Adagio for Strings Adagio for Strings Adagio for Strings is a work by Samuel Barber, arguably his best known, arranged for string orchestra from the second movement of his String Quartet, Op. 11. Barber finished the arrangement in 1936, the same year that he wrote the quartet. It was performed for the first time on November 5, 1938, by Arturo Toscanini conducting the NBC Symphony Orchestra in a radio broadcast from NBC Studio 8H. Toscanini also played the piece on his South American tour with the NBC Symphony in 1940. Its reception was generally positive, with Alexander J. Morin writing that "Adagio for
Adagio for Strings radio interview about it with WQXR and said, "They always play that piece. I wish they'd play some of my other pieces." In 2004, listeners of the BBC's "Today" program voted "Adagio for Strings" the "saddest classical" work ever, ahead of "Dido's Lament" from "Dido and Aeneas" by Henry Purcell, the Adagietto from Gustav Mahler's 5th symphony, "Metamorphosen" by Richard Strauss, and "Gloomy Sunday" as sung by Billie Holiday. In 2006 a recorded performance by the London Symphony Orchestra was the highest-selling classical piece on iTunes. The musicologist Bill McGlaughlin compares its role in American music to the role that