The Symphony No. 1 in D major, Op. 25, also known as the Classical, was Sergei Prokofiev's first numbered symphony. He began to compose it in 1916 and completed it on September 10, 1917.Steinberg, Michael. "The Symphony: A Listeners Guide". pp. 429–433. Oxford University Press, 1995. It was composed as a modern reinterpretation of the classical style of Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. The symphony's nickname was bestowed upon it by the composer. It premiered on April 18, 1918, in Petrograd, conducted by Prokofiev. It has remained one of his most popular works.

Background The symphony is composed in a style based on that of Haydn and Mozart, but does not follow them strictly. It has often been described as "neo-classical". The work was partly inspired by his conducting studies at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory, where the instructor, Nikolai Tcherepnin, taught his students about conducting Haydn, among other composers.

The influence of Mozart is apparent in the light, airy scoring and the fast paced bustle of the outer movements but it does deviate from this influence in some surprising ways. Prokofiev's own style is noticeable in the way the themes step upward or downward into the neighboring keys before returning to the first one. This is especially true of the second theme of the first movement and of the gavotte.1001 Classical Recordings You Must Hear Before You Die, Matthew Rye

Prokofiev wrote the symphony on holiday in the country, using it as an exercise in composing away from the piano.Listen from 1:00 to 3:40 (.ram RealAudio download) Discovering Music, BBC Radio 3, BBC Sounds This also served to get him away from the violent street fighting of the February Revolution which was then underway in Petrograd.

Movements

The symphony is in four movements and lasts about sixteen minutes:

History On December 18, 1916, Prokofiev wrote in his diary, "I look forward with joyous anticipation to the Piano Concerto No. 3, the Violin Concerto, and the Classical Symphony." Six months later in May 1917, he took the "important decision" to compose without the aid of a piano. "For some time", he wrote, "I contemplated composing my Classical Symphony away from the piano, and all the work I had so far done on it I had done in my head. Now I resolved to finish it. It seemed to me that composing with or without a piano was purely a matter of habit, and it would be good to gain more experience with a work as uncomplicated as this symphony."

That same month, he continued in a later entry that he had sketched out the symphony but had yet to pen a final draft in orchestral score. His entry continued:

The following month, in June 1917, Prokofiev wrote in his diary that he had scrapped the original finale for the symphony, which he felt had seemed "too ponderous and not characterful enough" for a symphony in the classical style: "Asafyev put into my mind an idea he was developing, that there is no true joyfulness to be found in Russian music. Thinking about this, I composed a new finale, lively and blithe enough for there to be a complete absence of minor triads in the whole movement, only major ones. From my original finale I salvaged only the second subject... this kind of finale is quite appropriate to Mozartian style." By the end of summer 1917, Prokofiev wrote that he had finally embarked upon the orchestration of the symphony, but that work was moving slowly at first on account of his unfamiliarity with the music's style.

Originally, the Classical Symphony was intended to be premiered in Petrograd on November 4, 1917 with the Violin Concerto No. 1, but this was postponed. On January 18, 1918, Russia adopted the Gregorian calendar, bringing it into line with the Americas and Western Europe. This meant that Prokofiev's diary entry for April 5 was actually April 18 under the new calendar, which is now the date accepted as the premiere for the Classical Symphony. On April 18, Prokofiev wrote in his diary: "Rehearsal of the Classical Symphony with the State Orchestra, I conducted it myself, completely improvising, having forgotten the score and never indeed having studied it from a conducting perspective. I thought it might be a complete debacle, but nothing happened and in any case the parts has so many mistakes in them that the session turned mainly into one for making corrections. In Kislovodsk, I had worried that there would be some antagonism from a 'Revolutionary Orchestra' playing my new works, but the opposite was the case: the State Orchestra, infused with much new young blood, was flexible and attentive, and played the Symphony with evident enjoyment."

Instrumentation The symphony is scored for a Classical period-sized orchestra consisting of two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani, and strings.

Recordings Prokofiev recorded a piano arrangement of the "Gavotte" in 1935.

Complete recordings of this symphony include: OrchestraConductorRecord companyYearFormatBoston Symphony OrchestraSerge KoussevitzkyRCA Victor1929CDNBC Symphony OrchestraArturo ToscaniniRCA Victor1951CDNational Orchestra of the O.R.T.F.Jean MartinonVox1954LPCzech PhilharmonicKarel AnčerlSupraphon1956CDPhiladelphia OrchestraEugene OrmandySony Classical1961CDParis Conservatory OrchestraErnest AnsermetLondon Records1964LPMoscow Radio Symphony OrchestraGennadi RozhdestvenskyMelodiya/Quintessence1968LPNew York PhilharmonicLeonard BernsteinColumbia1968CDLondon Symphony OrchestraWalter WellerDecca1974CDLondon Symphony OrchestraVladimir AshkenazyDecca1974CDCzech PhilharmonicZdeněk KošlerSupraphon1978CDLondon Symphony OrchestraAndré PrevinEMI Classics1978CDBerlin PhilharmonicHerbert von KarajanDeutsche Grammophon1981CDChicago Symphony OrchestraSir Georg SoltiDecca1982CDScottish National OrchestraNeeme JärviChandos1985CDOrchestre National de FranceLorin MaazelCBS Masterworks1985CDLos Angeles Philharmonic OrchestraAndré PrevinPhilips1986CDOrpheus Chamber Orchestra(none)Deutsche Grammophon1987CDMünchner PhilharmonikerSergiu CelibidacheWarner Classics1988CDOrchestre National de FranceMstislav RostropovichErato1988CDBerlin PhilharmonicSeiji OzawaDeutsche Grammophon1989CDSlovak PhilharmonicStephen GunzenhauserNaxos1989CDChamber Orchestra of EuropeClaudio AbbadoDeutsche Grammophon1989CDSoviet State OrchestraNikolay TiomkinDiscover the Classics1990CDPhiladelphia OrchestraRiccardo MutiPhilips Classics Records1990CDSinfonia VarsoviaKrzysztof PendereckiAperto1990CDLondon Symphony OrchestraMichael Tilson ThomasSony Classical1991CDChicago Symphony OrchestraJames LevineDeutsche Grammophon1994CDSt. Petersburg State Symphony OrchestraSony1994CDNational Symphony Orchestra of UkraineTheodore KucharNaxos1995CDLondon Symphony OrchestraValery GergievPhilips2004CDSão Paulo State Symphony OrchestraMarin AlsopNaxos2013CDUSSR Ministry of Culture State Symphony OrchestraGennadi RozhdestvenskyCD/LPBournemouth Symphony OrchestraKirill KarabitsOnyx Classics2014CDSinfonia VarsoviaJerzy MaksymiukWarner Music Poland2015CDDeutsches Symphonie-Orchester BerlinTugan SokhievSony Classics2016CDRoyal Scottish National OrchestraThomas SøndergårdLinn Records2019CDLondon Symphony OrchestraGianandrea NosedaLSO Live2020Download

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