fascinated by music. Vienna was Europe's cultural capital. When Ludwig was 17-years-old he made his first trip to this city. He went to study Classical music with Franz Joseph Haydn. While in Vienna, Beethoven played the piano for Mozart. Mozart told him, "You will make a big noise in the world". That year his mother and baby sister died, and Ludwig's father lost his job. He returned to Bonn and supported his family for 5 years, until his father's death, then Beethoven brought his "bigger-than-life" personality back to Vienna for good. He was an unkept, awkward, brash, and very, very self-confident young man. Ludwig easily made his place as both a performer and a composer. Sometimes he was rude and violent, other times he was kind and generous. He threw hot food at a waiter. He hit a choir boy. He swept candles off a piano during a bad performance. Ludwig van Beethoven's intensity caused a bitter custody battle over his nephew. To escape the fighting, the nephew actually tried to take his own life. Beethoven was kindhearted however, and he helped raise money for Johann Sebastian Bach's only surviving child, who was living in poverty. He donated new compositions for a benefit concert in aid of Ursuline nuns. Ludwig van Beethoven was 25-years-old when he first performed as a piano virtuoso. He was supposed to play his own Second Piano Concerto. Two days before the performance Beethoven hadn't finished composing it. He was sick with an upset stomach. A friend fed him remedies while Ludwig wrote out the music. The copyists sat outside his bedroom waiting for each new sheet of music. Beethoven seemed often to work down to the last minute. On the morning of the concert for the oratorio, Christ on the Mount of Olives, a friend found Ludwig sitting in bed composing the trombone part. The trombonists rehearsed from Beethoven's handwritten music at 8 a.m. that day. The ink was barely dry. At only 28 years old, just before writing his very first symphony, Beethoven began to lose his hearing. He tried every treatment he could find to fix this problem. Sometimes he could hear just fine. The last 10 years of Beethoven's life, he heard nothing. Beethoven sadly and bitterly mourned the loss of his hearing. He continued to lead rehearsals and play the piano until he was 44 years old. Ludwig may have "heard" music by feeling its vibrations. He knew music so well he could probably hear it in his head. The older Ludwig got, the more absorbed he became in his music. He was so focused that he didn't care at all about how he looked. He would pour water over his head instead of actually washing. In his rooms sat 4 pianos without legs and piles of manuscripts that no one was allowed to touch.. To feel the vibrations better, Beethoven composed music seated on the floor at a legless piano. He often worked in his underwear, or even naked. If friends came to visit him when he was composing, he completely ignored them. Works: for orchestra, composed nine symphonies, seven overtures, five concertos for piano and orchestra, for violin and orchestra l, 1 for piano, violin, cello and orchestra, ballet music and dance. Chamber music: 16 quartets, 3 quintets, trios 15 10 sonatas for violin and piano, two sonatas for cello and piano sextet, Septet, Octet, serenades, dances and variations. Piano: 32 sonatas, 2 sonatinas, 22 series of variations, trifles, minor works and for four hands. Song: Series of "lieder", "Mass in C major", "solemn Mass," "Christ on the Mount of Olives" and several cantatas. Music theater, "Fidelio," "Egmont", "The Ruins of Athens" and "Opferlied".