Summary: In addition to illuminating these works through reception history, musical analysis, manuscript studies, and the composers' own writings, the dissertation will address three interrelated topics in each chapter. First, I explore how the bande a Franck understood the concept of "serious" music, and how this conception shaped Third Republic attitudes about orchestral genres, absolute music, and program music. Second, I examine how French composers responded to the legacy of Wagner in non-theatrical genres. Finally, I discuss how these four musicians fashioned a cultural, national, and personal identity through---and sometimes in tension with---their orchestral works.