity of the production, whereas during the live performance, the quartet would have felt like a single breathing entity. By simply listening in a concert hall, the sound itself was somewhat blended when it arrived at the balcony, creating a more sonically cohesive result. The visual cue of each musician moving their bodies on the downbeat of their entry would have also aided in this effect. Stepping back to consider both Beethoven’s and classical music itself, the recording could be a perversion of the listening experience, as it never belonged to the confines of the recording industry.

There is something inherently resistant in the art form to the idea that performance can be solidified for eternity in the form of vinyl or digital information. This is not a condemnation of the popular success of recordings, but rather an assessment of aesthetics and ethics. The industry tries to fix in the collective imagination what individual musical works should be, like the totemic masterpieces of the Western canon: a series of desirable, aspirational cultural and commercial objects. The music was reduced by the heroic stage of the recording era to a library of unchanging, perfected icons instead of a living, breathing, ever-changing cultural practice.