Study Scores for the Secondary General Music Classroom

Mahler's third symphony, scored for a massive orchestra, was conceived as a vast cycle in six movements, including the opening march, the moving setting for alto solo of Nietzsche's "Oh Mensch! Gib Acht!"

Widely regarded as the crowning achievement of his career, Mahler's Symphony No. 8 received overwhelming recognition at its first performance, conducted by the composer in Munich on September 12, 1910.... view details

The best-known and most beloved large-scale musical work in the English-speaking world, Messiah was first performed in Dublin over 200 years ago to benefit local charities. Since that time, it has given

Perhaps the most majestic achievement in the last phase of Haydn's musical career, The Creation is a choral masterwork of seamless perfection. It is also among the most popular oratorios of all time,

In his monumental Ninth Symphony, one of Mahler's greatest and most popular works, the composer experimented with the four-movement symphonic form, producing a masterpiece of musical innovation, satiric

Among the most popular and important modern British composers, Gustav Holst (1874–1934) was a true eccentric, given to odd enthusiasms and mystical musings. His spectacular symphonic work The Planets,

In 1910, innovative young Russian composer Igor Stravinsky was commissioned by Serge Diaghilev, director of the Ballets Russes, to create a completely new score. The dazzling result was The Firebird, which

These three charming instrumental pieces, composed by Mozart in the 1770s and 1780s, were among a number of serenades he wrote during this period to provide an evening's entertainment at weddings,

With this brilliant and uncompromising work - perhaps the most famous musical work of the 20th century - Stravinsky changed the course of modern music forever. Discarding conventional harmonies for

Mahler's Fourth Symphony ranks among the most beloved of his symphonic works and marks a distinct turning point in his approach to composition. It was here that he developed in its most sophisticated guise

Commissioned by Serge Diaghilev for the Ballets Russes, Stravinsky's score for the ballet Petrushka was an immediate sensation at its Paris premiere in 1911. Brilliantly orchestrated in bold, unheard-of

One of the world's most beloved symphonic compositions, Scheherazade is a shimmering, evocative musical treatment of the legend of the sultan's wife who staved off certain death by entertaining her husband

One of the last composers in the great Romantic tradition, Gustav Mahler (1860–1911) possessed a strong sense of the dramatic in life. He chose to record that drama in nine magnificent symphonies (a

The crowning glory of Bach's achievements in sacred music, the Mass in B Minor represents a powerful statement of Christian faith. Composed over more than two decades, this unprecedented work pairs

A masterpiece of the choral literature, Mozart's Requiem, his last work, was commissioned in the summer of 1791 but left incomplete at the time of the composer's death in December of the same year. His