“Music is a higher revelation than all wisdom and philosophy.

Music is the electrical soil in which the spirit lives, thinks and invents.”

“Don’t only practice your art, but force your way into its secrets, for it and knowledge can raise men to the divine.

Music is the one incorporeal entrance into the higher world of knowledge which comprehends mankind but which mankind cannot comprehend.

Music is the wine which inspires one to new generative processes, and I am Bacchus who presses out this glorious wine for mankind and makes them spiritually drunken.

Music should strike fire from the heart of man, and bring tears from the eyes of woman.

From the glow of enthusiasm I let the melody escape. I pursue it. Breathless I catch up with it. It flies again; it disappears; it plunges into a chaos of diverse emotions. I catch it again; I seize it; I embrace it with delight.

Music is the mediator between the spiritual and the sensual life. Thousands of people cultivate music; but few have the revelation of this great art.

You will not find a treatise that is too learned for me; without laying claim to any genuine learning, I yet accustomed myself from childhood onwards to grasp the spirit of the best and wisest in every age. Shame on the artist who does not consider it his duty to achieve at least so much.

The true artist is not proud, he unfortunately sees that art has no limits; he feels darkly how far he is from the goal; and though he may be admired by others, he is sad not to have reached that point to which his better genius only appears as a distant, guiding sun. I would, perhaps, rather come to you and your people, than to many rich folk who display inward poverty.

What is difficult is also beautiful, good, great, etc, therefore every person understands that this is the greatest praise that one can give, because the difficult makes one sweat.

Recommend virtue to your children; it alone, not money, can make them happy. I speak from experience; this was what upheld me in time of misery.

Only the pure of heart can make a good soup.

I would rather write 10,000 notes than a single letter of the alphabet. To sing a wrong note is insignificant, but to sing without passion is unforgivable.

I love a tree more than a man. Love demands all, and has a right to all.

What you are, you are by accident of birth; what I am, I am by myself. There are and will be a thousand princes; but there is only one Beethoven. [Beethoven speaking to royalty]

Good morning on the 7th of July.
While still in bed my thoughts turn towards you my Immortal Beloved, now and then happy, then sad again, waiting whether Fate might answer us. – I can only live either wholly with you or not at all, yes, I have resolved to stray about far away until I can fly into your arms, and feel at home with you, and send my soul embraced by you into the realm of the Spirits. – Yes, unfortunately it must be. – You will compose yourself, all the more since you know my faithfulness to you, never can another own my heart, never – never. – Oh God why do I have to separate from someone whom I love so much, and yet my life in V[ienna] as it is now is a miserable life. – Your love makes me at once most happy and most unhappy. – At my age, I would now need some conformity regularity in my life – can this exist in our relationship? – Angel, I just learned that the post goes every day – and I must therefore conclude so that you get the l[etter] straightway – be patient, only through quiet contemplation of our existence can we achieve our purpose to live together – be calm – love me – today – yesterday. – What yearning with tears for you – you – you – my life – my everything – farewell – oh continue to love me – never misjudge the most faithful heart of your Beloved.
Forever thine
Forever mine
Forever us.

Applaud, my friends, the comedy is over. [Said on his deathbed]”

Quotes from Beethoven’s Letters

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~Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist; his music is amongst the most performed of the classical music repertoire, and he is one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music.

©Excellence Reporter 2020