The first performance of this work in 1935 caused a sensation, and Universal Edition snatched it up at once, signing a contract that same year. The piece has since firmly established itself in the concert repertoire. (It is still a mystery why Georges Bizet, who wrote it when he was 17, hid it away in a drawer and told no one about it). The music has more in common with Mozart and Rossini than with any French models; its last movement contains hints of Schumann's 2nd Symphony, composed five years earlier. The dance-like element of Bizet’s symphony inspired Georges Balanchine to create one his most successful choreographies.