NPR Music Tiny Desk Concerts

Daniel Hope (2022x24)

: 17, 2022

Our Tiny Desk (home) concert series has brought us to some very special places, but few can match the distinction of being inside Ludwig Van Beethoven’s house. Violinist Daniel Hope is the current president of Beethoven-Haus, where the great composer was born in 1770 in Bonn, Germany. Far more than a cultural curiosity, the house is, as Hope calls it, “the nerve center” for dozens of Beethoven scholars. It’s also a museum, library, publishing house and performance space. We often ask artists to perform at their own “tiny desk” of some sort. But the desk in this concert cannot be matched. On display, in front of Hope and pianist Sylvia Thereza, is Beethoven’s own traveling desk, a compact model he used to write letters and perhaps compose music.