Happy Beethoven's Birthday!

On Beethoven's birthday (he would be 238 years old), I'm going to link a piece I wrote last January called "Starting with nothing," in which I discussed the second movement of the Op. 59, No. 1 string quartet. In that movement, Beethoven used "very basic materials to create an incredibly complex work of genius." This piece gave me the opportunity to tell a couple of stories, including my favorite concert story ever.