Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphony No. 5 in C minor Op. 67 | Maxim Emelyanychev |WDR Symphony Orchestra
Ludwig van Beethoven's 5th Symphony in C minor op. 67, played by the WDR Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Maxim Emelyanychev. Recorded live on 17.11.2023 at the WDR Funkhaus.
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Ludwig Van Beethoven - Symphony No. 5 in C minor Op. 67
00:00:00 Entry
00:00:10 I. Allegro Con Brio
00:07:19 II. Andante Con Moto
00:16:43 III. allegro
00:24:30 IV. Finale. Allegro
WDR Symphony Orchestra
Maxim Emelyanychev, conductor
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Introduction to the work
"Thus fate knocks at the door!" Beethoven's secretary and biographer Anton Schindler passed down this sentence. And although no one knows on what occasion he overheard it or whether he even invented it himself and simply put it in his boss's mouth, it has characterised the image of Beethoven and his Fifth, the "Symphony of Fate", ever since. After all, it fits in so well with the image of the grim artistic genius who struggles with his emerging deafness and wants to "reach into the jaws of fate".
Exclusively out of this one motif
What does Beethoven's genius actually consist of? The "knocking motif" of three quavers and a semiquaver is nothing special in itself: Haydn already used it in his 28th Symphony in 1765. Well, the genius lies in developing a 500-bar-long movement exclusively from this one motif. At the beginning, Beethoven presents it once in isolation before interweaving it and using it to pile up breathtaking constructions. He composes like children playing with building blocks. The first "melody", for example, is only created by stringing the motif together in endless chains of quavers. Beethoven even uses the initial motif to accompany the simple counter-theme.
"Better noise"
The force of the first movement only falters once: shortly before the end, the oboe plays a short solo. It anticipates the atmosphere of the second movement, which resembles a contemplative stroll with its intimate melody. The third movement initially treads water. The strings seem restless, searching, questioning. The "solution" comes in the form of a military, jagged fanfare, the rhythm of which refers back to the knocking motif. The middle section is then a fugue - whereby Beethoven allows himself the joke of having the rough theme in the low strings abruptly interrupted several times, as if the musicians were playing away.
The transition into the finale is at least as ingenious as the opening movement. The music retreats to pianissimo, pawing at the ground and seemingly just waiting for the right moment to break out into a radiant fortissimo. The music also shifts from a dark minor to a bright major - a punch line that has become one of the most important aesthetic concepts of the Occident as "per aspera ad astra" (literally: through the rough to the stars - or analogously: through the darkness to the light). The building block motif of the first movement also returns here in radiant form. It is no coincidence that the snappy music is modelled on the freedom songs of the French Revolution, which inspired the ardent republican Beethoven. Some typical military instruments, which had never been heard in the concert hall before and which Beethoven uses as a special effect, also point to this connection. He proudly writes: "The last movement is scored with piccolo and three trombones. Although not three timpani, it will make more noise than six timpani - and better noise!"
Text: Clemens Matuschek