Contrapunctus
Guided journeys24 minutes · 8 stations

How the symphony grew

From Haydn’s “Surprise” Symphony to Mahler’s Ninth

At the Hanover Square Rooms in 1792, Haydn’s new symphony interrupted a quiet tune with a single loud chord. A little over a century later, the last page of Mahler’s Ninth is for strings alone, played softly.

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Station 01 08

Haydn’s surprise

Joseph Haydn · Symphony No. 94 “Surprise”
II. Andante

London, 23 March 1792. At Salomon’s concert in the Hanover Square Rooms, Haydn’s new symphony had the strings play a short, plain tune. They repeat it more softly. Then the whole orchestra plays one fortissimo chord, with timpani. Haydn wrote the symphony during his first London visit. The slow movement sets its C major tune as a series of variations. In the first variation the second violins and violas keep the melody while the first violins play semiquavers around it.

Sources & recording

Boston Symphony Orchestra, Serge Koussevitzky
Excerpt 0:00–⁠2:44 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. The strings begin a short tune in C major, with a bass note at the start of each bar.
  2. The quiet repeat ends with a single fortissimo chord from the whole orchestra, including timpani.
  3. The first violins play semiquavers around the tune, now held by the second violins and violas.
Places on record · 17911234
  1. Hanover Square Rooms, London · premiere · documented
    1791–⁠1795

    Salomon’s concerts presented his London symphonies, Nos. 93–⁠101, with Haydn directing.

  2. 18 Great Pulteney Street, London · lived · documented
    1791-01–⁠1791-05

    Lodged where his host and collaborator Johann Peter Salomon lived; worked in a room lent by Broadwood.

  3. London (Handel Festival) · heard · documented
    1791-05

    At the end of May he attended the great Handel Festival, with over a thousand musicians; no venue is named.

  4. Oxford · travelled · documented
    1791-07

    Awarded an honorary doctorate at a ceremony; Symphony No. 92 was performed and took its nickname.

Dated places on a present-day coastline.

This year on the Map
Station 02 08

Mozart: the G minor recapitulation

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart · Symphony No. 40, K. 550
I. Molto allegro

Three years before Haydn’s London visit, Mozart wrote his G minor Symphony, K. 550. It opens with a repeated figure in the violins. In the development, fragments of it pass between strings and winds, and each repetition moves into a less stable key. Mozart then brings the opening back in G minor. The recapitulation is longer than the exposition because the bridge between the themes modulates further. The second theme, first heard in B♭ major, returns in G minor, with semitone clashes in the woodwind and strings.

Sources & recording

Musopen Symphony (Commons credit; ensemble attribution disputed)
Excerpt 2:00–⁠5:38 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. Scraps of the opening violin figure pass between instruments and through changing keys.
  2. The opening returns in G minor; the bridge between the themes is now longer.
  3. The second theme returns in G minor; it was first heard in B♭ major.
Station 03 08

Mozart: five themes in combination

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart · Symphony No. 41 in C major, K. 551 “Jupiter”
IV. Finale: Molto allegro

Mozart wrote the “Jupiter” Symphony in the summer of 1788, the same summer as the G minor. In the finale the four-note tune C–D–F–E keeps its long notes while quicker figures pass it, and one part can begin before another has finished. The return to C major is followed by further development. In the coda five themes are combined, each keeping its own rhythm as they pass between the instruments. Trumpets and timpani join the final C major chords.

Sources & recording

Bruno Walter, Columbia Symphony Orchestra
Excerpt 3:46–⁠7:16 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. The four-note tune returns in C major, with quicker figures moving around it.
  2. In the coda five themes are combined, with long notes set against running figures and short replies.
  3. Trumpets and timpani reinforce the final C major chords as the running lines converge.
Station 04 08

Beethoven: a pause for an oboe

Ludwig van Beethoven · Symphony No. 5, Op. 67
I. Allegro con brio

The Fifth’s opening rhythm recurs long after its first statement. In the development it passes between instruments and through changing keys, and the exchanges eventually shrink to isolated chords, with silence between the replies. When the opening returns at bar 248, winds and brass reinforce it. At bar 268 the orchestra stops, leaving an oboe alone in an Adagio. Later, bassoons take the call previously played by horns, and the second theme returns in C major, a minor third below its earlier E♭ major.

Sources & recording

Skidmore College orchestra
Excerpt 3:23–⁠6:42 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. The opening rhythm moves through new pitches and keys as the development begins.
  2. Winds and strings exchange slow chords; the replies grow shorter, with rests between them.
  3. The opening returns, with winds and brass reinforcing its short-note rhythm.
  4. At bar 268 the orchestra stops and one oboe plays an unaccompanied Adagio.
  5. Bassoons take the horns’ old call before the second theme returns in C major.
From the score · bar 125Engraved score page containing bar 125
Recording time · provisional · 3:23. Symphony No. 5, Op. 67 — first movement ↗ Score and recording in the Hall
Station 05 08

Brahms’s greeting from the mountains

Johannes Brahms · Symphony No. 1 in C minor, Op. 68
IV. Adagio — Più andante — Allegro non troppo, ma con brio — Più allegro

In 1868 Brahms sent Clara Schumann a melody from the Bernese Alps, with the words: “High on the mountain, deep in the valley, I greet you many thousand times.” Eight years later a horn plays a version of that melody in the finale of his First Symphony, over tremolo strings; flutes then take it over. Trombones and bassoons follow with a short chorale. All this comes before the long string theme of the main Allegro. The chorale returns, played loud, in the coda.

Sources & recording

Czech National Symphony Orchestra
Excerpt 2:10–⁠4:34 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. The long wind call is held above strings playing rapidly repeated notes.
  2. Trombones and bassoons play a short chorale. It does not appear again until the coda.
  3. The call dies away, and the main Allegro follows after this excerpt.
Station 06 08

Bruckner: the scherzo of the Seventh

Anton Bruckner · Symphony No. 7 in E major, WAB 107
III. Scherzo — Sehr schnell; Trio — Etwas langsamer

A short repeated figure in the strings opens the scherzo of the Seventh, in A minor. Over it a trumpet plays a call and the clarinet answers; this exchange supplies much of the movement’s material. Bruckner returns repeatedly to the same short figures, moves them between instruments and builds them into long crescendos. Between the loud passages the brass play quietly: trombones and tuba join in a soft chorale while the strings continue to move. Another crescendo begins before the excerpt ends. After it comes the slower trio in F major, in which quiet timpani introduce a melody for the violins.

Sources & recording

Hochschulsymphonieorchester, University of Music and Theatre Munich; Marcus Bosch, conductor
Excerpt 0:00–⁠3:18 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. A short repeated figure in the strings opens the scherzo, and a trumpet call rises above it.
  2. Brass and timpani join the strings in the first loud passage.
  3. Trombones and tuba play softly in the quieter passage; the strings stay busy beneath them.
  4. Winds and brass join the strings in another crescendo before the slower trio.
Station 07 08

Tchaikovsky’s fading basses

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky · Symphony No. 6 in B minor “Pathétique”, Op. 74
IV. Finale — Adagio lamentoso

In Klin on 23 February 1893, Tchaikovsky told his nephew Vladimir Davydov that the Sixth would end with “the most drawn-out Adagio”. He was delighted with the new symphony. Here, after the low-brass chorale, a melody first heard in D major returns in B minor and rises to one last climax. The orchestra then drops out until only the low strings remain, and the double basses repeat B as the texture thins. Their pulse grows softer until it is barely audible.

Sources & recording

Musopen Symphony
Excerpt 8:06–⁠10:18 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. The second theme returns in B minor, over the low B in the basses.
  2. The strings play one last swell.
  3. The remaining phrase descends towards the low strings and their repeated bass pulse.
  4. The double basses hold a B, growing softer, as the symphony ends quietly.
Station 08 08

Mahler: the last page of the Ninth

Gustav Mahler · Symphony No. 9
IV. Adagio — Sehr langsam und noch zurückhaltend

The last page of Mahler’s Ninth begins with muted second violins. The marking is Adagissimo, slower still. Only strings remain, and the long melodies of the finale have broken into phrases of a few notes, separated by rests. One note is held after the others stop, and another, played softly, follows it. A viola plays a small upward turn inside the last D♭ major chord.

Sources & recording

Vienna Philharmonic; Bruno Walter, conductor
Excerpt 15:50–⁠18:30 · Full recording & listening notes

  1. Adagissimo: muted second violins begin the final page, with strings alone and long rests between phrases.
  2. The viola plays its phrase upwards inside the last D♭ major chord, and the remaining notes die away.
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