Symphony No. 1 by Stefan Wolpe Orchestra - Sheet Music

SKU: PR.617208560

UPC: 680160429769.

Symphony No. l was written at Black Mountain College, North Carolina, in l955-l956. It was a Rodgers-Hammerstein commission given to me by the League of Composers- I.S.C.M. (American Section). It is in three movements. All of these movements consist of a series of transformations of an initial two-measure melody that acts as root and source material. This is a structured field of pitches, the various tones standing in relation to one another that the composer views as an analogue to those of physical bodies in a force field. The successive elaborations of the material resume when these relations of the tones are in some way disturbed and at times restored. The material is such as to admit of manifestations that vary widely in nature, and in fact often contradict each other. Thus, there are treatments of complexity and of simplicity, of tension and of calm, of animation and of ebbing activity.