The work is scored for two
flutes, two
oboes, two
clarinets, two
bassoons, four
horns, two
trumpets, three
trombones,
timpani, and the usual
strings. The 1851 (published) version of the work is in four movements which follow each other without pause: Schumann's biographer Peter Ostwald comments that this earlier version is "lighter and more transparent in texture" than the revision, but that Clara "always insisted that the later, heavier, and more stately version [of 1851] was the better one.". Both
Bernard Shore and
Donald Tovey wrote analyses of the symphony and preferred the earlier orchestration while noting the improved integration of the revision, suggesting that the revised structure could profitably be paired with the original scoring as far as possible. Schumann's deficiencies as a conductor led to him doubling entries between parts, so that the score became "playable but opaque". The symphony is highly integrated for its time, with thematic material recurring between movements. The slow introduction to the first movement reappears early in the second movement, and then has a violin
arabesque based on it. A modification of this arabesque then appears in the trio section of the scherzo. The slow introduction to the finale and its main opening theme incorporate phrases from the main theme of the first movement, in different tempi. Dramatic chords from the first movement also reappear in the finale. Tovey described the overall structure as "possibly Schumann's greatest and most masterly conception". Schumann may also have borrowed a melody that appears in the first and fourth movements from the continuous string accompaniment for "
Siehe! wir preisen selig" ("
Happy and blest are they"), the final chorus in scene one of
Felix Mendelssohn's oratorio "
St. Paul," a work which Schumann praised in a letter dated March 2, 1839. ==Notes==