While Aaron Copland's Symphony No. 3 is viewed as being one of his most characteristic masterworks, his earlier efforts in the form of symphony -- including at least four separate projects -- are not nearly as well celebrated. In Naxos' Copland: Dance Symphony, conductor Marin Alsop, known for her special facility with "classic" American works of this kind, leads the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in what might be termed Copland's symphonic "outtakes," symphonies that Copland undertook, but that really didn't make it to the ...
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While Aaron Copland's Symphony No. 3 is viewed as being one of his most characteristic masterworks, his earlier efforts in the form of symphony -- including at least four separate projects -- are not nearly as well celebrated. In Naxos' Copland: Dance Symphony, conductor Marin Alsop, known for her special facility with "classic" American works of this kind, leads the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in what might be termed Copland's symphonic "outtakes," symphonies that Copland undertook, but that really didn't make it to the mantle of the Symphony No. 3. For Copland, the unnumbered Dance Symphony (1925) was a matter of damage control, an attempt to rescue music written for his early ballet Grohg (1922-1925) that had no hope of being staged; Copland remarked that he didn't number it "because it is really not a symphony in the traditional sense." However, it won him an RCA Victor-sponsored competition in 1929, Copland's first such honor, and has gained some middleweight following as a work; it has been...
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