What happens when a global pandemic collides with a global Beethoven celebration? Professor Daniel Chua of Hong Kong University takes the confluence of Beethoven’s 250th birthday and COVID-19 as an opportunity to explore aspects of Beethoven’s musical persona that speak most directly to this time of heightened awareness of mortality and social isolation. 

This event will feature a screening of Professor Chua’s home-made, phone-made, and lone-made video, “Music in Words: Beethoven’s 250 in the Time of COVID-19,” posted in May 2020 to Musicological Brainfood, a series of provocations hosted by the International Musicological Society, followed by a live interview and Q&A session with Professor Chua.