This site uses the Eroica as the starting point for several different kinds of exploration.

What's new

10/30/2008 Updated the discography.

Many new performances added to the survey, mostly recorded from Internet broadcasts (not by me) and posted by participants in various discussion groups.

The increase in this activity is phenomenal; there are now 397 performances on hand, and for the first time in years there are many recent commercial releases I haven't yet tried to obtain.

Since the May spike, traffic has leveled off, though still a bit busier than before (around 100 unique visitors per day).
4/6/2008

Welcome Metafilter visitors! A mention on Metafilter sent traffic here to an all-time high.

Updated the Eroica Discography, added a few more metrics. There are now 386 performances on hand.

New additions since August include: Barenboim 97, Celibidache 59, Gielen 87 (DVD), Järvi 05 Minkowski 00, Otterloo 72, Pappano 08, Steck 05, Storgards 07, Vänskä 06, Unger 45, Uno 90.
8/26/2007

Updated the Discography, added a few more metrics. There are now 376 performances on hand.

New additions since March include: Boulez 62, Bour 80, de Billy 2006, Dessau 70, Haitink 2007, Karajan 81 (DVD), Klemperer 70 (DVD), Kubelik 56, McCreesh 2005, Nagano 06 (DVD), Solti 83, Stein 90 (DVD), Tilson Thomas 2006 (DVD).
4/14/2007

Added a clip of Daniel Grossman leading Ensemble 28 to the Extremes page -- the fastest 'slow" movement ever.

Revised formatting of the Discography page so it looks better in Mozilla.

Fixed broken links on this page.
4/9/2007

Welcome, memepool visitors. Normally, traffic here averages 60 visitors per day. On 4/2/07, a link to this site appeared on memepool. Traffic spiked to nearly 400 visitors per day, and has been gradually tapering off. Still around 4x normal.

Added a complete copy of the 1926 Albert Coates performance to the Sounds page.

New arrivals since January (see Discography for details): Batiz 1996, Dausgaard 2002, Dohnanyi 2006, Kawai 1994, Kocsis 2005, Szell 1970, Toscanini April 20 1949.

4/7/2007 Added a complete copy of the 1926 Sir Henry Wood performance to the Sounds page.
1/23/2007 Although not always noted here, the Discography and metrics are updated at least every eight weeks.

There are now 363 performances on hand.

New arrivals (since last April; see discography for full details): Asahina 67, Barenboim 2007, Enrique Batiz 96, van Beinum 57, Jiri Belohlavek 2006, Thomas Dausgaard 2002, Dohnanyi 2006, Eschenbach 2005, Ferencsik 63, Giulini 79, Haitink 2005, Ryoichi Kawai 1994, Erich Kloss 1969, Zoltan Kocsis 2005, Kegel 75, Kubelik 82, Mackerras 2006, Enzo Marciano 88, Maazel 2006, Kent Nagano 2006, Rico Saccani 2003, Skrowaczewski 2005, Suitner 81, Tennstedt 79, Tennstedt 82, Toscanini 11/26/49

4/6/2006 Updated the Discography, added a few more metrics. New arrivals: Brüggen 2003 (En Larmes), McGegan 2005 (Magnatone download), Meier [1970] (CBS LP), Kubelik 1967 (Re!Discover).
3/6/2006 Archived old news (2003).
10/12/2005 New miscellaneous pages: a quote from Thomas Bernhard's Ritter, Dene, Voss.
A bit of Engrish.
10/7/2005 Updated the Eroica Discography.

Trying to cut into the backlog for the metrics database -- Second half of Development has reached 100 performances.

New arrivals: Heinz Bongartz (Weitblick), Franz Brüggen 1987 (Philips DVD), Carl St. Clair (Denon DVD), John Eliot Gardiner 2002 ('Eroica' telefilm DVD), Helmut Müller-Brühl (Naxos), Simon Rattle (9/1 Lucerne broadcast), Jose Serebrier (Kultur VHS), Carl Schuricht 1963 (Living Stage) , Stanislaw Skrowaczewski 2002 (BMG Japan).

333 versions now on hand.

8/31/2005 Updated the Eroica Discography. (I'm now writing it in full as 'Eroica Discography' because I discovered that search engines aren't smart enought to figure out that's what it is. Currently a search for 'Eroica Discography' doesn't even list this site on the first page.)

First half of Development now complete to 1971 (193 performances). Second half of Development has 89 performances. I will note here that a comparison of these two charts shows that 89 perforamnces are clearly not enough to get a good picture of what constitutes a 'normal' performance.

I no longer spend much time (or money) on new acquisitions, but even so they seem to keep rolling in. I obtained the 1961 Wislocki performance mentioned on 6/1/2005 via eBay. Other arrivals since June include performances led by Colin Davis (8/19 Proms broadcast), Alexander Dmitriev (Melodiya LP), Daniel Grossmann (Preiser), Jonathan Brett Harrison (Orchestergesellschaft Zürich website), Herbert von Karajan (Unitel 1971), Gianandrea Noseda (BBC download), Morten Ryelund (Classico), Gunnar Staern (Lily), Mamoru Takahara (National Panasonic).

Added a link to this site in the Wikipedia entry Symphony No. 3 (Beethoven)

6/1/2005 First half of Development now complete to 1968 (177 performances). Second half of Development has 64 performances.

Charts now also include recent performances from DVDs by Gielen and Abbado, and radio broadcasts by Brüggen and Gatti. (The Brüggen, from 2005 April 30, can be heard in streaming audio in the AVRO Listening Room.)

Updated the Discography, including the addition of VHS listings.
A sharp-eyed correspondent from Poland wrote that the Wislocki/Rowicki entries were confused. Upon examination, Stolat SZM 0101 (1977) was found to say Wislocki on the jacket, but Rowicki on the label! (It's Rowicki.) Also, there is apparently a 1961 Wislocki performance that had escaped prior notice.

5/8/2005 First half of Development now complete to 1967 (171 performances). Second half of Development has 54 performances.
Updated the Discography, which now includes all DVDs listed by Yoshii. (Yoshii's discography, originally published in 2001, was the starting point for mine; he has kindly sent me an update.)
4/27/2005 First half of Development now complete to 1965 (165 performances). Second half of Development has 34 performances.
Updated the Discography, which now includes a few DVDs.
4/20/2005 Added a new entry to the Quirks page, for David Porcelijn with the Tasmanian Symphony -- they use a fortepiano 'continuo'.

The recommendations page now includes links to the various sound clips scattered about the site.

4/16/2005 The Discography can now be sorted by single-movement timings (I  II  III  IV) and bpm (beats per minute). Also, you can now hide the media listings, which makes the page much more compact.
4/11/2005 First half of Development now complete to 1964 (162 performances). Second half of Development has 28 performances.
Updated the Discography.
4/6/2005 Another extreme example, this one from Norrington's 2002 recording: an ultra-fast Funeral March.
3/28/2005 Revised the Sounds page, adding a complete performance of the Funeral March (by Hans Swarowsky -- never issued complete on CD).
One more extreme example added, a clip of Celibidache's ultra-slow Funeral March.
3/26/2005 Six more extreme examples added, including complete clips of the Scherzo.
3/24/2005 Just for fun, added four 1-minute audio clips illustrating extremes of tempo.
3/24/2005 'First half of Development' now complete to 1962, includes 157 performances. Finally past the halfway mark -- after more than a year -- so I've started on 'Second half of Development' to keep things interesting. I've also added 'Exposition & Development (first half)' combined.
3/4/2005 Updated the Discography, 310 versions now on hand.
'First half of Development' now complete to 1961, includes 151 performances.
1/1/2005 Updated the Discography, 308 versions now on hand.
'First half of Development' now complete to 1960, includes 144 performances.
10/12/2004 New recommended recordings page added to the Opinions section.
New mystery recording: an mp3 of the first movement of 'Unknown (Ledermann)' has been added to the Sounds page.
Updated the Discography, 300 versions now on hand.
'First half of Development' now complete to 1957, includes 124 performances.
9/9/2004 Integrated three more performances into the metrics data: Karajan 53, Jochum 78, Suitner 77. Updated the Discography.
297 versions now on hand.
'First half of Development' now includes 104 performances.

The comments on some older pages need revision.

8/17/2004 Updated the Discography.
295 versions now on hand.
'First half of Development' now includes 95 performances.
Tintner turns out to be a special problem: he adds 2 bars to the exposition.
4/15/2004 'First half of Development' now complete to 1955.
Updated the Discography.
291 versions now on hand (haven't yet integrated Kord & Tintner into the metrics database).
3/3/2004 New tempo map ('first half of Development') now complete to 1952.

Updated the Discography.
I never would have imagined I'd have a column from Sports Illustrated in my bibliography, but life is full of surprises.

2/6/2004 Added some pages of opinions.
1/10/2004 Unusually, a recording has moved from the pseudonymous to the main listings. My source is an email from Jerome F. Weber:

Alexander von Pitamic (1918- )/Munich SO was issued in France in 1973 as LP: Sonopresse UM 64044.

My apologies to Herr von Pitamic.

1/9/2004 I've been creating sectional charts of various bits of the first movement, most of which showed little of interest. Eventually I decided to simply continue on from the Exposition, and so now there is a new chart showing the various interpretations of the first half of the Developement. You can get there from the Sections page. The data is far from complete -- only 59 recordings out of 287 -- but since there are already some interesting patterns I've decided to present it as a work-in-progress.

Eight new recordings integrated into the metrics database (Dohnanyi 2003, Han, Mitropoulos 1955, Norrington 2002, Sinaisky, Svetlanov, Tabakov).

Updated the Discography.

2003What's New 2003
2002What's New 2002