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Beethoven 3

BAM! … BAM! With those two chords – a pair of stabbing orchestral thunderbolts – Beethoven opened his ‘Eroica’ Symphony, and at the same time began redefining what a symphony could be. Not only was his Third Symphony almost twice as long as any previous symphony written by the great Mozart or Haydn, and not only did it expand the scope of the orchestra (with three horns rather than the standard two) – but this was one of the earliest concept symphonies: an attempt to load the rule-based, logic-driven, abstract symphonic framework with a narrative or descriptive element.

This was originally to be a symphony in honour of Napoleon, a figure who, as guardian of the French Revolution’s core ideals – liberté, fraternité, egalité – Beethoven greatly admired. The composer named the work ‘Bonaparte’ but later, on hearing that Napoleon had appointed himself Emperor, Beethoven famously scratched out the dedication on his manuscript score. He declared the new leader was a mere human after all, and that ‘he too will trample on all human rights and indulge only his ambition’. The published title instead became Sinfonia eroica (Heroic Symphony).

The sense of heroism is visceral in the first movement, but there is struggle too, an impression of battling to create order out of chaos. It has been suggested that this movement represents the hero’s life, but it is hard not to also hear it as a reflection of Beethoven’s own personal struggles at the time. Only the previous year (1802), Beethoven – profoundly deaf and chronically aware of his social isolation – penned a letter, known as the Heiligenstadt Testament, expressing his grief and revealing contemplations of suicide.

With its sombre, deliberate tread and its ta-ta-ta tah drumbeat rhythm, the second movement is a funeral march. There’s a brief ray of light in a sunnier pastoral section but another episode brings a solemn, almost asphyxiating ‘double fugue’ section (where two themes, heard simultaneously, are repeated or answered in close succession).

The Scherzo third movement comes as welcome relief, beginning in hushed anticipation before a brief full-orchestral outburst. Beethoven throws in some characteristic accented off-beats as mis-steps. The middle section is where the players of the newly expanded horn section come into their own.

The finale opens with an attention-grabbing flourish, and then strings pluck out a cheeky, bare theme. It’s only after this theme is heard again in two variations (slightly transformed repetitions) that, on the third time through, we hear an oboe tune above it, revealing that the ‘theme’ was in fact just a bass line. As well as this playful ingenuity, Beethoven references a range of musical forms and devices, along the way alighting on a pompous march and a poignant version of the earlier oboe tune, now spotlighting five wind players. But there is grandeur and exuberance too, and the symphony’s end could hardly be more conclusive and affirmative.