Beethoven was a classical and romantic composer, but his body was full of heavy metal

Beethoven was a classical and romantic composer, but his body was full of heavy metal toggle caption The Print Collector/Getty Images Ludwig van Beethoven was a prodigious composer. “I used tweezers,” says Erdahl, who said she felt zero temptation to touch the composer’s hair with her bare hands. “And that’s why it’s precious and we handle it with care.” Erdahl carefully rinsed and treated the hair before running it through the instrument that measures heavy metals. “And back then, it was not uncommon to actually add lead acetate to the less expensive wines because it binds the acids to add a sweeter flavor to the wine.” Jannetto says that even for people of his time period, the lead levels in Beethoven’s hair would have been about 10 times higher than average. “It’s still a major problem globally,” he says, “because of lead contamination in spices and cookware and all sorts of other sources around the world.” Still, Hu can’t help but reflect on how Beethoven managed his virtuosic composing in spite of the lead.