County of bust: Independent City of St, Louis
Location of bust: Grand Music Stand, Tower Grove Park, St. Louis
Artist: Unknown
Copy After: Ferdinand von Miller, II, 1842-1929, sculptor
Architect: George Ingham Barnett, 1815-1898
Proper Description: "Bust of Beethoven featuring a gilded inscription on its plinth. Bust rests on a pedestal consisting of a limestone capital atop a polished Missouri red granite column on a limestone base" ~ Smithsonian American Art Museum
Remarks: "This bust is a replacement of the original marble bust that was commissioned by Henry Shaw and made in 1884 by Ferdinand von Miller (see IAS 76001105). Shaw funded the original at a cost of $725. This replacement bust sits on the original pedestal, which was designed by George Ingham Barnett" ~ Smithsonian American Art Museum
"Ludwig van Beethoven, (baptized December 17, 1770, Bonn, archbishopric of Cologne [Germany]—died March 26, 1827, Vienna, Austria), German composer, the predominant musical figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras.
"Widely regarded as the greatest composer who ever lived, Ludwig van Beethoven dominates a period of musical history as no one else before or since. Rooted in the Classical traditions of Joseph Haydn and Mozart, his art reaches out to encompass the new spirit of humanism and incipient nationalism expressed in the works of Goethe and Friedrich von Schiller, his elder contemporaries in the world of literature; the stringently redefined moral imperatives of Kant; and the ideals of the French Revolution, with its passionate concern for the freedom and dignity of the individual. He revealed more vividly than any of his predecessors the power of music to convey a philosophy of life without the aid of a spoken text; and in certain of his compositions is to be found the strongest assertion of the human will in all music, if not in all art. Though not himself a Romantic, he became the fountainhead of much that characterized the work of the Romantics who followed him, especially in his ideal of program or illustrative music, which he defined in connection with his Sixth (Pastoral) Symphony as “more an expression of emotion than painting.” In musical form he was a considerable innovator, widening the scope of sonata, symphony, concerto, and quartet; while in the Ninth Symphony he combined the worlds of vocal and instrumental music in a manner never before attempted. His personal life was marked by a heroic struggle against encroaching deafness, and some of his most important works were composed during the last 10 years of his life when he was quite unable to hear. In an age that saw the decline of court and church patronage, he not only maintained himself from the sale and publication of his works but also was the first musician to receive a salary with no duties other than to compose how and when he felt inclined.
"The compositions belonging to the years at Bonn—excluding those probably begun at Bonn but revised and completed in Vienna—are of more interest to the Beethoven student than to the ordinary music lover. They show the influences in which his art was rooted as well as the natural difficulties that he had to overcome and that his early training was inadequate to remedy. Three piano sonatas written in 1783 demonstrate that, musically, Bonn was an outpost of Mannheim, the cradle of the modern orchestra in Germany, and the nursery of a musical style that was to make a vital contribution to the classical symphony. But, at the time of Beethoven’s childhood, the Mannheim school was already in decline. The once famous orchestra was, in effect, dissolved after the war of 1778 between Austria and Prussia. The Mannheim style had degenerated into mannerism; this particular influence is reflected in a preoccupation with extremes of piano (soft) and forte (loud), often deployed in contradiction to the musical phrasing, that may be found in Beethoven’s early sonatas and in much else written by him at that time—which is not surprising, since the symphonies of later Mannheim composers formed the staple fare of the Bonn court orchestra. But what was only an occasional effect for Mozart and others influenced by the Mannheim composers was to remain a fundamental element for Beethoven. The sudden pianos, the unexpected outbursts, the wide leaping arpeggio figures with concluding explosive effects (known as “Mannheim rockets”)—all these are central to Beethoven’s musical personality and were to help him toward the liberation of instrumental music from its dependence on vocal style. Beethoven may indeed be described as the last and finest flower on the Mannheim tree." ~ Complete text at Encyclopedia Britannica