Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 5

I'm always tickled by composer trivia questions, like which standard canon works begin in a major key and end in a minor key? I'll give you one, but please comment others below: Mendelssohn's 4th Symphony. Well, how about this one: how many of Beethoven's 16 string quartets end i ...  Show more

Brahms spent much of his adult life battling with his ambition to write the next great symphony and his terror at the shadow of Beethoven standing behind him. Brahms tortured himself for 14 years with his first symphony, and only published it when he was 49 years old. But when th ...  Show more

Synopsis No four notes in classical music are more familiar than those that open Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5. Their powerful psychological resonance has often extended beyond music into overtly political contexts. For example, on today’s date in 1941, the British Broadcasting Comp ...  Show more

You know Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. You’ve heard it in films, advertisements, parodied in Saturday morning cartoons and disco-ized in Saturday Night Fever. The Fifth Symphony is a given, so much so that it blends into the background. You know this piece, but how well? Of all the ...  Show more

Ludwig van Beethoven's Second Symphony came at a pivot point in his life. Musically, the composer moved toward the more epic, revolutionary style that would define his later symphonies. Personally, Beethoven sank into despair as his hearing loss worsened. 

Before Beethoven’s time, classical music culture looked and sounded quite different. When Mozart premiered his Symphony 31 in the late 1700s, it was standard for audiences to clap, cheer, and yell “da capo!” (Italian for “from the beginning!”) in the middle of a performance. Afte ...  Show more