Beethoven began professional work in the musical establishment of Bonn, serving as a deputy court organist and later playing viola in the court orchestra. Early publications and commissions brought him recognition before he moved to Vienna in 1792 to study with Joseph Haydn. He also received instruction from Johann Georg Albrechtsberger and Antonio Salieri.

He established himself as an improvising pianist, teacher, and composer supported by aristocratic patrons, publishers, and concert income. Piano sonatas, chamber music, concertos, and the First Symphony, premiered in 1800, developed the genres associated with Haydn and Mozart while displaying increasing rhythmic force and dramatic contrast.

Progressive hearing loss threatened his performing career. In the private Heiligenstadt Testament of 1802, he described despair and his determination to continue creating. The enlarged scale and expressive intensity of the Third Symphony, the Eroica, marked a major development. Beethoven withdrew its intended association with Napoleon after Napoleon became emperor. His middle-period achievements included the Fourth and Fifth Symphonies, the Pastoral Symphony, the Violin Concerto, the Razumovsky quartets, and the Fourth and Fifth Piano Concertos.

His sole opera began unsuccessfully as Leonore in 1805 and reached its lasting form as Fidelio in 1814. Financial insecurity, disputes with patrons and publishers, wartime disruption, and family responsibilities accompanied his work. An annuity pledged by aristocratic supporters in 1809 helped keep him in Vienna, although inflation and difficulties collecting payments reduced its security. Increasing deafness gradually ended his public activity as a pianist; conversation books later helped visitors communicate with him.

In his final decade Beethoven pursued increasingly concentrated and experimental forms. The Hammerklavier Sonata, the Diabelli Variations, and the Missa solemnis placed exceptional demands on performers. The Ninth Symphony, first heard in Vienna in 1824, introduced vocal soloists and a chorus into its finale, setting words from Schiller's Ode to Joy. His late quartets explored unusual movement structures, abrupt contrasts, and extended contrapuntal writing, including the Grosse Fuge. He died in Vienna in 1827, leaving music that transformed expectations of instrumental composition and became central to later concert repertory.