Who Is the Greatest Composer Ever?

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There was a short, pocked-faced, plain-looking manmusic geniuses have not been great mathematicians
walking the streets of Vienna in the early 19thand vice versa; Beethoven often struggled with basic
century. No wonder all women he proposed toarithmetic.
rejected him and so he remained single all his life. TheFurthermore Joseph Haydn, the father of the string
poor thing! As a boy, much to the chagrin of hisquartet, considered it as great conversations with
father, he showed no signs of being a child prodigy;nature. And many scholars consider the string quartet
he was often crying, as he was forced by his fatheras the pressure cooker of music, the most
to play the piano.demanding musical genre, the brightest jewel in the
And yet most scholars, musicians, and music loverscrown of music. It is by far the best medium to
worldwide would agree with this statement: "Awrite absolute music.
universal genius widely regarded as the greatestMoreover Beethoven spent the last two and a half
composer who ever lived, Ludvig van Beethovenyears of his life writing nothing but string
dominates a period of musical history as no one elsequartets—Opuses 127, 130, 131, 132, and
before or since." (Encyclopaedia Britannica, Volume 14,135—when he was totally cut off from society
p 737a)because he was stone-deaf. Doesn't this fact tell us
Music scholars and composers consider these musicsomething? He was sensing that his life on this
genres as the main ones: piano sonata, pianogorgeous planet was coming to an end; he loved
concerto, violin concerto, opera, mass, symphony,nature deeply and took long walks to gather musical
and string quartet. Most scholars would agree withideas, which he jotted down using a carpenter's
my evaluation here:pencil. So he zeroed in on the most beautiful medium,
Best piano sonata ever: Beethoven's Piano Sonata Nothe string quartet, to express abstract, concise,
29 in Bb, Opus 106, "Hammerklavier" (1817—18)beautiful musical ideas.
Best piano concerto ever: Beethoven's PianoTherefore "The five late string quartets contain
Concerto No 5 in Eb, Opus 87, "Emperor" (1809)Beethoven's greatest music, or so at least many
Best violin concerto ever: Beethoven's Violin Concertolisteners in the 20th century came to feel." (The New
in D, Opus 61 (1806)Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Second
Best opera ever: Mozart's Don Giovanni. ButEdition, 2001, Volume 3, p 106a)
Beethoven's Fidelio, Opus 72 (c1803—05;Thus to me Beethoven is the greatest composer
1814), follows very closely.ever and his String Quartet No 14 is the greatest
Best mass ever: Beethoven's Missa Solemnis in D,piece of music of all time. "...Beethoven next wrote
Opus 123 (1819—23)the most closely integrated of all his large
Best symphony ever: Beethoven's Symphony No 9 incompositions. From this point of view, the Quartet of
d, Opus 125, "Choral" (1822—24), or hisC# minor op. 131 may be seen as the culmination of
Symphony No 5 in c, Opus 67 (1807—08)his significant effort as a composer ever since going
Best string quartet ever: String Quartet No 14 in c#,to Vienna. The seven movements
Opus 131 (1826).[c#—D—(b)—A—E—g#—c#] run
The string quartet is my favorite music genrecontinuously into one another, and for the first time
because it's the most concise and elegant of all musicin Beethoven's music there is an emphatic and
genres—it expresses deep thoughts and ideas in aunmistakable thematic connection between the first
few phrases, just as mathematics expresses themovement and the last—not a reminiscence, but a
deep secrets of the universe using a few symbols.functional parallel which helps bind the whole work
The languages of music and mathematics have thetogether. A work of the deepest subtlety and
same ground of being. But even though there havebeauty....