交响曲(symphony)
为管弦乐团写作的大型乐曲，通常由几个乐章组成。其名称在原古希腊语中为「数音同时和鸣」之意；在早期的义大利歌剧中是指器乐间奏，尤其是前奏的专门用语。在17世纪後期那不勒斯歌剧的前奏曲中，尤其是1680年前後史卡拉第的作品中，已经具有快-慢-快三个乐章的固定形式。很快的这类前奏曲在音乐会上被用於单独演奏，就好像交响曲的另一个前身大协奏曲那样。到18世纪初期，这类前奏曲和协奏曲已经在萨马尔蒂尼（G. B. Sammartini）的交响曲中被合并起来。1750年左右，德国和维也纳的作曲家们开始为其增加一个小步舞曲乐章。有「交响乐之父」之称的海顿在1755～1795年写了超过一百部交响曲，充满创意、激情和辉煌。从海顿开始，交响曲已被视为最重要的管弦乐队作品。莫札特写有三十五部富有创意的交响曲。贝多芬的九部交响曲注入了作曲家的气魄与雄心。此後重要的交响曲作曲家有：舒伯特、孟德尔颂、舒曼、布鲁克纳、布拉姆斯、德弗札克、柴可夫斯基和马勒。20世纪的後起之秀有：佛汉威廉士、西贝流士和萧士塔高维奇。
English version：
symphony
Long musical composition for orchestra, usually in several movements. The term (meaning “sounding together”) came to be the standard name for instrumental episodes, and especially overtures, in early Italian opera. The late-17th-century Neapolitan opera overture, or [italian]sinfonia, as established especially by Alessandro Scarlatti c. 1780, had three movements, their tempos being fast-slow-fast. Soon such overtures began to be performed by themselves in concert settings, like another forerunner of the symphony, the [italian]concerto grosso. The two merged in the early 18th century in the symphonies of G. B. Sammartini. Around 1750, German and Viennese composers began to add a minuet movement. Franz Joseph Haydn, the “father of the symphony,” wrote over 100 symphonies of remarkable originality, intensity, and brilliance in the years 1755-95; since Haydn, it has been regarded as the most important orchestral genre. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote about 35 original symphonies. Ludwig van Beethoven's nine symphonies endowed the genre with enormous weight and ambition. Later symphonists include Franz Schubert, Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Anton Bruckner, Johannes Brahms, Antonín Dvorak, Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, and Gustav Mahler; their 20th-century successors include Ralph Vaughan Williams, Jean Sibelius, and Dmitri Shostakovich.