A piano symphony is a piece for solo

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

in one or more

movements Movement may refer to: Common uses * Movement (clockwork), the internal mechanism of a timepiece * Motion, commonly referred to as movement Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * "Movement" (short story), a short story by Nancy Fu ...

. It is a symphonic genre by virtue of imitating

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...

l tone colour, texture, and symphonic development.

History

An early piano symphony was written by

Theodor Kullak Theodor is a masculine given name. It is a German form of Theodore. It is also a variant of Teodor. List of people with the given name Theodor * Theodor Adorno, (1903–1969), German philosopher * Theodor Aman, Romanian painter * Theodor Blue ...

and published in 1847. French composer

Charles-Valentin Alkan Charles-Valentin Alkan (; 30 November 1813 – 29 March 1888) was a French Jewish composer and virtuoso pianist. At the height of his fame in the 1830s and 1840s he was, alongside his friends and colleagues Frédéric Chopin and Franz Lisz ...

composed one, which was published in 1857.

José Vianna da Motta José Vianna da Motta (modern spelling as 'Viana da Mota') (22 April 18681 June 1948) was a Portuguese pianist, teacher, and composer. He was one of the last pupils of Franz Liszt. The José Vianna da Motta Music Competition was founded in 1957 ...

wrote of it, "Alkan demonstrates his brilliant understanding of ymphonicform in the first movement of the Symphony (the fourth Study f his Op. 39. ... The tonalities are so carefully calculated and developed that anyone listening to it can relate each note to an orchestral sound; and yet it is not just through the sonority that the orchestra is painted and becomes tangible, but equally through the style and the way that the polyphony is handled." Several decades later,

Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji (born Leon Dudley Sorabji; 14 August 1892 – 15 October 1988) was an English composer, music critic, pianist and writer whose music, written over a period of seventy years, ranges from sets of miniatures to wor ...

wrote his Third Piano Sonata (1922), which he described as a piano symphony. Between the years 1938–1976, Sorabji wrote 6 piano symphonies. Among these is also sometimes included his Piano Symphony No. 0 (1930–1931), which is the complete piano part of his otherwise unfinished 2nd Symphony for Orchestra.

Niels Viggo Bentzon Niels Viggo Bentzon (Copenhagen, 24 August 1919 – Copenhagen, 25 April 2000) was a Danish composer and pianist. Biography Bentzon was the son of Viggo Bentzon (1861-1937), Rector of Copenhagen University and Karen Hartmann (1882-1977), conc ...

described his Partita for Piano, Op. 38 (1945), as a "symphony for solo piano". Jonathan Powell, liner notes for Kaikhosru Shapurji Sorabji, ''Concerto per suonare da me solo'', Jonathan Powell, (Altarus Records, AIR-CD-9081, 2006), p. 8. The composer John White's Piano Sonatina No. 8 (1961) consists of six movements, of which the fifth is called "Symphony in Five Movements". Haskel Small has also composed a piano symphony.

References

Piano Symphony Symphonies {{classical-composition-stub

History

See also

References