Program Notes

The genesis of this symphony came about when McKinley attended the premiere of his Symphony for Thirteen Instruments performed by the New York Chamber Symphony under Gerard Schwarz's direction on 19 October 1983 at Merkin Concert Hall. McKinley felt that Schwarz's orchestra would be a possible home for his new commission, and in his program notes McKinley wrote that “...it was not until I heard this marvelous orchestra rehearse... that I was able to conceptualize the sound ideal that was to become the inspiring basis for my Third Symphony. Even though of Mozartian proportions, the Y orchestra displayed an incredible richness of tone and personality which helped to guide me in important details of composition and orchestration. I could hear strong lines, long melodic connections, dark timbres, and violet-like hues; and since I envisioned a large harmonic canvas, one of my most challenging musical tasks was to mold, balance, and integrate the exact orchestral proportions of my ideas, thus giving a rich perspective as well as bringing to the foreground the transparent and delicately fragile nature of an orchestra this size.”

In composing this work, McKinley prepared himself for this new opus by listening to other composers' symphonies that would guide his choices in terms of architectural structure and compositional colors that would make the work sound quite full and lucid, yet in spite of hearing works ranging from the symphonies of Mozart and Schubert to Prokofiev's “Classical” Symphony and Shostakovich's eighth symphony (“...which is, of course, a work for considerably larger forces”), McKinley, in his words, “...never used any of these works as models to be stylistically imitated. Instead, some of them provided an evocative guide to the general texture and physiognomy of the classical orchestra. My Third Symphony, then, is in three movements, all of which are traditional in their dramatic character, formal structure, and development.”

Of the three movements in McKinley's opus, the first (Allegro Vivace) is described as “a rondo which supports brilliant lines of great velocity and pulse, sweeping movement, punctuated harmonies, and a sustained and dramatically lyrical violin solo. The first movement also introduces a source harmony (C, E flat, G, B flat, D, F, A flat) that serves as a transition (without pause) into the second movement, becomes the principal harmonic pillar of that second movement and moreover, is the final harmony of the last movement. "The second movement is a broadly suspended Largo, with dark harmonies, a significantly dramatic French horn solo, and a consistently lamenting dramatic orchestral fabric. It is tragic in character. The third and final movement is a carefree, optimistic, lyrically soaring and dancing waltz (Presto) which derives from several historical streams... In short, my Third Symphony tries to honor traditionally expected elements of harmony, melody, pulse, thematic character, color, development, and the like; and it strives to endow these elements with personal character, continuity, and comprehensibility throughout."

– Kevin Scott, 2023