Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn on December 16, 1770, and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. Though his home in Bonn was overshadowed by destitution, discord, and distress and his first music teacher was his harsh and violent alcoholic father, Beethoven somehow persevered to pour into his remarkable music his pain, his hunger for peace and for happiness, and the strength of will that helped him survive a tortured life.

   Settling in Vienna in 1792, he made a living by giving music lessons and playing the piano at the private homes and palaces of the Viennese aristocracy, where his dynamic, emotionally charged performances began to attract attention. He moved from a career as a virtuoso pianist toward one as a composer, writing piano  concertos and sonatas, chamber works for winds and strings, and then symphonies. Although by 1800 his musical prestige was considerable and his material fortunes were blossoming, he became aware that his hearing was deteriorating, and deafness soon threatened not only his musical life, but his social and personal life as well.

   Beethoven became increasingly morose, withdrawn, and distrustful and contemplated suicide in 1802, even writing a testament, addressed to his two brothers, describing his unhappiness over his affliction and suggesting that he believed that death was imminent. The document reveals not only how distraught but also how determined a man Beethoven was: “Such incidents drove me almost to despair; a little more of that and I would have ended my life—it was only my art that held me back. Ah, it seemed to me impossible to leave the world until I had brought forth all that I  felt was within me. So I endured this wretched existence.” Beethoven not only endured but also entered a new creative period during which he wrote the Mass in C and produced other works that established his reputation as the premiere composer of his time.

   Each year, the Hungarian Prince Nicholas Esterházy II, whose family Joseph Haydn had served for many years as music master, had a new choral mass performed to celebrate his wife’s name day, September 8. In 1807, Beethoven was commissioned to compose this mass and wrote to the Prince: “I shall deliver the Mass to you with timidity, since you are accustomed to having the inimitable masterpieces of the great Haydn performed for you.”

   He ultimately produced a work that his patron and audience found unsatisfactory, since it was much humbler and more spiritual than the grand symphonic masses to which Prince Esterházy and the Viennese musical establishment had become accustomed. It is said that Beethoven first survived a singer rebellion led by chorus master Johannes Hummel, who did not enjoy working with an “aurally challenged” conductor.

   At the public reception following the work’s first performance on September 13, 1807, Prince Esterházy offended the composer: “My dear Beethoven, what is it you have done here?” and later said that he found the mass “unbearably ridiculous and detestable.”

   Though Beethoven followed Haydn’s general plan for a mass, including fugal settings for the “cum Sancto Spiritu” in the Gloria, “et vitam venturi” in the Credo, nd “osanna in excelsis” in the Sanctus, his interpretation seems quite individual. The mass contains no solo arias, and the solo quartet and choral parts are employed to provide contrasts of color, texture, and dynamics rather than to form separate musical sections. Juxtaposed dynamic extremes, wide vocal leaps—frequently of an octave, especially in the Credo, contrapuntal passages contrasted with chordal and unison plainchant-style sections, and startling harmonic changes hint that Beethoven was expressing his inner struggles and his desires for mercy and peace.

   “The general character of the Kyrie,” said Beethoven, “is heartfelt resignation, whence comes a deep sincerity of religious feeling.” It features alternating passages for chorus and four soloists, with the central “Christe eleison” written in a key a third higher than the C major opening and closing sections. In the Gloria, joyous choral outbursts surround a central section in which chorus and soloists offer their petitions. In the Credo, the soloists do not participate until the middle section, in which Beethoven paints significant texts using such devices as the key changes and unusual harmonies, chromaticism, descending motives for Jesus’s incarnation and suffering under Pontius Pilate, and rising motives for the resurrection and ascension.

   The opening section of the Sanctus, in A major, is tranquil, reverent, and chant-like, while the “pleni sunt coeli” is more lively and contrapuntal. The relatively lengthy Benedictus, in F major, is begun by the soloists, who are soon joined and accompanied by the chanting chorus. The same A major fugal Osanna that concludes the Sanctus reappears to close the Benedictus. The prayerful minormode Agnus Dei is characterized by key and tempo contrasts; its pained pleas for mercy give way to a soaring “dona nobis pacem.” Beethoven brings the Mass to a close with the same gentle music that opens the Kyrie, thus providing the work with a satisfying unity as the listener accompanies him at last into the spiritual peace of the “higher world.”

   The Choral Fantasy has often been cited as a sketch and precursor to the “Ode to Joy” movement of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Many listeners will detect the similarities between the principal themes of these works. The parallel extends beyond thematic kinship into such realms as basic architecture and treatment of detail. There are rowdy alla macia episodes in each, impressive choral declamations — “Vor Gott!” in the symphony and “Und kraft!” in the fantasy — and passages in both where the voices are accompanied by chains of trills.

   Few works are harder to classify. Beethoven’s Opus 80 begins as a melodrama for solo piano. When the instruments of the orchestra finally enter, the impression is of chamber music rather than symphonic impersonality. Once the full orchestra does assert itself, the music takes the form of a piano concerto until Beethoven pulls his final trump card by introducing human voices. Those with sharp ears will hear traces of Beethoven works in addition to “Ode to Joy.” For example, the passage just prior to the first appearance of the voices — with the solo piano accompanying the horns with broken unison arpeggios - resembles parts of the “Emperor” Concerto.

   Beethoven put the work together on such short notice that at the premiere he had to improvise the introductory piano solo because he had not yet written it down. Working in great haste, he found the theme for his variations in a song (“Gegenliebe”) he had composed in 1794 or 1795. Because he envisioned the Choral Fantasy as a hymn to the art of music, he asked the poet Christoph Kuffner to provide new verses for the choral finale.