I remember reading about a famous 19th French composer (Gabriel Faure)
who suffered from pitch distortion. He could hear the music well enough
to compose a symphony or string quartet in his head, but when he
attended the premiere he could not bear to hear it played... Several
composers have been affected by pitch distortion and one committed suicide.
On 11/11/2017 01:51 AM, G. C. wrote:
So, is this just another example of that recent (american?) phenomenon
"fake news"? The google string "Beethoven bone conduction" gives an
awful lot of hits! And Mace beating him to it is great. :) Doesn't the
custom of leaning the lute onto a table also somehow associate to the
question, vibrationwise? It's quite alluring to buy the argument that
Beethoven did indeed use such a contraption, considering that he was
able to compose the 9th symphony while being stone deaf.
G.
On Sat, Nov 11, 2017 at 7:59 AM, howard posner
<[1][email protected]> wrote:
I was being unclear. I also recall Mace chomping his lute, but I was
asking about Beethoven specifically. I haven't seen a source for
these 20th/21st century descriptions of his using bone conduction.
The very contrary account of Beethoven banging on an out-of-tune piano
and howling as he composed the Missa Solemnis is from Schindler, who
knew Beethoven but was every bit as much as much of a fiction writer as
Dan Brown.
--
References
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