"Let your deafness no longer be a secret," Beethoven wrote in 1806, "even in art." Between 1804 and 1808, the years that saw the composition of the Fifth Symphony (among many other masterworks), Beethoven was more determined than ever to assert himself artistically, despite an often hostile Viennese public and the personal difficulties that marked his life at the time. Running counter to the Sixth ("Pastoral") Symphony, which seems to depict a man at peace with the world and nature, the Fifth shows a fraught and uneasy confrontation with fate, exemplified by the famous opening motif.

From early music to cutting-edge contemporary pieces, small chamber works to grand operas, Spanish conductor Pablo Heras-Casado is a passionate proponent of every kind of repertoire. In 2013 he led the Mahler Chamber Orchestra—the prestigious ensemble founded by Claudio Abbado in 1997 that forms the core of the Lucerne Festival Orchestra—in this striking performance of Beethoven's masterpiece.