This work resulted from a commission to Leonard Bernstein for a piece for the centennial celebration of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1980. Bernstein had studied at the Symphony's summer institute at Tanglewood and served as conducting assistant to conductor Serge Koussevitsky. Divertimento is an expression of his fondness for the city of his youth and its symphony. The piece is a series of vignettes based on two notes – B for Boston and C for Centennial – and most are dances of varying types. The opening movement was originally intended to be the entire composition, but Bernstein expanded it to accommodate the numerous motives that came to him on the B and C theme. (The first movement's title, Sennets and Tuckets, by the way, is a Shakespearean stage direction for fanfares.) Throughout