An outcry. Crashing, dragging secondary note steps in the orchestra. Only quiet echoing. Nothing!

The cry in the orchestra is followed by a lonely lament from the violin. It begins with an upbeat e-f second step that widens to a third d-f and melancholically becomes a sad melody. A tapping motif can be heard softly in the percussion. The violin increases to F-sharp and concludes its melody in brightening C-sharp. Then a lonely bassoon melancholically continues the violin's melody. The violin insists sadly on its melancholy seconds, the oboe takes over the melody, typical figurations of the violin accompany it, push forward until a clarinet and then the horn also take over the second and third steps of this melody, whose mood testifies to a fundamental mournfulness of human life.  

The violin, however, resists all resignation and drives the musical events forward excitedly and in ever higher pitch.

Then a second outburst in the orchestra, even more violent than at the beginning; crashing figures in the horns and then in the trumpets dominate. Violent beats of the percussion conclude this outcry of the orchestra.

A slowly descending string chorus, accompanied by anxious violin figures, follows the sudden termination of this cry, spreads some calm and leads over to a Largo. The solo violin begins with a slow accompanying figure, above which a string phrase beginning in a delicate height slowly descends. The wearying melody is solemnly joined by a wind choir that also descends, but the excitement builds again. The violin rebels, fights its way forward, interrupted by an angry incoming trumpet, then a horn joins in, the whole orchestra dominates. The violin fights desperately against it. In a wild run of sixteenths, the violin - twice restarting - furiously charges ahead, a bell rings in the background, the violin suddenly breaks off. With great expression and molto cantabile, a serious song melody emerges in the strings, actually two melodies played over and with each other in an almost painful contrapuntal manner. Passionately rubbing against each other, both melodies lead to a climax of lamentation, bells ringing out in the middle of the full orchestra. A little later, the knocking motif from the beginning emerges violently and explodes. Intermission.

Now the solo violin takes over the song melody in pianissimo, sings inwardly while the violas play the counterpoint melody, and quietly exhausts itself on an F sharp. A solo cello unexpectedly plays the opening melody again, beginning e-f and d-f. Now the solo violin angrily interjects the glaring knocking motif, heightening it. But the bassoon also takes over the mourning melody of the beginning and, despite the violin's garish interjections, leads it to a beautifully luminous wind conclusion.

After a brief pause, the violin now begins a beautifully calm melody in slow syncopated triplets, reminiscent of the opening melody in its secondary structure; it is overpainted by an orchestral violin melody in the high register.  Again, bell sounds can be heard in the background. Two darkly coloured flutes take over the triplet melody, the violin plays short high melodic fragments to it. Then timpani and tambourine take over the rhythm and transform the triplet melody into a furious outcry.

Passionately, the violin stands up to all the desperately wild interjections of the various orchestral instruments with sweeping gestures. The violin fiercely defends its triplet melody against the individual voices of the orchestra. Only when the violin plays the slow melody on the G string a little later, after an outburst from the orchestra, does the orchestra seem to calm down. But in vain, the orchestra dominates and plunges into a new outburst of violence, which abruptly breaks off again. Emptiness.

A clarinet quietly restarts a descending motif, the solo violin tremulously throws in its motif, futile harp sounds, flutes repeat the violin's motif, but the orchestra ragingly asserts its dominance more and more. In the midst of the wild orchestra, the horn plays the melody of the beginning aggressively, twice almost tauntingly. Again, the violin fights against the events in increasing sixteen-figure runs, interrupted by violent orchestral beats, and finally all violence collapses again. Only a bell fades away quietly.