I live on the 24th floor of a high-rise in Chicago. My entire west wall is a vast window.

And every July 4th, rather than go downtown to watch Chicago’s spectacular fireworks display, I stay at home, turn on Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, sit at my westward window, and watch more than thirty suburban fireworks shows. Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is the perfect underscore for this theatrical experience.

I imagine families, friends, and couples gathering on shores and hills and in yards… watching and waiting…

Early in the second movement, the instruments begin to play a fugue.

And now the fireworks shows are also forming a fugue: Each show performs an individual dazzling melody. Different shows enter and exit the fray at different times. Yet the shows all work together to create something intertwining and breathtaking.

The third movement gives me a sense that I am floating through the air. I leave my apartment and float up and out and into the fireworks shows. I drift through the coruscating lights as they explode all around me. I am suspended in the air, surrounded by the ephemeral points of light as they scatter toward the earth. I travel over the entire western landscape of Chicagoland.

I arrive back at my apartment during the fourth movement, as the voices culminate in the triumphant chorus.

By the time Ludwig van Beethoven conducted the world premiere of his Ninth and final symphony, he was completely deaf. The story is often told that he was unaware of the audience’s enthusiastic applause at the end of the performance. One of the singers turned the maestro around so he could experience the adulation of the audience.

Historians differ as to the accuracy of this story.

It is of course a great story. But I imagine a slightly different version.

In my version, as the complex masterpiece concludes, the audience erupts into thunderous applause and stomping of feet and shouting. Beethoven physically feels the clamor of the audience’s reaction reverberating through his body. Yet, having just bared his soul to the world, and knowing that he will never hear the symphony himself, he is so overcome with emotion that he cannot bring himself to face his audience. Finally a singer turns him around, breaking the maestro’s reverie.

Of course this is pure speculation.

But there are some things I know to be true.

I know that Beethoven’s Ninth will be revered as long as there are human beings with the ability to hear. I know that this composer, whose health and hearing were failing, spent almost two years laboring tirelessly to give the world this symphony.

And I know that, like every great designer of fireworks displays, Ludwig van Beethoven saved his best for last.