Beethoven's Ninth has topped the ABC Classic 100 countdown for the fifth time. We explore its mystique and shed light on composers following in Beethoven's footsteps.

Szymanowski began drafting his Symphony No. 3 Song of the Night, a work dedicated to his mother, Anna Szymanowska née Taube, in Tymoszówka in the summer and autumn of 1914. He continued working on it ...

I’ve been listening to a symphony that I would describe as an almost perfect masterpiece by a composer of towering importance ...

Dvořák, who was so inspired by the folk music of his native Czech culture, wrote this symphony during his time in America, ...

Dvořák on cheery form, inspired by the Bohemian folk music that he loved. A more timid sibling to the limelight-stealing New World Symphony, the composer dedicated his Symphony No.8 to the music world ...

The great composer’s iconic dark and broody notes, now in sunny C major? You probably won’t even recognise it! The first four notes of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 are some of the most famous in all of ...

These accounts are quite magnificent, and their claims on the allegiance of collectors remain strong. Their freshness and vigour remind one of what it was like to hear these symphonies for the first ...

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Classical sonatas, symphonies, and concertos share common musical DNA: the system of contrasting themes ...

Philip Glass' newest symphony, an homage to Abraham Lincoln, was supposed to premiere at the Kennedy Center — until it didn't ...

No Sibelius symphony begins quite like the Fourth. That grinding, primal bottom C; the cellos, basses and bassoons pushing up ...

The Seventh Symphony's premiere concert was performed to benefit the soldiers wounded a few months earlier in the battle of Hanau. It was one of Beethoven's most successful concerts. Viennese ...