Symphony No. 1, Op. 9

The symphony plays as a single continuous span of about 20 minutes, but you can hear four traditional symphonic movements folded into one another. It opens with a forceful, striding theme in the low strings that sets the whole piece in motion, answered by a more lyrical second idea in the winds. This fast opening section works like a compressed first movement, building to a hard climax before easing into a scherzo-like passage, quicker and lighter, driven by nervous, skittering rhythms in the strings and woodwinds. From there the music slows dramatically into a broad, singing slow movement, carried by the oboe and strings, the emotional center of the piece. Listen for how the opening theme, transformed, reappears here in a gentler shape. The final section returns to the symphony's opening energy and, instead of a new closing theme, builds a passacaglia, a set of variations over a repeating bass line, that gathers intensity until the opening theme returns in full force to close the work. First-time listeners should listen for that final return: the same striding idea that opened the symphony now sounds inevitable, having passed through every mood the piece contains.

Barber wrote his Symphony No. 1 in 1936 while living in Rome on a fellowship, drawn to the idea of fitting the weight of a traditional four-movement symphony into a single unbroken span. It was premiered in Rome in December 1936 by the Augusteo Orchestra under Bernardino Molinari, becoming the first symphony by an American composer to be performed at the Salzburg Festival, in 1937. Arturo Toscanini took an interest in Barber's music around this time, and the symphony helped establish the young composer's reputation. Barber later revised the score in 1942, and it has remained one of his most performed orchestral works, valued for compressing symphonic scope into a compact, dramatically direct form.