*claps*

I think not but obviously some people may fanboi to 11 in that circumstance yes.

 

In regards to your first question, it depends on who you ask. Me personally, I don't listen to Beethoven all that often.

 

Don't care for the Violin Concerto or the "Emperor" Piano Concerto

 

How? The 2nd Mov't of the Emperor Concerto I consider the most beautiful piece of music ever written.

 

Is Beethoven overrated?
Can anyone list piece by the great man that they dislike?

I am tired of his symphonies, but still love his piano concertos, and some of is late exquisite violin quartets. Though I really dislike his violin concerto.

No never. Proud cannot overrate such genius

 

Beethoven was great, but he is a victim of his own popularity.

So many people come to classical music through Beethoven that he remains a favourite. His music provides many things to many people: not least the supposition that he represents the 'discerning person's genius of choice' and also represents music in the established classical tradition, but which has enough edge to it for the aficionado to just escape being the sort of listener who enjoys the mere entertainments of a Mozart. A sort of Mozart, but for real men. (At least that's what they tell themselves).

I don't belong to the club who declares, with a deep sense of cultured ennui: "I'm now tired of Beethoven's 5th..." No, I think that symphony is still great in every way and will remain so. It stays fresh because I have never fetishised it.

 

I don't belong to the club who declares, with a deep sense of cultured ennui: "I'm now tired of Beethoven's 5th..." No, I think that symphony is still great in every way and will remain so. It stays fresh because I have never fetishised it.

I don't think I fetishized it and I don't think I'm saying this with ennui, but the truth is I did listen to that symphony about ninety thousand times as a teenager and now I never want to hear it again (same with the seventh). It's my fault, not Beethoven's.

 

I avoid Beethoven and all other over-hyped composers.

Just give me Wagner.

 

"We are talking about Beethoven! Before such a name we all prostrate ourselves reverently." (Giuseppe Verdi)

He would have been interested to know he was wrong!

 

Overrated is such an overrated word. To the many classical music lovers who love his music, his place in the eternal unchangeable big three is the way it should be. But there are also lots of classical music lovers who do not rate him that highly.

I love him for many works that after 30 years still are among my favourites (e.g. string quartets, piano sonatas, symphonies 5+6, violin concerto, piano concertos 3+4), but there are easily 20 composers I would overall prefer over LvB.

There are also many famous works that I've never really appreciated, including:

- Symphony 9
- Missa solemnis
- Cello sonatas
- Triple concerto
- Fidelio

 

There are also many famous works that I've never really appreciated, including:

- Symphony 9
- Missa solemnis
- Cello sonatas
- Triple concerto
- Fidelio

I love the cello sonatas, but they didn't open up for me until I heard them on period instruments (Coin/Cohen/Harmonia Mundi)

 

No he isn't overhyped. Yes he is. I don't know. I don't care. Hero worship and iconoclasm are equally boring. All I'm certain of - as certain as one can be of such things - is that Beethoven produced a lot of music which is as great as any ever composed, the sort of music that just leaves me dumbfounded that anyone could ever have gone there - wherever "there" is - and come back to go there again and again.

 

No he isn't overhyped. Yes he is. I don't know. I don't care. Hero worship and iconoclasm are equally boring. All I'm certain of - as certain as one can be of such things - is that Beethoven produced a lot of music which is as great as any ever composed, the sort of music that just leaves me dumbfounded that anyone could ever have gone there - wherever "there" is - and come back to go there again and again.

Exactly.........

 

Whether Beethoven is overhyped, overrated or overblown overindulging in his oeuvre can be overkill. Except his overtures which over and above overcomes the overpowering overpraise. Roll over Beethoven.

 

I used to sleep to his string quartets during my 8th grade year, I loved his string music but he seemed paled to Mozart in symphonies. His music is not bad, a lot of warmth and ideas, he is a great musician. It is true that I never buy his music CD, but I surely want to in the future, but never piano and choral music, piano is the enemy, no choral music after Mozart, string quartet only.

 

Is Beethoven overrated?

The OP makes no mention of the piano sonatas, which I find to be the most richly varied and perennially rewarding part of his oeuvre.

 

The OP makes no mention of the piano sonatas, which I find to be the most richly varied and perennially rewarding part of his oeuvre.

Agreed, closely followed by the string quartets. I might add that there's a huge amount of variety and reward to be found in the symphonies, too. A magnificent composer.

 

If Beethoven is overrated, then I suppose the whole of classical music should be deemed overrated as well! :lol:

It is normal (inevitable, I'd argue, unless there really is some fetishism going on) to dislike some works by a certain composer and still hold him in high regard.

 

I share the view that Beethoven is not overrated.
If all he had written were symphonies and concertos he would still be seen as great. Add in all the chamber music and his place amongst the gods is assured

 

I agree Beethoven can’t be overrated, unless we overrate our opinions. I had a friend who wanted to show how much he knew of music by saying he was. We aren’t friends anymore.

 

I would rather be with someone who will risk overrating something than someone who needs to talk about something being overrated.

 

No, he isn't overrated, but over played. What a musical giant he was. The fertility of thought, the power, the beauty - what a master. It was for good reason that 19th c. composers felt threatened by his legacy and that they would never be able to match him. As a bassoon player, every time I rehearse or play any of the symphonies, concertos, overtures I'm just blown away at how great it is. Beethoven isn't tedious or annoying to play - which can't be said of a lot of others. He was so influential in the 19th c there were orchestras formed for the sole purpose of playing his music. But like every composer he had his duds. I've never cared for the Christ on the Mount of Olives and with Wellington's Victory he hit rock bottom.

 

I've never cared for the Christ on the Mount of Olives and with Wellington's Victory he hit rock bottom.

Yep. Charles Rosen said about Christ on the Mount of Olives, "It is unique in Beethoven's output for its total lack of interest: it almost never rises above the merely competent or falls below it." He also says of Wellington's Victory, "It is so frankly a potboiler that shame would have been of little comfort, and Beethoven, reproached for it during his lifetime, indignantly put the best possible face on it."

 

There is one other Beethoven work that is said to be quite bad - so bad that I have never listened to it: Der glorreiche Augenblick (The Glorious Moment), cantata for four solo voices, chorus and orchestra Op. 136 (1814). Written one year after his Wellington's Victory.

 

Ken, I don't recall which version I heard (probably from a Complete Beethoven volume), but these are the parts of Op. 136 that I noted as highlights:

"O Himmel, welch Entzucken!"/"Alle die Herrscher darf ich grussen"

 

No. .

 

Playing any composer's work is often a different experience than passive listening. Hindemith wrote some works that sound a bit dull when merely listening, but when you have the music in front of you and you're playing it you notice all the marvellous structure. I'm thinking in particular of his Kanonische Sonatine, which I didn't think much of at first listen, but after having a go at playing it and studying it for performance, you appreciate it more.

 

I think classical music is the only genre that has perfectly rated musicians, all are geniuses, one more than the other. But very gifted. Beethoven's work is really fascinating.

 

Overrated is when one seeing someone starting a thread about it.

 

The first question cannot be answered satisfactorily because it requires that there be a universal artistic taste which there cannot be.

It is the discussion equivalent of dividing by zero.

The question concerning individuals' dislike of specific pieces is answerable.

Generally, my impression of Beethoven's music is that I'm much more likely to run into a performance I dislike rather than a composition I dislike. That said, I don't like them all equally nor have I heard them all. I may be the only person on Earth who has been listening to classical music heavily for decades and yet have never listened to all of his symphonies. I spend most of my attention on keyboard-related music. Now that I think of it, I'm not keen on Ode to Joy.

 

The first question cannot be answered satisfactorily because it requires that there be a universal artistic taste which there cannot be.

It is the discussion equivalent of dividing by zero.

The question concerning individuals' dislike of specific pieces is answerable.

I agree with this completely.

When it comes to art, which is almost completely subjective, the terms "overrated" and "underrated" do not even make sense.

You are in effect, stating, that since you don't like artist X as much as many people seem to, said artist must be overrated. No, it is much simpler, you just don't like artist X as much as others seem to.

 

Is Beethoven over-hyped? Most likely yes, now that musicologists have determined that he faked his deafness and paid others to write his best-known works. Like that Japanese guy, in fact.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/wor...news/world/japanese-beethoven-exposed-fraud-hired-ghostwriter-article-1.1605189

 

I've been bored of these or those Beethoven works many times but that was probably from overplaying them. I've always ended up coming back to them and loving them just as much or more. The symphonies, quartets, piano sonatas, concertos ... are as great as any music I know. Apart from anything else there is just so much to find in them, so many different ways of playing them. I can't begin to understand how he made so much music that is so wonderful. I feel the same about Mozart and Bach and a few others.

 

No I don't think he is overhyped by the musically educated. Perhaps in the general public but only because they know his name but know almost none of his music. Imo creatures of prometheus is very underrated and the work has some brilliant orchestral textures that he was unable to explore in his symphonic works. I think when it comes to keyboard music no one had pushed the envelope as far as Beethoven. Much of it is subtle change to be sure (when comparing to what Chopin or Debussy did to piano music). However the textures he creates I think are genius. Take a listen through sonata no. 7. The way he uses silence is so effective and his textures are pure genius.