Leonard Bernstein's second symphony is unusual in its instrumentation as it is written for symphony orchestra and solo piano. Bernstein comments on this, saying, "Auden’s fascinating and hair-raising Eclogue had already begun to affect me lyrically when I first read it in the summer of 1947. From that moment, the composition of a symphony based on The Age of Anxiety acquired an almost compulsive quality...I imagine that the conception of a symphony with piano solo emerges from the extreme personal identification of myself with the poem. In this sense, the pianist provides an almost autobiographical mirror in which he sees himself, analytically in the modern ambiance. The work is therefore no concerto, in the virtuosic sense...The essential line of the poem (and the music) is the record of