«Eroica»

With the first two tutti chords of the “Eroica”, which strike like blows from out of nowhere, Beethoven opened up a whole new world in the symphonic genre. Confident and self-assured, he wrote to his publisher in 1802, “I am not satisfied with my previous works; from now on I want to tread a different path.” One could almost speak of a “zero hour” in classical symphonic music, the beginning of something entirely new, greater in expression, more expansive in its passion and more triumphant in its resolve. The title page reads “Sinfonia eroica” – a heroic symphony composed to celebrate the memory of a great man. The thematic material of the symphony seems to reveal his identity. It is partly taken from Beethoven’s ballet music, “The Creatures of Prometheus”, evoking the memory of the mythological Prometheus, the “forward thinker” who wants to bring about intellectual emancipation through education and freedom through art. It also evokes the ideal of the true, free and comprehensively educated human being. Beethoven found himself and his moral-aesthetic stance in this: “There is nothing nobler than to approach the Deity more closely than others and from there to spread the rays of the Deity across the human race. These rays still strike us directly today in every performance of the “Eroica”.