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Symphony No. 3 in Eb Major, op. 55 (“Eroica”)
Ludwig van Beethoven

One of history’s pivotal composers, Ludwig van Beethoven was born on December 15 or 16, 1770 in Bonn, and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. His epic and groundbreaking Symphony no. 3 (“Eroica”) was composed in 1804 and received its first public performance at Vienna’s Theater an der Wien on April 7, 1805. The “Eroica” is dedicated to Prince Franz Joseph von Lobkowitz, in whose palace it received its first private reading in front of a select audience. The Symphony is scored for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 3 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings.


Beethoven had what might be characterized as a love-hate relationship with the dominant political figure of his day—Napoleon Bonaparte. The violent erasure of the French leader’s name from the title page of the Eroica Symphony stands as silent witness to the composer’s reaction to Napoleon having crowned himself Emperor in 1804. Scholars such as Frida Knight and Maynard Solomon have observed that Beethoven’s public rejection of Napoleon signified more than a tempestuous artist’s reaction to a tyrant. It represented his psychological alignment with Austrian nationalism and Enlightenment humanism. Beethoven’s plan, in short, was to match political power with artistic power. The Eroica Symphony, therefore, was the first shot to be fired in this battle.


These political issues, however, came later. Many of the musical influences that shaped the Eroica Symphony were undeniably French in origin. Post-1789 France cultivated an impressive repertoire of “heroic” music, much of which was composed to honor the memory of the Revolution’s fallen heroes and martyrs. The composers of these pieces--Gossec, Grétry, Méhul, and Cherubini—were well-known figures to Beethoven. Important features of their works were muffled funeral drums and hymn-like melodies, elements that Beethoven freely incorporated in the Eroica’s second movement; the Marcia funèbre (the same influence may also be seen in the slow movement of his Piano Sonata in A-flat, op. 26). The chief glory of the Eroica Symphony lies in its synthesis of the spirit of the French revolutionary style with the formalities of the four-movement symphony to create a work of unparalleled and unprecedented scope and power.


The sheer length of the Eroica—nearly twice that of Beethoven’s first two symphonies—is only the outward manifestation of its immense scope. Beethoven was well aware that such expansion entailed a certain degree of risk taking. This is why the first edition of the score and parts for the Eroica included a recommendation to place the piece “nearer the beginning than the end” of a concert, lest the audience become “fatigued by the previous pieces.”


The scenario that is played out in the opening movement, Allegro con brio, is akin to a French “rescue drama”: a kind of Fidelio without words in which we sense both peril and exultation to the fullest extent. Similarly, the Marcia funèbre is written on a huge scale. This movement is filled with dramatic gestures, none more explosive than the suspense-filled moment whereby a single note in the violins hangs quietly in the air, only to be severed by a fortissimo guillotine blow of cellos and basses. The last two movements also live up to the Eroica’s grand scale. No classical minuet will suffice here. Instead, Beethoven substitutes a truly explosive scherzo, a movement that lives up to its name (“joke”) through audacious rhythmic and metric trickery. Even the humble trio section is raised to a higher level of drama by means of a stirring trio of horns. The finale, Allegro molto, is based on a tune that Beethoven had used in three previous works—the seventh of twelve Contradanses, WoO 14; the finale of the ballet, The Creatures of Prometheus op. 49; and the Variations for Piano, op. 35. A feature of the latter work—variations on the tune’s bass line before the entry of the tune itself—is retained in the Eroica’s finale. Beethoven, in this final movement, took a giant stride toward redefining the significance of the last movement of a symphony, a part of the sonata cycle that heretofore (except, perhaps, in Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony) had been given far less weight than the first or second movement.


Notes by David B. Levy, © 2007/2026

Symphony No. 3 in Eb Major, op. 55 (“Eroica”)
Ludwig van Beethoven

One of history’s pivotal composers, Ludwig van Beethoven was born on December 15 or 16, 1770 in Bonn, and died in Vienna on March 26, 1827. His epic and groundbreaking Symphony no. 3 (“Eroica”) was composed in 1804 and received its first public performance at Vienna’s Theater an der Wien on April 7, 1805. The “Eroica” is dedicated to Prince Franz Joseph von Lobkowitz, in whose palace it received its first private reading in front of a select audience. The Symphony is scored for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 3 horns, 2 trumpets, timpani, and strings.


Beethoven had what might be characterized as a love-hate relationship with the dominant political figure of his day—Napoleon Bonaparte. The violent erasure of the French leader’s name from the title page of the Eroica Symphony stands as silent witness to the composer’s reaction to Napoleon having crowned himself Emperor in 1804. Scholars such as Frida Knight and Maynard Solomon have observed that Beethoven’s public rejection of Napoleon signified more than a tempestuous artist’s reaction to a tyrant. It represented his psychological alignment with Austrian nationalism and Enlightenment humanism. Beethoven’s plan, in short, was to match political power with artistic power. The Eroica Symphony, therefore, was the first shot to be fired in this battle.


These political issues, however, came later. Many of the musical influences that shaped the Eroica Symphony were undeniably French in origin. Post-1789 France cultivated an impressive repertoire of “heroic” music, much of which was composed to honor the memory of the Revolution’s fallen heroes and martyrs. The composers of these pieces--Gossec, Grétry, Méhul, and Cherubini—were well-known figures to Beethoven. Important features of their works were muffled funeral drums and hymn-like melodies, elements that Beethoven freely incorporated in the Eroica’s second movement; the Marcia funèbre (the same influence may also be seen in the slow movement of his Piano Sonata in A-flat, op. 26). The chief glory of the Eroica Symphony lies in its synthesis of the spirit of the French revolutionary style with the formalities of the four-movement symphony to create a work of unparalleled and unprecedented scope and power.


The sheer length of the Eroica—nearly twice that of Beethoven’s first two symphonies—is only the outward manifestation of its immense scope. Beethoven was well aware that such expansion entailed a certain degree of risk taking. This is why the first edition of the score and parts for the Eroica included a recommendation to place the piece “nearer the beginning than the end” of a concert, lest the audience become “fatigued by the previous pieces.”


The scenario that is played out in the opening movement, Allegro con brio, is akin to a French “rescue drama”: a kind of Fidelio without words in which we sense both peril and exultation to the fullest extent. Similarly, the Marcia funèbre is written on a huge scale. This movement is filled with dramatic gestures, none more explosive than the suspense-filled moment whereby a single note in the violins hangs quietly in the air, only to be severed by a fortissimo guillotine blow of cellos and basses. The last two movements also live up to the Eroica’s grand scale. No classical minuet will suffice here. Instead, Beethoven substitutes a truly explosive scherzo, a movement that lives up to its name (“joke”) through audacious rhythmic and metric trickery. Even the humble trio section is raised to a higher level of drama by means of a stirring trio of horns. The finale, Allegro molto, is based on a tune that Beethoven had used in three previous works—the seventh of twelve Contradanses, WoO 14; the finale of the ballet, The Creatures of Prometheus op. 49; and the Variations for Piano, op. 35. A feature of the latter work—variations on the tune’s bass line before the entry of the tune itself—is retained in the Eroica’s finale. Beethoven, in this final movement, took a giant stride toward redefining the significance of the last movement of a symphony, a part of the sonata cycle that heretofore (except, perhaps, in Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony) had been given far less weight than the first or second movement.


Notes by David B. Levy, © 2007/2026