Brahms: Symphony No. 3

Franz Welser-Möst conducts The Cleveland Orchestra in a performance of Brahms' Symphony No. 3. A late-romantic treasure, this work demonstrates the evolution of the composer's modest symphonic output, balancing the brightness of his Second Symphony with the monumentality of his Fourth Symphony. Strangely enough, even though the Third reaches several glorious outpourings of massed winds and strings, the work ends in pianissimo, leaving the listener taken aback, reflective rather than jubilant.