Choral Symphonies – Sheet Music & Scores

Fan of the glorious Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s 9th Symphony? Amazingly, it wasn’t until Beethoven in the 19th Century that the choral symphony came to be! Browse our sheet music and scores, and explore the wide world of choral symphonies with Stretta Music today!

The Birth of the Choral Symphony

Beethoven’s first attempt to integrate a vocal component into his symphonic music was in 1808 with Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy. This piece interestingly used a piano soloist and a choir, and even contains similar themes to the revolutionary Beethoven’s 9th Symphony of 1824. Beethoven breaks the conventions of the symphony, and the choral symphony was born.

The Development of the Choral Symphony

Beethoven’s model was very popular with many composers of the Romantic Period, due to the new creative, descriptive and narrative possibilities. Berlioz’s Romeo & Juliet Symphony in 1839 uses the choir to narrate, but it is still belongs firmly to the symphonic world because the orchestra plays the leading role.

Felix Mendelssohn also experimented with this new form, and described his second symphony, Mendelssohn’s Hymn of Praise of 1840, which uses biblical texts, as a “Symphony-Cantata”.

Franz Liszt uses a male voice choir, his “Chorus Mysticus”, at the end of Liszt’s Faust Symphony of 1854 , singing the last verses of Goethe’s original drama Faust. Here, the work is more of a “Choral Symphonic Poem”.

Gustav Mahler was a keen advocate of the choral symphony, and in two of the three Choral Symphonies by Mahler, he uses a boys’ choir.

One of the most famous British choral symphonies, and indeed one of the most popular choral symphonies to this day, is Vaughan Williams’ Sea Symphony of 1910, written when he was just 30 years old.

The Russian composer Alexander Scriabin uses a choir at the end of Scriabin’s Prometheus Symphony to create a mystical tension, and to increase the dramatic climax to the end the work.

Modern Choral Symphonies

Igor Stravinsky’s Symphony of Psalms of 1930 departs from the typical symphonic structure, and is one through composed movement, using experimental instrumentation and the texts from three psalms.

Dmitri Shostakovich wrote three choral symphonies, Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 2, Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 3 and Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 13, published in 1927, 1930 and 1962, he also uses soprano and bass soloists in the 1969 Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 14.

The Russian-German composer Alfred Schnittke composed two choral symphonies, Schnittke’s Symphony No. 2, St. Florian of 1979 and Schnittke’s Symphony No. 4 of 1983.

The Polish composer Henryk Mikołaj Górecki uses choir in his Choral Symphony No. 2, “Copernicus”, of 1972 and in Górecki’s Symphony No. 3, “Symphony of Lamentations” of 1977 he uses soprano soloist and symphony orchestra.

Hanz Werner Henze uses choir in Henze’s Symphony No. 9 of 1997, consciously following in Beethoven’s footsteps, which is dedicated to the heroes and martyrs of the German anti-fascism movement.

The Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki uses German poems of the 19th and 20th centuries in Penderecki’s Symphony No. 8 “Songs of Transience” of 2005. Here he stretches the boundaries of the symphonic form, using 12 relatively short movements.

Related Links

• Symphonies – Sheet Music
• Oratorios – Sheet Music
• Choral Music – Sheet Music
• The Classical Period – Sheet Music
• The Romantic Period – Sheet Music
• Classical Modernism – Sheet Music