Symphony No. 2 in B minor

The symphony unfolds in four movements.

I. Allegro opens with a stark, hammered unison figure in the low strings and brass that returns throughout the movement like a recurring signal; around it the orchestra builds broad, sweeping string melodies.

II. Scherzo, a fast, driving movement full of nervous energy, gives way in its middle section to a slower, more lyrical woodwind tune before the opening dash returns.

III. Andante is the emotional center, opening with a horn call answered by a long, arching clarinet melody, unfolding at a much slower pace than the movements around it.

IV. Finale, marked Allegro, returns to the hammering energy of the opening movement, driven by strong dance-like rhythms and bright brass fanfares before a fast, decisive close. Listen for the way the same short, forceful motif keeps resurfacing in different guises across the outer movements, giving the symphony a tight, unified feel despite its shifts in mood, and for the horn and clarinet exchange that opens the slow third movement.

Borodin worked on his Second Symphony over several years in the 1870s alongside his opera "Prince Igor" and his day job as a research chemist, and the symphony shares some of that opera's melodic material and its interest in evoking old Russian and Central Asian subjects. An earlier attempt at a premiere performance did not go well, and Borodin revised the score before it was performed again in Saint Petersburg in 1877 under Eduard Napravnik, and again in a revised version some years later. The work was slow to gain a firm place in the international repertoire but came to be admired for its concentrated energy and its role in shaping a distinctly Russian symphonic voice, one that influenced later composers including Alexander Glazunov, who helped prepare and promote Borodin's scores after his death.