This is a reduction for piano quintet of the composer's famous (or infamous) "Dollar Symphony," (Symphony no 6 in C, op 31). There is nothing about the style of the symphony that made gave it a particular reputation; in fact, it is a fairly gentle, conservative work.

He began this work in February of 1927 and after sketching a light-hearted thirty-measure section decided his ideas were suitable for a symphony. In November he heard that Columbia Records had announced a very lucrative composition prize. It was originally to go to the "best completion" of Schubert's "Unfinished" Symphony, timed to coincide with the centennial of Schubert's death in 1928. After this idea was derided as equivalent to musical sacrilege, Columbia changed the terms of the contest and offered the prize for the best symphony "in the spirit of" Schubert.

When Columbia changed the terms of the contest it set a later entrance deadline, giving Atterberg just enough time to complete this symphony and submit it in April 1928. When he won the grand prize, jealous writers and colleagues started calling the new work "The Dollar Symphony," and London critic Ernst Newman claimed Atterberg had appealed to the judges' national prejudices by quoting or borrowing from various works, including Stravinsky's Petrushka, which Atterberg said he had never heard at that time. (The instantwriter finds no such quotations.)

Sir Thomas Beecham premiered the symphony and made a Columbia recording of it in 1928, and in the same year Atterberg also conducted a recording of it made in Sweden. Although it received numerous performances, after World War II it was generally eclipsed by new trends in Swedish and international music.

But in the mean time Atterberg had sought to take advantage of its popularity by, in 1942, re-scoring it for piano quintet (piano and string quartet). It is a very convincing composition in this form, scarcely causing one to suspect that it originated in a different musical medium.

In reaction to Newman's article, Atterberg often stressed that the symphony and quintet are entirely original except for a quotation from a Schubert string quintet in the finale, included as homage to the great Austrian composer.

The first movement, Moderato, is a seriously-argued but good-natured sonata-allegro. It is not a highly dramatic movement, which makes it, if anything, even more effective in its quintet version.

The next movement, Adagio, is the only movement that is based on folk-like melodies and is charming.

For the finale, Atterberg turned to a sketch he had made treating an intentionally trivial theme in learned, fugal manner. He realized that this music (begun before hearing of the Columbia competition) would be precisely what the work required, as it could be adapted to poke fun at the "incitement to reactionary music-making" inherent in the competition rules. As such, it is sarcastic, but not bitter, and is an entertaining end to the work.



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