Portraits of the artist as an increasingly disheveled man: Beethoven in 1803, 1815 and 1820

This article is part of a series for the 2025/26 Season in which we consider different aspects of the symphony. After skating around the issue, it’s high time we looked at some of the very greatest, all written by a single composer.

Beethoven’s symphonies are considered cornerstones of the repertoire: it’s very unusual for an orchestra (whether of the chamber or symphonic size) not to play at least one of them per season. Yet even within his cycle of nine such works, there is a distinct hierarchy to them. We’ve previously looked at what makes the supposedly lesser symphonies so worthy of attention, so now it’s the turn of the absolute masterpieces, the four that no fan of Beethoven would be without for all the world. What precisely is it that makes them so great?

These four works – the Eroica, Fifth, Seventh and Choral – all show Beethoven at his most confident, a defiantly heroic figure who commands our attention. Three of them have political import: the Eroica was originally intended as a tribute to Napoleon, the Fifth is driven by the rhythms of the French Revolution and the Choral’s culmination in Schiller’s Ode to Joy encapsulates Beethoven’s ideal of social equality. This is not to say that the Seventh is devoid of meaning: it is viewed by some as a celebration in music of the struggle against Napoleon, but this connection is far from overt. These four symphonies can therefore be considered as a running commentary on the development of Beethoven’s political conscience – if that doesn’t pour water on the power of their inspiration.

When working on the Eroica in 1803-04, he was still something of an idealist, viewing Napoleon as the personification of everything that was good about the French Revolution. An embodiment of upward mobility, here was a man whose rise through the ranks (both in military and social terms) was the result of his own skill in battle, nothing to do with nepotism or inherited wealth. When he declared himself Emperor in 1804, however, Beethoven was incensed: to all intents and purposes, the power had gone to Napoleon’s head, proving him to be no better than any other man. The music would remain as it was, its power unaffected by the change of dedication; instead of celebrating Napoleon, it became a monument to the man Beethoven thought he had been.

The political content of the Fifth Symphony is less clearly defined, though it’s not much of a stretch to see the combative tone of its first movement as an encouragement to stand up to oppression. Musically, the work as a whole shows the influence of Cherubini – a composer Beethoven greatly admired – or more specifically his 1794 Hymne du Panthéon. Written a mere five years after the fall of the Bastille, its driving, military rhythms more than live up to its subtitle of ‘grand chorus to the glory of the martyrs of liberty and its defenders’, one which could equally apply to Beethoven’s expansive finale.

This interpretation of the symphony as representing defiance has never really gone away. If anything, it took on a new dimension when its opening salvo was adopted by the Allies in World War Two as shorthand for the slogan ‘V for victory’, the letter being represented by the same distinctive rhythm (three short notes and one long) in Morse code. The association would be a long-standing one, lingering at least as far as 1986, when it appeared in the animated film Asterix in Britain as a secret door knock for the English resistance to the Roman invaders.

The tide had started to turn against Napoleon by the time Beethoven started work on his Seventh Symphony in 1811: the attempted invasion of Russia the following year came towards the end of what had been an equally catastrophic campaign in Spain and Portugal. It would be a bit much to suggest the bounding confidence of the Seventh is a consequence of this, however much Beethoven will have appreciated the front line having moved far from Vienna (his home since 1792). Despite a small connection to the more overtly political Eroica (both their slow movements have the steady rhythm of a funeral march, though only the Eroica’s is identified as such) the Seventh is more defined by its obsessive rhythms than any external meaning. Pekka Kuusisto’s performance of this symphony with the Orchestra in our Beethoven, Pekka and Dreamers’ Circus concerts (19-21 March) may draw out its deeper meanings – or not, depending on the folk tunes with which he intersperses its movements.

If the Seventh can seem slightly detached from real-world concerns, the Choral plunges headlong back into them with a call for universal tolerance. Beethoven brings such power to bear on this idea that it comes across as a genuinely achievable goal, far removed from a utopian dream. Much of this comes down to the sheer darkness of what comes before the Ode to Joy itself: the first movement is a tightly-wound coil of tension that never lets up, after which the Scherzo channels the Fifth Symphony’s restless drive. The pressure eases slightly in the third movement, only to return with a vengeance in the finale, which spends a little while trying to find its feet before landing on the Ode to Joy theme, but even this initially comes across as a bit naïve in its simplicity. Little by little, however, Beethoven transforms it into a confident declaration of intent, one which continues to inspire audiences over two centuries later. It's with good reason that the Choral it has become the classical world’s music of choice for marking important events in world history, from the fall of the Berlin Wall (for which Schiller’s poem was recast as the Ode to Freedom) to the attacks on the World Trade Center. Put simply, no other work comes close.

The Choral also set the seal on symphonies building towards their conclusion rather than the significant material tapering off after the first movement, as had been the case before. In truth, Beethoven had started this process many years previously: the length of the Second Symphony's finale had come in for criticism back in 1802, a full two decades before the Ninth, and the Fifth would probably be better known for its epic close if its opening motif weren't quite so memorable. This shift of weight from the first to the last movement is clear when considering what music the words 'Beethoven's Fifth' and 'Beethoven's Ninth' bring to mind: the opening four notes of the former, as opposed to the Ode to Joy theme for the latter. There's an argument to be made for later composers favouring a more equal balance between the movements of their symphonies, but the likes of Mahler's Resurrection would be unthinkable without Beethoven's example.

Returning to the Choral in the context of Beethoven's symphonies, it crowns his cycle as a whole. Music lovers may have their favourites among the earlier ones – it’s inevitable that the set has its ups and downs – but the Ninth stands head and shoulders above the others. Small wonder composers have struggled to live up to his standard: when it comes to the symphony, he is all but unassailable.