The Symphony No. 8 in C minor, Op. 65, by Dmitri Shostakovich was written in the summer of 1943, and first performed on 4 November of that year by the USSR Symphony Orchestra under Yevgeny Mravinsky,...

Five Tudor Portraits (1935), by Ralph Vaughan Williams, is a work scored for contralto (or mezzo-soprano), baritone, mixed chorus and orchestra. It sets several poems, or extracts from poems, by the...

The scenario of Martinu’s 1930 “Echec du Roi” (Checkmate) anticipates that of Stravinsky’s “Jeu de Cartes” (1937), with dancing chessmen taking the place of dancing poker chips. The score mixes...

Inspired by the personality, prodigious technique and musicality of the cellist Gregor Piatigorsky, Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s Cello Concerto in G minor is a work of imposing scale and demanding...

Among Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s important, large-scale Judaically incited concert works is his second violin concerto (Op. 66), which he subtitled I profeti (The Prophets). Its three movements are...

The tone poem/ballet Amazonas, composed originally for orchestra and published in 1917, was transcribed for piano by Villa-Lobos himself and published in a new version in 1932. Like Uirapuru,...