On 9/9, we share with you Leonard Bernstein’s examination of the superstition surrounding “Ninth” symphonies. What's your favorite Ninth? In an introductory trailer to his Dmitri Shostakovich 9th Symphony performance with the Vienna Philharmonic / Wiener Philharmoniker, distributed by Deutsche Grammophon, Bernstein explains how Shostakovich “thumbed his nose” at the tradition of Ninth symphonies of the great composers. "The mystique of the number nine exerted itself in an odd way, so typical of

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On December 1, 1944, Béla Bartók's "Concerto for Orchestra" received its premiere performance by Serge Koussevitzky leading the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Symphony Hall. A success at the time, it remains one of Bartók's best-known, most popular, and most accessible works. The work was written in response to a commission from the Koussevitzky Foundation (run by conductor Serge Koussevitzky) and was to be dedicated to the memory of Natalie Koussevitzky, the conductor's wife, who had died a few y