the.com/symphony
a hundred strangers agreeing, for forty minutes, on exactly how to feel.
means A large-scale musical composition for orchestra, usually in several movements, in which many instruments are woven into a single unfolding whole.
from From Greek 'symphōnia,' a marriage of 'syn-' (together) and 'phōnē' (sound or voice) — literally 'sounding together.' It passed through Latin 'symphonia' and Old French before reaching English, where for centuries it could mean any pleasing concord of sounds, or even an instrument that made them. Only later did it settle into its grand modern sense: not just sounds agreeing, but a whole architecture of agreement.
- word origin
- Greek symphonia, meaning sounding together
- Beethoven's ninth
- composed while completely deaf
- conductor's job
- makes no sound, controls everything
- tuning note
- whole orchestra surrenders to one oboe's A
- longest ever
- Mahler's third runs about 100 minutes
beethoven's 9th symphony — premiered 1824 in vienna, features 'ode to joy' with 1,000+ performances annually
mahler's 8th symphony — premiered 1910, requires 858 performers including 4 orchestras
shostakovich's 7th symphony — composed 1941 during siege of leningrad, broadcast by soviet radio
mozart's 40th symphony — k550 1788, one of only two minor key symphonies by mozart