Beethoven's Greastest Hits

Beethoven: Greatest Hits CD is relatively self-explanatory. It is a compilation of many of the works that Beethoven created during his life and showcases the works that seem to be the most often heard or the most often discussed by music lovers and critics alike. The CD has only the works of Beethoven and does not contain a compilation of artists like many other classical music CDs, where there are works by many different classical composers that all lived in the same basic period of time. The 'Greatest Hits' title is a common one. It is seen on the CDs of many artists when they have been producing music for some time, have several CDs available, and feel that they should take their best-selling or most-often-played songs and put them together in one compilation for their fans to buy. This allows these fans to have a compilation that has what are statistically going to be their favorite songs from that particular artist. By using this method of determining what should go on a 'Greatest Hits' album, most people are very happy, but there are always some that feel that an important song was left off of the album or a song that was included was really not any good and should not have been included.

Beethoven himself wrote many wonderful works and much of what he wrote was not written until he had already lost his hearing. Although he aspired to be a great singer and composer, he started going deaf at a very early age, which usually does not signal a long and prosperous music career. His ninth symphony, probably his most important and recognized piece of work, was not composed until after he was already completely deaf. This means that he never actually heard that music, he only felt it, or heard it in his head. This made him very extraordinary for his time, and would likely make him very extraordinary even in today's society where everyone seems to expect more of others. Whether he thought of his compositions as 'hits' is not known, and no one will ever know whether he would have preferred that different compositions should have been used, or whether he would have even agreed to such a compilation CD if it were available during his lifetime. There is still much about the man that is not known.

While the ninth symphony is on the Greatest Hits CD, there are other works that are also listed and that many enjoy very much. There is no need to discuss each particular song here, as they can easily be found on the CD and on many lists at Web sites and companies where the CD can be purchased. It is important to note, however, that the term 'Greatest Hits' is relative. In other words, the idea that these are Beethoven's Greatest Hits is an idea that comes from those that put the CD together. Beethoven himself could obviously not pick and choose which of his many beautiful compositions he wanted to put on the CD, so those that compiled it had to pick which compositions to use and choose what to call the CD. Those that are very serious fans of Beethoven might have a different opinion as to whether the compositions presented on the CD are actually Beethoven's 'Greatest Hits.'