The Third Symphony by Alfred Schnittke was his fourth composition in the symphonic form, completed in 1981.
Like its predecessor, it is in four movements: an opening Moderato , followed by an Allegro and a relatively brief movement marked Allegro pesante, with the lengthy finale marked Adagio . At around 50 minutes, it is Schnittke's third longest symphony, after the First and Second symphonies.
It shares an intensity similar to the First Symphony, but unlike that work has a more traditional form, and contains no direct quotations. Nonetheless, the influence of many composers hangs over the piece (Richard Taruskin called the opening of the work "Wagner's Rheingold prelude, cubed and cubed again." [1] ), not merely stylistically but in Schnittke's repeated use of composers' initials. These include Bach, Handel, Mozart, Schoenberg, Stockhausen and Hans Werner Henze. Further use is made of transposed words later in the work: in the third movement the word "das Böse" ("the Evil") appears as an eight-note tone row (D, A, E flat, A flat, B flat, E, E flat, E), with the B-A-C-H monogram dominating the final movement. [2]
The work was premiered in Leipzig on 5 November 1981, with Kurt Masur conducting the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester in Schnittke's presence. It was first recorded in 1984 by Gennadi Rozhdestvensky with the USSR Ministry of Culture Symphony Orchestra. Further recordings appeared in the 1990s with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra under Eri Klas and in 2015 [3] with the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin under Vladimir Jurowski (PENTATONE PTC 5186485).
The symphony is scored for a large orchestra consisting of 4 flutes (all doubling piccolos), 4 oboes (4th doubling cor anglais), 4 clarinets (3rd doubling piccolo clarinet, 4th doubling bass clarinet), 4 bassoons (4th doubling contrabassoon), 6 horns, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones (4th doubling contrabass trombone), tuba, timpani, 2 tam-tams, vibraphone, marimba, bells, glockenspiel, electric guitar, bass guitar, 2 harps, piano, harpsichord, organ, celesta, and strings (16-16-12-12-10)
The symphony consists of four movements :
The duration of the symphony is approximately 50 minutes.
The Symphony No. 10 in E minor, Op. 93, by Dmitri Shostakovich was premiered by the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra under Yevgeny Mravinsky on 17 December 1953. It is not clear when it was written. According to the composer, the symphony was composed between July and October 1953, but Tatiana Nikolayeva stated that it was completed in 1951. Sketches for some of the material date from 1946.
Symphony No. 12 in D minor, Op. 112, subtitled The Year 1917, was composed by Dmitri Shostakovich in 1961. He dedicated it to the memory of Vladimir Lenin. Although the performance on October 1, 1961, by the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Yevgeny Mravinsky was billed as the official premiere, the actual first performance took place two hours earlier that same day in Kuybyshev by the Kuybyshev State Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Abram Stasevich.
The two Serenades, Op. 11 and 16, represent early efforts by Johannes Brahms to write orchestral music. They both date from after the 1856 death of Robert Schumann when Brahms was residing in Detmold and had access to an orchestra.
The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra, Op. 34, is a 1945 musical composition by Benjamin Britten with a subtitle Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell. It was based on the second movement, "Rondeau", of the Abdelazer suite. It was originally commissioned for the British educational documentary film called Instruments of the Orchestra released on 29 November 1946, directed by Muir Mathieson and featuring the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Malcolm Sargent; Sargent also conducted the concert première on 15 October 1946 with the Liverpool Philharmonic in the Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool, England.
The Symphony No. 5 in B-flat major, Op. 55, was written by Alexander Glazunov from April to October 1895. Although in this symphony Glazunov returned to his conventional four-movement layout he frequently utilizes thematic transformation. Glazunov described it as "silenced sounds" and "an architectural poem".
The Symphony No. 2 in E minor and C major by Arnold Bax was completed in 1926, after he had worked on it for two years. It was dedicated to Serge Koussevitzky, who conducted the first two performances of the work on 13 and 14 December 1929.
The Symphony in F-sharp, Op. 40, is the only symphony by 20th-century Austrian composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold, although as a teenager in 1912 he had written a Sinfonietta, his Op. 5. Using a theme from the 1939 film The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex, the symphony was completed in 1952 and dedicated to the memory of American president Franklin D. Roosevelt, who had died seven years earlier.
Alexander Glazunov composed his Symphony No. 3 in D major, Op. 33, in 1890, and it was published by 1892 by the Leipzig firm owned by Mitrofan Belyayev. The symphony is dedicated to Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and was first performed in St. Petersburg in December 1890 under the baton of Anatoly Lyadov. The symphony is considered a transitional work, with Glazunov largely eschewing the influences of Balakirev, Borodin, and Rimsky-Korsakov inherent in his earlier symphonies for the newer influences of Tchaikovsky and Wagner. Because of this change, the Third has been called the "anti-kuchkist" symphony in Glazunov's output. He would tone down these new influences in his subsequent symphonies as he strove for an eclectic mature style. The Third also shows a greater depth of expression, most evident in the chromatic turns of its third movement, reminiscent of Wagner's opera Tristan und Isolde.
The Symphony No. 9 by Alfred Schnittke was written two years before his death in 1998. As a result of paralysis following a series of strokes, the manuscript was barely readable, and a performing edition was made by Gennady Rozhdestvensky. Schnittke was dissatisfied with Rozhdestvensky's edition, and following his death his widow Irina Schnittke sought to have a reconstruction made that was more faithful to the manuscript. Nikolai Korndorf was first engaged to perform the task, and following his early death the manuscript was passed to Alexander Raskatov. Raskatov not only reconstructed Schnittke's Ninth but also wrote his own composition: Nunc dimittis – In memoriam Alfred Schnittke, which was performed after the symphony in the premiere recording conducted by Dennis Russell Davies.
The Symphony No. 1 by the British composer Michael Tippett was completed in 1945.
The Symphonia: sum fluxae pretium spei is an orchestral triptych by the American composer Elliott Carter. Its three movements were composed between 1993 and 1995. The complete work was first performed on April 25, 1998 at Bridgewater Hall, Manchester by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Oliver Knussen. The second movement "Adagio tenebroso" was a finalist for the 1996 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
Variations for Orchestra is an orchestral composition by the American composer Elliott Carter. The work was commissioned by the Louisville Orchestra and was composed between 1953 and 1955. It was given its premiere on 21 April 1956 by the Louisville Orchestra under the conductor Robert Whitney, both to whom the work is dedicated. This is Carter's next major work after his first String Quartet
Symphony No. 11 is a composition by the Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos, written in 1955. A performance lasts about twenty-five minutes.
The Concerto for Viola and Orchestra is a viola concerto by Soviet and German composer Alfred Schnittke. It was written in the summer of 1985. Its dedicatee is viola player Yuri Bashmet, who gave the work its world premiere with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra conducted by Lukas Vis at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam on 9 January 1986.
The Concerto no. 4 for Violin and Orchestra is a violin concerto by Soviet and German composer Alfred Schnittke. It was commissioned by the 34th Berlin Festival and written in 1984. Its first performance was given in Berlin on 11 September 1984 with dedicatee Gidon Kremer as soloist and the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Christoph von Dohnányi.
Symphony No. 0 by Russian composer Alfred Schnittke was composed in 1956–57 whilst Schnittke was a student at the Moscow Conservatory. It was given its first performance in 1957 by the Moscow Conservatory Symphony Orchestra conducted by Algis Zhiuratis. Present at the premiere were Dmitri Shostakovich and Dmitry Kabalevsky.
Symphony No. 6 by Russian composer Alfred Schnittke was composed in 1992. It was commissioned by cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich and the National Symphony Orchestra of Washington, who together gave its first performance in Moscow on 25 September 1993.
Russian composer Alfred Schnittke's Symphony No. 7 was composed in 1993. It is dedicated to conductor Kurt Masur who gave its world premiere performance in New York with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra on 10 February 1994.
Russian composer Alfred Schnittke's Symphony No. 8 was composed in 1994. Its dedicatee Gennady Rozhdestvensky conducted the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra in the symphony's premiere in Stockholm on 10 November 1994.
The Symphony No. 2 is a four-movement orchestral composition by the Finnish composer Uuno Klami, who wrote the piece from in 1945; it is the final of Klami's two numbered symphonies. Toivo Haapanen and the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra premiered the work at the Helsinki Conservatory on 15 December 1946.