Orchestre de Chambre de Bâle – Giovanni Antonini, Isabelle Faust

Two of Beethoven's greatest scores meet on this bill: the epic Symphony No. 3, in which the wind of History blows, and the Violin Concerto, both lyrical and haughty, entrusted to the incandescent bow of Isabelle Faust.

Composed at breakneck speed in 1806, Beethoven's only Violin Concerto is reputed to be a "love song", conveying the happiness of his secret engagement to Therese of Brunswick. The first movement, with its four signal timpani strikes, is serenely heroic, the second adopts the character of a Romance with variations and the last, in Rondo form, introduces the popular element. Almost contemporary is Symphony No. 3, "Eroica", famous for its dedication to the "liberator of Europe", the First Consul Bonaparte, in whom Beethoven saw the heir to the ideals of the French Revolution. Later, Napoleon's decision to have himself crowned emperor angered the composer, who crossed out the dedicatee's name and substituted a "funeral march" for the "triumphal march" originally intended. Its four movements, especially the first, with its confounding richness of development, and the last, with its contrapuntal density, are characteristic of the emancipation of Beethoven's writing, but it is of course the dotted rhythm of the Adagio that remains in people's minds, notably used for the funerals of Felix Mendelssohn, Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy.