Symphony No. 2 (Shostakovich) October Revolution in his Twelfth Symphony, subtitled "The Year 1917". The symphony is a short (about 20 minutes) experimental work in one movement; within this movement are four sections, the last of which includes a chorus. In a marked departure from his First Symphony, Shostakovich composed his Second in a gestural, geometric "music without emotional structure" manner, with the intent of reflecting speech patterns and physical movements in a neo-realistic style. This choice may have been influenced at least partially by Vsevolod Meyerhold's theory of biomechanics. Shostakovich placed far more emphasis on texture in this work than he did on
Symphony No. 59 (Haydn) Symphony No. 59 (Haydn) The Symphony No. 59 in A major is a relatively early work by Joseph Haydn that is known popularly as the Fire Symphony. Composed under the auspices of Nikolaus Esterházy, it was written in the middle or late 1760s. Despite its high number, the symphony is one of several in the Hoboken classification system (Symphony No. 72 is another good example, as it was composed even earlier) that is unsympathetically misplaced. It is, in fact, a moderately early work, certainly composed before 1769, and possibly as early 1765. By contrast, the Symphony No. 62 was written