The key of the _Leonore Overture No. 3_ is C major. A short _fortissimo_ is struck. It is diminished by wood-wind and horns, then taken up, _piano_, by the strings. From this G there is a descent down the scale of C major to a mysterious F sharp. The key of B minor is reached, finally A flat major, when the opening measures of Florenstan's air, "In des Lebens Frülingstagen" (Act II of the opera), is played. The theme of the _allegro_, C major, begins _pianissimo_, first violins and violoncellos, and waxes impetuously. The second theme has been described as "woven out of sobs and pitying sighs." The working out consists in alternating a pathetic figure, taken from the second theme and played by the wood-wind over a nervous string accompaniment, with furious outbursts from the whole orchestra. Then comes the trumpet call off stage. The twice-repeated call is answered in each instance by the short song of thanksgiving from the same scene. Leonore's words are: "_Ach! du bist gerettet! Grosser Gott!_" A gradual transition leads from this to the return of the first theme at the beginning of the third part (flute solo). The third part is developed in general as the first part and leads to a wildly jubilant _coda_.
Strange things have been done by conductors to Beethoven's overture. We remember Franz Wüllner in Berlin slackening the pace in the _allegro_ section when he came to the heavy chords that are supposed by some commentators, finders of sunbeams in cucumbers, to represent Alva, and then playing the chords with brutal emphasis and a long pause between them. Another conductor, no less a person than Arthur Nikisch, made a long hold on the short, incisive violin stroke just before the _coda_, and then brought the figure slowly down _portamento_. We doubt if he did this in later years.
This overture was composed in 1810; it was published in 1811. The music to Goethe's play--overture, four entr'actes, two songs sung by Clärchen, "Clärchen's Death," "Melodrama," and "Triumph Symphony" (identical with the coda of the overture), for the end of the play, nine numbers in all--was performed for the first time with the tragedy at the Hofburg Theater, Vienna, May 24, 1810. Antonie Adamberger was the Clärchen.