On today’s date in 1993, the American composer Daniel Asia conducted the Phoenix Symphony in the premiere performance of his Symphony No. 4. The work included a slow movement, written as an orchestral elegy for Asia’s friend and composer colleague, Stephen Albert, who had died in a car crash the previous year.

But Asia cast his symphony in the traditional four-movements familiar from the symphonies of Haydn and Beethoven. And, as in the symphonies of Haydn and Beethoven, Asia left room for a wide range of emotions—including humor. So, in addition to a slow, elegiac movement, Asia’s Symphony has a second movement Scherzo, with a traditional, but jaunty and very American-sounding trio section.

“In this piece,” writes Asia, “I was rediscovering old formal ideas, and perhaps laying bare the primary motivic ideas and their development. The second movement is a true scherzo. There are refractions of Beethoven scherzos, but sometimes a beat is chopped off, creating a skipping effect. Also everything is in threes in the trio-section; the harmony is three-voiced, and the instrumentation is also in threesomes.”

For three years, during 1991-1994, the American composer Daniel Asia served as composer-in-residence with the Phoenix Symphony, a residency funded by Meet the Composer. As both composer and conductor, Daniel Asia has been meeting with a number of major American orchestras for coast-to-coast performances of his orchestral works, ranging from his hometown Seattle Symphony to the American Composers Orchestra in New York.