Ludwig van Beethoven

Born in Bonn in 1770, Beethoven was drilled as a prodigy by his father before finding steadier ground with teacher Christian Gottlob Neefe and the von Breuning family. At 21 he moved to Vienna to study with Haydn, built a reputation as a virtuoso pianist, and by 1795 had published his first opus-numbered works. His career unfolded in three phases: early works in the classical mold of Haydn and Mozart, a middle period from 1802 to 1812 that produced the Eroica and Fifth Symphonies at unprecedented scale, and a late stretch of radical invention — the choral Ninth Symphony in 1824, the Hammerklav…