Part 2
An Alpine Symphony...Richard Strauss Riohard Strauss took a hundred days, in 1914-15, to compose the Alpine Symphony, which is not a symphony at all but the last of his orchestral descriptive pieces. It is continuous, but in twenty-two named sections. At itsfirst London performance in 1923 nuimlbered cards were held up on the platform so float the audience could keep its place in the analytical programme.
Night opens the work with a slow, descending minor scale, during which all the notes of the scale are heard sounding at the same time. With a big climax comes the Sunrise. Then the Ascent starts with a theme that rises from cellos and double-basses and runs through most of the work. N-ext follow Entry into the wood; Wandering betide the brook; At the waterfall; Apparition; In flowering meadows; On the mountain pasture (cow-bells hire); Through thickets and undergrowth, mistaking the path; On the glacier; Dangerous moments; On the summit (quiet oboe melody rising to broad orchestral climax); A vision; Mists rising; The sun becoming gradually less bright; Elegy; Quiet before the storm; Storm and descent (with wind-machine, rhundermachine, and heavy organ chords); Sunset; Dying away of sound. Finally Night again, with the whole scale sounding simultaneously as at the opening of the work. A.J.