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Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

smithsonianmag.com

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Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#71

Post by lqet »

jorgesborges wrote: post #30

Beethoven wrote a letter to his brothers that he never sent but it’s often referred to as a suicide note. It’s interesting — apparently he hid his bad hearing for a long time and considered it a humiliation. From the letter it also sounds like he was a real dick to people around him as a result, but they weren’t aware. So it serves as a sort of confession, apology and goodbye. You can read it here it’s pretty short.…

Beethoven surely was an interesting character. He often had trouble finding apartments because he was such a difficult neighbor (and it didn't help that he played his piano as loud as possible, so that he could hear it). One time, he was arrested because he was creeping around Wiener Neustadt at night, dressed like a beggar, and peeping into living rooms. Nobody believed he was the famous composer, and a local organist had to be brought in to identify Beethoven. He also fought a long violent legal battle for custody of his nephew Karl after the death of his brother (Beethoven hated his sister-in-law) which lead to a suicide attempt of Karl, and the break-off of all contact. His sister-in-law in turn told the authorities that the "van" in Beethovens surname had nothing to do with nobility (as he seemingly had claimed), but was just a normal surname in in the Flemish region of his ancestors.

What I also find highly fascinating are the entries in his conversation books which document how relatives tried to teach him basic math. It's strange to see that one of greatest composers in human history was unable to grasp multiplication or division.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#72

Post by plussed_reader »

watwut wrote: post #68
hilbert42 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You mean “Mozart in the middle of his career” at 14" Sorry. Yeah you're right. I recall when I got to the age of 35 he died at I asked myself what the hell have I done in my 35 years. The comparison was embarrassing (even now years later I still use that comparison).

You lived like a normal person during that time. That should be actually ok.

Should-ing on others is very close to another, similar 4 letter invective.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#74

Post by krisgenre »

amatecha wrote: post #17

"It was so incredibly tragic that he couldn’t hear this majestic music that he created." He couldn't physically hear the performance of it, but it's possible he could "hear" what it would sound like - and he very possibly heard it in his head before writing a single note down on paper (or however he recorded his music). I'm not sure everyone has this ability, but whenever I've written/recorded music, I almost literal…

There is also this legendary composer from south India who has this exact ability - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilaiyaraaja

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#75

Post by littlestymaar »

hilbert42 wrote: post #64
littlestymaar wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the young Mozart of 14 listened You mean “Mozart in the middle of his career” at 14 ;) (he was already an international star for seven full years before he was 14)

"You mean “Mozart in the middle of his career” at 14" Sorry. Yeah you're right. I recall when I got to the age of 35 he died at I asked myself what the hell have I done in my 35 years. The comparison was embarrassing (even now years later I still use that comparison).

At least you're not dead yet, which makes you a much better organism than him by biological standards ;).

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#76

Post by suslik »

darby_eight wrote: post #40
chasd00 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there are people without an inner monologue, that little voice inside your head. If you don't have that voice then i wonder if you can imagine or hear music inside your head like you would "that little voice". edit: here's a old article about people who lack an inner monologue https://www.iflscience.com/people-with-no-internal-monologue...

TBH I never thought to even call the speech processing in my a head a "little voice" until someone accused me of not having an inner monologue. I don't perceive it as audio at all unless I put effort into it. Meanwhile music plays in my head constantly, so I don't think they're related.

I'm exactly the same; I also don't have anything 'visual' in my head at all - no images, shapes, or similar - only words, or music.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#77

Post by ohthehugemanate »

jorgesborges wrote: post #30

Beethoven wrote a letter to his brothers that he never sent but it’s often referred to as a suicide note. It’s interesting — apparently he hid his bad hearing for a long time and considered it a humiliation. From the letter it also sounds like he was a real dick to people around him as a result, but they weren’t aware. So it serves as a sort of confession, apology and goodbye. You can read it here it’s pretty short.…

Better than just reading the letter is to listen to the musical change in Beethoven's works.

Beethoven's music is usually divided into 3 periods. The first is really classical sounding, like late Mozart. In fact, Beethoven was a fan of Mozart and some sources say that Mozart appreciated Beethoven's compositions too. Go listen to string quartet no. 1, or symphony no. 1 for a bit. StructureStructured, restrained, even elegant. There's definitely emotionality in there especially compared to peak Classical era like Haydn. Those guys may as well have shit marble, as Mozart put it. Check out the pathetique sonata for something about as emotive as Beethoven got at the time.

Then came the diagnosis of progressive deafness. This letter is the best insight into Beethoven's mind at the time, and "existential depression with suicidal ideation" seems like the right description to me. He stopped composing for several months.

When he returned to composing in 1803, it's a totally different sound. This is the wild, emotional Beethoven we generally think of. Waldstein sonata, symphony 5, string quartet no. 9 are good examples here. It's Rage Against The Machine before electric instruments were invented.

If you're interested in the third period, read on.

The transition to third period is more gradual, around 1815. There isn't a hard biographical line in the sand like the Heiligenstadt testament, but his relationship with his nephew/ward Karl got awful, his love life fell apart, and his deafness took a sharp turn for the worse, all around the same time. His old tricks to keep composing, like sawing off the legs of his piano so he could feel it in the floor (poor downstairs neighbors!) were not effective anymore, and he was reduced to mostly communicating on a chalk tablet.

His music turned inwards, became more introspective. Themes like life and death and afterlife, godliness and debasement, retribution and redemption flood the work. It also gets much more complicated harmonically. He does a lot of contrasts, between the grandiose and the intimate, for example. Symphony 9, particularly the Ode To Joy, is quintessential. Also check out string quartet op.131, the Hammerklavier piano sonata, and the missa solemnis in D.

Now go out and impress your friends at dinner parties with your deep knowledge of Beethoven! Tune in next time for Bach: the original "ba-rock" star.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#78

Post by ohthehugemanate »

w-m wrote: post #20

I'm quite confused. I learned 20+ years ago that lead poisining from the wine was the cause, or at least the suspected cause of Beethovens deafness. It's great that they found lead in his hair (again?), but thoroughly weird that they don't mention that it was the go-to theory already. On a large tangent, I tried asking GPT-4o to check the article whether it mentions that previously that theory already existed (could…

Schumann believed it was a form of syphilis which causes progressive deafness, then a period before death of wonderful clarity, like the whole world is verging on a great revelation of unity and you are the carrier.

This is a real form of syphilis, but AFAIK there's no evidence other than the ode to joy.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#79

Post by t-3 »

rjzzleep wrote: post #45
odyssey7 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A term for this is the mind’s ear . You hear the mind’s eye used more often. You can generalize the construction to any sense you can imagine.

There’s a French show called le prochain grand pâtissier. In one season there a guy who dislikes sweets (or sugar I can’t remember) but said he could taste it by smelling. The chefs didn’t believe him, but I think they were proven wrong.

Not super surprising, sugar has a strong smell (and really disgusting too - try sticking your nose in the bag sometime). I can usually tell how sweet something is by smelling it.

Re: Researchers find high levels of lead, mercury and arsenic in Beethoven's hair

#80

Post by IAmGraydon »

amatecha wrote: post #17

"It was so incredibly tragic that he couldn’t hear this majestic music that he created." He couldn't physically hear the performance of it, but it's possible he could "hear" what it would sound like - and he very possibly heard it in his head before writing a single note down on paper (or however he recorded his music). I'm not sure everyone has this ability, but whenever I've written/recorded music, I almost literal…

Musician here, and it’s the same for me. Recalling music is so detailed and vivid that it’s almost like it’s playing in the room with me. I’m sure it has something to do with how rewarding our brains find music.
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