#17 The Smell of Firmness

This is a very special recording of Coriolan. Smell the force of bows in the first chord, it defines the landscape. Here I am, here I stand, live or dead.

Depending on your mood, you can sense Coriolan music as either fragmentary or concentrated. It's nervous, pushing forward. And then (after 6 minutes), the heroic theme breaks in the middle. The finale brings nothing but emptiness with no salvation.

Composer: Ludwig van Beethoven
Work: Coriolan Overture
Recording: Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, John Eliot Gardiner