Music Composer

Choosing one musician as most influential of the millennium is one of the more difficult assignments. Popular music styles change quickly, and musical taste is personal and hard to define. Because of this, the most logical choice is the individual whose work has stood the test of time, enrapturing each new generation as it discovers him: German composer Ludwig van Beethoven.

Born in Bonn in 1770, Beethoven is often linked with Austrian composers Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as a chief figure of the Viennese classical style. Beethoven briefly studied with Mozart while in his teens, and the two might have become contemporary rivals if Mozart had not died in 1791 at the age of 35. Beethoven moved permanently to Vienna, Austria, in 1792 to study with Haydn, and he remained there the rest of his life. The student soon surpassed the teacher.

Beethoven was one of the most skilled and innovative keyboardists of his time, but it was his compositional skill that was truly incomparable. His composing brilliance extended to every genre of classical music, from concertos to symphonies, from sonatas to operas and string quartets. Beethoven's career output is usually broken down by musicologists into three periods, and each period is marked by changes in style and technique—a refusal to rely on familiar forms and a continual search for new challenges, some of the hallmarks of an influential artist.

Beethoven's life and career were colored by an unusual tragedy that gave him no choice but to change and adjust: He gradually lost his hearing in the early 1800s and remained deaf for the rest of his life. Although he could no longer perform in public and for a time even contemplated suicide, Beethoven could still compose. Some of his greatest works, such as his Third Symphony in E-flat Major (the Eroica, completed 1804) and the opera Fidelio (1805), were written during and after the time of his hearing loss. In fact, some scholars believe that the composer's greatness came not in spite of his deafness but because of it, as it freed him to experiment with new forms. Experts say that much of the work Beethoven composed during his third and last period was far ahead of its time.

Beethoven's body of work endures. The opening strains of his Fifth Symphony (1808) are instantly recognizable today, and the “Ode to Joy” choral finale of his Ninth Symphony (1824) is one of the most famous pieces of music ever written. Some musicologists credit Beethoven with actually changing the way instrumental music, and music in general, is viewed in the pantheon of art. In the late 18th century, instrumental music was considered inferior to vocal music, and music itself was deemed inferior to painting or literature. After Beethoven, the opposite came to be accepted as true.

Activist

Until the 19th century, women were disenfranchised and largely powerless before the law. For example, a married woman could not hold property in her own name, and in divorce proceedings men were commonly awarded permanent legal custody of any children. And, of course, women were not allowed to vote. Then, in the mid-19th century, the unthinkable happened: Brave women began speaking up about the inequity in their lives. Slowly, 50 percent of the world's population won largely equal standing under the law. One of the most vocal and important of these women was Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

Stanton, along with fellow activist Lucretia Mott, was the driving force behind the first women's rights convention in the United States, held in 1848 in Seneca Falls, New York. A Declaration of Sentiments, based on the famous language of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, was signed at the end of the meeting. The statement called for property and custody rights for women, criticized men for barring women from higher education and most professions, and proposed that women should have the right to vote—an incredibly radical idea at that time.

Stanton and her group, the National Woman Suffrage Association, began winning some battles as states changed their property laws so that women could own property. A constitutional amendment guaranteeing U.S. women the right to vote was first introduced in 1878. Stanton and her cohorts also helped women in other countries in their struggles to win rights such as the vote.

However, Stanton did not believe that winning the vote alone would change the plight of women, and certainly not overnight. She was also outspoken on issues such as reproductive rights, contraception, and religion, and her views alienated many of the more conservative members of the women's movement. In essence, Stanton advocated nothing less than a complete restructuring of society.

History has largely justified Stanton's beliefs. Although the battle for equal rights continues today in many places around the world, in 1920, 18 years after her death, the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was finally passed, giving U.S. women the vote. When the second wave of feminism began in the 1960s, the new leaders of the movement drew on Stanton's life for inspiration. Today's feminists and scholars have a deep appreciation for the pivotal role that Stanton played in the battle for women's rights. Fellow 19th-century activist Susan B. Anthony might have more name recognition, as well as her own dollar coin, but even she acknowledged Stanton as the true founder of the women's rights movement.