Symphony No. 1 (Schnittke)

The First Symphony of the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke was written between 1969 and 1974.

Scored for a very large orchestra, it is recognised as one of Schnittke's most extreme essays in aleatoric music: from the outset the piece is loud, brash and chaotic, and it imports motifs from all parts of the Western classical tradition. Schnittke includes a choreography for the musicians themselves, and in a manner similar to Haydn's Farewell Symphony, leave and re-enter the stage at points marked in the score.

The second movement opens with a faux-baroque rondo which is soon usurped by a Mahlerian intervention on clarinet. This too is soon eclipsed by a sleazy percussive theme. There are also direct quotations from Tchaikovsky's B flat minor Piano Concerto, Johann Strauss Jr's 'Vienna Woods' waltz, Chopin's Second Piano Sonata amongst many others. Often the material collides in a manner similar to Charles Ives' music, but as the critic Alex Ross notes, taken to a much greater extreme. Schnittke also includes an extended jazz improvisation sequence for violin and piano in the second movement.

Ross regards it as surprising that the work was ever passed by the Soviet authorities, even though by the 1970s the regime had become less hardline. Schnittke himself noted:

...
Wikipedia