Beethoven's Third, the Eroica

Like all beginnings of greatness, new understandings, revelations, Beethoven's Third Symphony is steeped in myth. It is so powerful that it almost needs the attachment of these stories, from the the composer's tearing of the title page off the completed symphony for his sudden disgust of Napoleon to its being composed while Beethoven considered suicide while at the healing baths of Heilignestadt, for us to comprehend its depth. They certainly prime us to hear this piece, which is the beginning of Symphony as we think of it.