Pantheon

Who: Musical genius, hair trend-setter, difficult tenant, frustrated lover.

Why: Hint: It's not because of the last three.

When one must select between three equally qualified candidates, one often factors in sentimentalities irrelevant to the deciding criteria. Realizing that any vacillation towards one over the other two comes simply from having heard that composer's work last, I've concluded that based on musical output alone, choosing between the three top candidates for greatest musical genius in history is impossible. So, like an admissions officer who considers high school seniors' hardships or background when assigning freshman seating, when one takes into account the conditions under which they worked, Beethoven is the greatest musical mastermind of all time.

Yes, Mozart had Saliere all up in his business and Bach had to deal with failing eyesight, but to compose the near unanimously-accepted greatest work in music history (below) while totally deaf has to rank up there with Christie Alley's dramatic weight loss as testament to man's capacity for greatness.

Let your ears luxuriate in the greatness.

The Symphony No. nine in D minor, Op. 125 "Choral"

I chose the performance conducted by Gardiner just because it's the first one I came across. It's a little quicker than usual, I think, and he tries for a more authentic performance. It also has Luba Orgonosova and Anne Sofie von Otter, one of my favorites (check out her Berlioz).

As a testament to the inter-cultural greatness of Beethoven, the Japanese company Sony insisted the compact disc be large enough to accommodate the 74 minutes it took to perform all five movements of the Ninth Symphony.

Movement One: Allegro Ma Non Troppo Un Poco Maestoso

Movement Two: Molto Vivace

Movement Three: Adagio Molto E Cantabile

Movement Four: Presto Change-o

Movement Five: Presto - Allegro Assai

Beethoven: Symphony No 9 /ORR * Gardiner