On this edition of Milestones of the Millennium, we explore the most expansive, expressive and flexible of musical forms: the symphony. Performance Today’s Lisa Simeone is joined by Michael Steinberg, symphony scholar and author of The Symphony: A Listener’s Guide. Steinberg shares insights on the infinite variety of symphonies and their composers, while we listen to a sampling of great symphonic highlights.

The term “symphony” means “sounds coming together”--an apt title for a form that contains such wide ranging musical expression. The symphony grew out of the opera overture, with its distinctive pattern of alternating themes and tempos. Early symphonies, like Giovanni Battista Sammartini’s six minute Sinfonia in D major, looked closer to an opera overture in length. Soon composers would write symphonies five times this length. This century, single symphonic movements have rivaled the length of an entire Beethoven symphony. We hear Sammartini’s pioneering Symphony in D major in its entirety.

Johannes Brahms

Many composers have relished the freedom the symphony form offers, with its loose structure and accommodating length. Franz Joseph Haydn wrote over 100 symphonies; they were an outlet for his incessant inspiration. We hear No. 64 with Christopher Hogwood conducting the Academy of Ancient Music. Throughout his career, Haydn would constantly break the rules, make new ones, and break them again. But many great composers have found their first symphony a daunting proposition. Johannes Brahms spent 15 years composing his; the superb results of the third movement indicate that the incubation period was well spent. We also listen to highlights of Beethoven’s 9th, which first introduced singing to the symphony. Steinberg says Beethoven “makes us believe that he personally invented triumph…joy and unbridled physical exuberance.”

Ludwig van Beethoven

More recently, Tchaikovsky used the form to express his own sinking despair, while Gustav Mahler demonstrated that “pain…lives together with joy” through his symphonies. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart had chosen not to wear his anguish on his sleeve. He insisted that the listener discover subtle messages amidst the decorum of his majestic movements, as a sort of reward for one's attention.

Steinberg says a symphony’s whole is greater than the sum of its parts. As great composers expanded the vocabulary and design of the form, we continually saw new patterns of fast and slow movements, and minuets. Originally, the first movement was emphasized. But gradually more attention has been given to the finale--the place to which everything tends, where tension is resolved and questions answered. With such innovation, the narrative flow of the symphony crystallized, making each such work a complete story told entirely in music.

Listen to our online edition of this Milestones of the Millenium feature, as Lisa is joined by symphony scholar Michael Steinberg. Note: Some music parts have been edited from the commentary due to internet rights issues. (This audio segment requires the free RealPlayer 5.0 or higher. You can also listen with a 14.4 connection)