The surprising story of Beethoven and George Bridgetower, the black violinist

Published: Sept. 30, 2020, 12:20 p.m.

Beethoven was feeling a bit flat in the early 1800s as his hearing started to fade, but the arrival of an exciting young violin player in Vienna cheered him up immensely. George Bridgetower was a virtuoso violin player whose mother was Polish and his father was West Indian. While his father tried to market him as a novelty, he had genuine brilliance as a violin player. Beethoven was going to dedicate a violin sonata to him, so what happened?