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}} ''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 in 1938, in a radio broadcast from a New York studio attended by an invited audience, conducted by Arturo Toscanini, who also took the piece on tour to Europe and South America. Its reception was generally positive, with Alexander J. Morin writing that ''Adagio for Strings'' is "full of pathos and cathartic passion" and that it "rarely leaves a dry eye."〔 The music is the setting for Barber's 1967 choral arrangement of ''Agnus Dei''. ''Adagio for Strings'' can be heard in many TV shows and movies. == History == Barber's ''Adagio for Strings'' began as the second movement of his String Quartet, Op. 11, composed in 1936 while he was spending a summer in Europe with his partner Gian Carlo Menotti, an Italian composer who was a fellow student at the Curtis Institute of Music. The inspiration came from Virgil's ''Georgics''. In the quartet the ''Adagio'' follows a violently contrasting first movement (''Molto allegro e appassionato'') and is succeeded by music which opens with a brief reprise of the music from the first movement (marked ''Molto allegro (come prima) – Presto'').〔 〕 In January 1938 Barber sent an orchestrated version of the ''Adagio for Strings'' to Arturo Toscanini. The conductor returned the score without comment, which annoyed Barber. Toscanini then sent word through Menotti that he was planning to perform the piece and had returned it simply because he had already memorized it.〔 〕 It was reported that Toscanini did not look at the music again until the day before the premiere.〔 〕 On November 5, 1938, a selected audience was invited to Studio 8H in Rockefeller Center to watch Toscanini conduct the first performance, a radio broadcast which was recorded for posterity. Initially, the critical reception was positive, as seen in the review by ''The New York Timess Olin Downes. Downes praised the piece, but he was reproached by other critics who claimed that he overrated the piece.〔 〕 Toscanini took ''Adagio for Strings'' on tour to South America and Europe, the first performances of the work on both continents. Over April 16–19, 1942, the piece had public performances by the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by Eugene Ormandy at Carnegie Hall. Like the original 1938 performance, these were broadcast on radio and recorded. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Adagio for Strings」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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