On September 5, 1857, Franz Liszt's "Faust Symphony" was premiered in Weimar, Germany, during the dedication of the Goethe and Schiller Monument. In this choral symphony, inspired by Goethe's "Faust," Liszt creates musical portraits of the three main protagonists: Faust, Gretchen, and Mephistopheles. "I think most musicians would agree with me that this Faust Symphony is one of the monumental works of the whole Romantic Movement." -Leonard Bernstein, Young People's Concerts: Liszt and the Devil,

On 9/9, we share with you Leonard Bernstein’s examination of the superstition surrounding “Ninth” symphonies. What's your favorite Ninth? In an introductory trailer to his Dmitri Shostakovich 9th Symphony performance with the Vienna Philharmonic / Wiener Philharmoniker, distributed by Deutsche Grammophon, Bernstein explains how Shostakovich “thumbed his nose” at the tradition of Ninth symphonies of the great composers. "The mystique of the number nine exerted itself in an odd way, so typical of