1 of 9 out of 104: Salmanov's Symphony No. 1 in D minor

To celebrate my new Smashwords book 104 Great Symphonies You Haven't Heard Yet, in which I list 104 great Symphonies outside the core repertoire of overplayed works and describe them in 104 words or less, I will be presenting in this blog a write-up on each of the first 9 Symphonies listed in the book with far more detail, and oriented more for musicologists and performers than for listeners. Today's installment is #1 in the list of 104.

Vadim Salmanov, Symphony No. 1 in D minor

Salmanov wrote three more Symphonies after his first, of which the Second seems to have achieved at least a small degree of popularity at one point.
In the Soviet Union, there was an expectation on symphonists to deliver "social realism," though graduation pieces (such as First Symphonies), were exempt. It may not be too difficult to nevertheless read social realism into Salmanov's First Symphony.
To my mind, the beginning is a cold winter day in Russia. The mood is not so much tragedy nor Sturm und Drang as it is an almost elemental determination to survive. The slow movement is a kind of slow march. The finale arrives at a well done, triumphant but not over the top conclusion. Note the motivic integration throughout.
A concert ending with this Symphony would do well to start out with Antonio Salieri's Les Danaïdes Overture and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Concerto in D minor, K. 466, in the first half. Or maybe Salmanov in the first half, Salieri and Mozart in the second half.