Symphony No. 1
Slavonian
A teenager's astonishing first statement, bright and folk-rooted, that announces a fully formed talent without a trace of hesitation. The music is warm, tuneful, and confident where a student's work has no right to be.
Glazunov wrote his First Symphony in 1881, at sixteen, while studying privately with Rimsky-Korsakov, who had taken the boy on and moved him through years of technique in a matter of months. The score speaks the language of the Mighty Handful, and Borodin above all, with its Slavonic melodic turns, modal colour, and love of a broad singing tune. Balakirev looked over the slow movement and offered advice on how to extend it. The result earned its nickname from that unmistakably Russian, folk-flavoured idiom.
The premiere in 1882 became one of the more famous debuts in Russian music. The audience applauded a mature symphony, then watched a schoolboy in his uniform walk out to take his bow. Tchaikovsky, among others, was impressed. Mitrofan Belyayev, the timber merchant and patron, heard the work and built much of his publishing and concert enterprise around the young composer.
The orchestration already shows Glazunov's ear for balance and clean, well-lit textures rather than heavy Romantic weight. The writing favours long lyrical lines carried by strings and woodwinds, with the brass held in reserve for the climaxes. It sounds less like a first attempt than like an early work by a composer who has already found his centre.
Movements
Recordings coming soon
The individual movements will be uploaded here.