Sinfonie Nr. 3 Es-Dur op. 55

'So he too is nothing more than an ordinary man. [...] he will place himself above everyone else and become a tyrant!' is what Beethoven is said to have shouted full of rage when Napoleon had declared himself emperor, and supposedly tore the title page of Symphony No. 3 headed 'Bonaparte' to pieces. Despite his anger, however, the work was again headed 'Bonaparte' when he wanted to publish it in 1804. But it was the first edition of 1806 which finally bore the title of Sinfonia eroica. Symphony No. 3 was Beethoven's first work in which he had come to terms with his progressing deafness and left the boundaries of the musical conventions far behind.