Beethoven, A Life

Foreword by Daniel Hope
Prologue

Part One: The Artist as a Young Man (1770-1792)
1 • Louis van Beethoven: A Grandfather Figure
2 • Jean van Beethoven: The Absent Father?
3 • The Early Years
4 • Christian Gottlob Neefe: The Mentor
5 • The Young Professional
6 • Bonn Turns to Vienna
7 • Beethoven's First Crisis
8 • A Second Home, and New Horizons
9 • Renewed Vigor and the First Major Works
10 • Farewell to Bonn

Part Two: A Time of Proving (1792-1802)
11 • Vienna in 1792
12 • Beethoven's First Patron: Karl von Lichnowsky
13 • Haydn and Albrechtsberger
14 • Career Plans
15 • Family, Friends, and Loves in Vienna
16 • In Anticipation of Greater Things
17 • Lobkowitz's "Center of Excellence"
18 • The Immortal Beloved: Episode One
19 • The Road to a Broader Public
20 • A Word from the Critics
21 • The Disciples: Carl Czerny and Ferdinand Ries
22 • The Heiligenstadt Testament

Part Three: The Master (1802-1809)
23 • A "New Way" Forward
24 • The Laboratorium Artificiosum
25 • Publishing Pains and the "Warehouse of the Arts"
26 • Composer in Residence
27 • Salieri's Opera Lessons
28 • The Mystery of the Eroica
29 • The Immortal Beloved: Episode Two
30 • In Search of the Perfect Piano
31 • Leonore: A Work in Progress
32 • The Golden Years

Part Four: Crowds and Power (1809-1816)
33 • A New Social Status
34 • New Prospects
35 • An Imperial Pupil
36 • Beethoven and Goethe
37 • The Immortal Beloved: Episode Three
38 • Se non è vero . . .
39 • The End of the Classical Symphony
40 • Music for the Masses
41 • A Lucrative Sideline
42 • From Leonore to Fidelio
43 • From Coffee and Cake to Congress and Kitsch
44 • The Fight for a Child
45 • From the "Immortal Beloved" to a "Distant Beloved"

Part Five: The Lonely Way (1816-1827)
46 • Longing for Greater Things
47 • Post-Congress Vienna
48 • London Plans
49 • A Faustian Sonata and a Diabolical Contraption
50 • The Missa solemnis: A Mass for Peace
51 • The Circle Is Complete: The Late Piano Works
52 • Estrangement
53 • Encounters with the Younger Generation
54 • An Ode to Joy
55 • Decline
56 • Karl's Emancipation
57 • Money Matters
58 • The Discovery of Heaven: The Late String Quartets
59 • Comoedia finita est

Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Illustration Credits
Index of Works
Index of People