Track Listing

1. Symphony No. 3: 1. Molto moderato - with simple expression
2. Symphony No. 3: 2. Allegro molto
3. Symphony No. 3: 3. Andantino quasi allegretto
4. Symphony No. 3: 4. Molto deliberato
5. Symphony for Organ & Orchestra: Andante
6. Symphony for Organ & Orchestra: Scherzo
7. Symphony for Organ & Orchestra: Finale: Lento

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #123471 in Music
• Brand: Sony
• Released on: 1997-10-28
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

Amazon.com essential recording
Leonard Bernstein's performance of Copland's Third Symphony has had to wait a long time before finally appearing on CD. Part of the delay no doubt stemmed from the fact that DG released a second, later recording with the same orchestra, in digital sound. Comparing the two versions, both of which are very good, one prefers this first performance. Not only does the music move a bit more quickly, with sharper rhythms and a stronger sense of the dance (never far from Copland's musical thoughts), but the sonics are more naturally pleasing. The coupling is a terrific performance of the early Organ Symphony, which the composer wrote for his teacher, Nadia Boulanger. --David Hurwitz

Customer Reviews

Bernstein and Copland Were Made for Each Other
The Copland Third Symphony reminds listeners of why Copland remains the most popular and revered American composer. He has more original musical ideas on a single page of this score than most composers have in a lifetime.

If I had the choice between a Bernstein reading of a Copland work or a performance led by the composer himself, I would always choose Bernstein -- not because Copland didn't conduct his own works well, but Bernstein is absolutely inspired.Bernstein's conducting of this symphony reminds us why he is the interpreter of Copland's work against which all other performers will always be measured.

Lenny was the perfect intermediary for Aaron
From William Flanagan's liner notes: "The slow movement, ANDANTINO QUASI ALLEGRETTO, is at once the most personal and the most original in structural procedure--and it is the very heart of the piece. An essentially independent introduction, which is a metamorphosed treatment of the third principal theme from the first movement, comes to a more or less complete rounding out in preparation for a delicate, undulating, sharply profiled theme introduced by the solo flute."

Flanagan was apparently so impressed by that flute motif that Flanagan himself used it in a piece he wrote called ANOTHER AUGUST. Which is another masterpiece. And I wish Bernstein had conducted it for the purpose of popularizing it.

Copland's greatest passage of music is the last 6 minutes of the 1st movement of SYMPHONY #3. After the loud brassy climax in the middle, it segues into a quiet section. It's the most achingly tender & wistful piece of music that I've ever heard. And only Copland could've written it.

A snapshot of Copland as symphonist
This disc provides a snapshot of Copland as an American symphonist.

The Symphony for Organ and Orchestra (1925) was Copland's first large-scale work. It looks backward to his youthful influences--especially Stravinsky and Bartok in their "bad boy" phase--and forward to the open-sounding populist style he would develop a few years later in works such as "Appalachian Spring." There are three movements. The short prelude is quiet but unsettled. The second movement scherzo anticipates the rhythmic, percussion-heavy Western sound that Copland would adopt for scores such as "Billy the Kid" and "Rodeo," and the solo organ jazz riffs look forward to later jazz-inspired works such as the piano concerto. The finale is the most traditionally symphonic movement, with a final piling-up of themes in the closing pages reminiscent of the opening of "The Miraculous Mandarin." The young Virgil Thomson, on hearing this work, recognized that Copland would become one of the creators of a truly American style of classical music. Bernstein and Biggs capture the symphony's "shock of the new" quality better than any other recorded performance. (This is also one of the few recordings of the Aeolian-Skinner organ ripped out of Lincoln Center during the Avery Fisher Hall renovations.) The more familiar Symphony No. 3 (1946) represents Copland in his maturity. (The last movement includes a theme based on "Fanfare for the Common Man.") Bernstein's performance is justly celebrated. It's good to have the early and later works together on one disc as a snapshot of Copland as symphonist. The 1960s recorded sound is dated but serviceable enough to make this disc highly recommendable.