Ludwig van Beethoven was baptized in Bonn, Germany, on December 17, 1770, and died in Vienna, Austria, on March 26, 1827. The first performance of the Fifth Symphony took place in Vienna at the Theater an der Wien on December 22, 1808, with the composer conducting. The Symphony No. 5 is scored for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, two horns, two trumpets, three trombones, timpani, and strings. Approximate performance of the first movement is seven minutes.

Beethoven’s immortal Fifth Symphony is music that continues to astonish listeners with its elemental power, taut drama, and, above all else, a sense of absolute inevitability. But there was nothing inevitable about the process of the work’s creation. The composition of the Fifth Symphony took place over a span of approximately four years (1804-1808). During that time, Beethoven wrote and rewrote passages, filling sketchbook upon sketchbook with ideas for the Symphony.

The extraordinary power and revolutionary nature of the Beethoven Fifth at first inspired confusion, awe, and even fear on the part of some music lovers. In his Memoirs, Hector Berlioz recalled an 1828 performance of the Beethoven Fifth in Paris, attended by one of the young French composer’s teachers at the Conservatoire, Jean-François Lesueur:

The next day I rushed off to his house, and we at once fell to talking about the masterpiece which had stirred us so deeply...I persisted until Lesueur, after again admitting how deeply the symphony had affected him, shook his head with a curious smile, and said, “All the same, such music ought not to be written.” To which I replied, “Don’t be afraid, dear master, there will never be too much of it.”

1. Allegro con brio—The Symphony opens with the clarinets and strings proclaiming the famous “short-short-short-long” motif—the seed from which the entire work will grow. A terse sequence, based almost exclusively upon the motif, leads to the introduction of the flowing, second subject by the first violins and winds (here, the central four-note motif serves as accompaniment, played by the lower strings). A repetition of the four-note motif by the horns and clarinets, in dialogue with the strings, inaugurates the development section. A mysterious exchange between the strings and winds leads to the recapitulation. The fierce activity abruptly halts, and the oboe plays a brief, haunting solo. The momentum now resumes, propelling to a stunning close.

Program notes by Ken Meltzer