The Symphony in E minor is the first symphony written by the American composer Florence Price. The work was completed in 1932 and was Price's first full-scale orchestral composition and the first symphony by a Black woman to be performed by a major...

REPRINT SERIES  Stravinsky wrote the symphony from 1942–45 on commission by the Philharmonic Symphony Society of New York. It was premièred by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under Stravinsky on January 24, 1946.The Symphony in...

The symphony is a short (about 20 minutes) experimental work in one movement; within this movement are four sections, the last of which includes a chorus. In a marked departure from his First Symphony, Shostakovich composed his Second in a gestural,...

REPRINT SERIESProkofiev's Symphony No. 1 (1916-17) represents the composer's earliest mature effort in a genre he returned to time and again for the remainder of his career. Though the symphony received a warm reception in Russia and abroad -- and...

REPRINT SERIES  The Symphony was written between 1938 and 1940 on a commission from American philanthropist Mrs. Robert Woods Bliss. It was a turbulent period of the composer's life, marked by illness and deaths in his immediate family. In 1937,...

While Shostakovich wrote this piece as his graduation exercise from Maximilian Steinberg's composition class, some of the material may have dated from considerably earlier. The immediate parallel to the 19-year-old composer presenting his first symphony...

The Symphony No. 8 in C minor, Op. 65, by Dmitri Shostakovich was written in the summer of 1943, and first performed on 4 November of that year by the USSR Symphony Orchestra under Yevgeny Mravinsky, to whom the work is dedicated. It briefly was...

REPRINT SERIES Prokofiev's Symphony No. 4 is actually two works, both using material created for The Prodigal Son ballet. The first, Op. 47, was completed in 1930 and premiered that November; it lasts about 22 minutes. The second, Op. 112, is too...

It is fair to say that Szymanowski’s First Symphony (1906–07) was something of a reverse in his creative fortunes and is best regarded as a flawed if valiant attempt to write on a larger orchestral scale. The pre-eminent writer on...

Villa-Lobos composed his Ninth Symphony in Rio de Janeiro in 1952. It was first performed by the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Eugene Ormandy. The score is dedicated to Mindinha (Arminda Neves d'Almeida), the composer's companion for the last 23...

On 19 December 1941, Martinů wrote a letter to Serge Koussevitzky, expressing a wish to compose a symphony for the Boston Symphony Orchestra for their next season. In reply, early in 1942 Koussevitzky commissioned a work for large orchestra in memory of...

REPRINT SERIES The Fifth Symphony was composed from March to May 1946. Although Martinů initially spoke of dedicating it to the Red Cross, in the end the score was dedicated to the Czech Philharmonic, perhaps in anticipation of a return to his native...

The Symphony No. 9 in E minor was the last symphony written by the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams. He composed it during 1956 and 1957, and it was given its premiere performance in London by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir...

Hugo Alfvén regarded his Symphony No 1 (1896) as the first ‘written in the Swedish language’. It gets a little tied up in the closing pages of its otherwise clearly argued opening Allegro; the Andante is at its best when it breaks...

Ralph Vaughan Williams's Symphony No. 8 in D minor was composed between 1953 and 1955. Sir John Barbirolli, its dedicatee, conducted the Hallé Orchestra in the premiere at the Kings Hall in Manchester, on 2 May 1956. It is the shortest of the...

The Symphony No. 6 ("Fantaisies symphoniques"), H. 343, by Bohuslav Martinů was begun in New York City in 1951, after a hiatus of four years since its predecessor, and was tentatively completed three years later on 23 April 1953. In Paris, in the months...

REPRINT SERIES Martinů composed his Third Symphony during a summer retreat in Ridgefield, Connecticut from 2 May to 14 June 1944. The composition was not the result of a commission, but rather was a spontaneous gesture, and is dedicated to Serge...