Music of the Russian Avant-Garde 1905-1926

[erato]

This is just to give notice to a new disc that may be of interest:

ROGER WOODWARD Music of the Russian Avant-Garde 1905-1926

1 Obukhov - Révélation - Le glas d'au de là 01:01
2 Obukhov - Révélation - La mort 01:15
3 Obukhov - Révélation - Néant 04:26
4 Obukhov - Révélation - Immortel 02:54
5 Obukhov - Révélation - La détrèsse de Satan 00:50
6 Obukhov - Révélation - Vérité 01:49
7 Aleksandr Skryabin - Feuillet d'album (1910) 01:53
8 Aleksandr Skryabin - Feuillet d'album (1905) 00:41
9 Julian Skryabin - Deux Préludes Op.3 - No. 1 00:39
10 Julian Skryabin - Deux Préludes Op.3 - No. 2 00:56
11 Julian Skryabin - Prélude 01:51
12 Pasternak - Two Preludes - Andante in G-sharp minor 04:08
13 Pasternak - Two Preludes - Con moto in E-flat minor 01:01
14 Mosolov - Two Nocturnes Op.15 - Elegiaco, poco stentato 02:53
15 Mosolov - Two Nocturnes Op.15 - Adagio 02:30
16 Roslavets - Trois compositions - Adagio nobilissimo 00:44
17 Roslavets - Trois compositions - Agitato con passione 00:46
18 Roslavets - Trois compositions - Allegretto grazioso 01:18
19 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - Désirée 00:52
20 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - Les ombres 00:47
21 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - L'ange noir 01:05
22 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - L'ambre sacrée 00:52
23 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - Inconnue 00:33
24 Obukhov - Six tableaux psychologiques - Esprits 00:37
25 Obukhov - Les astrales parlent 05:42
26 Obukhov - Reflet sinistre 06:09
27 Obukhov - Aimons-nous les uns les autres 02:05
28 Obukhov - Prières - No. 1 01:42
29 Obukhov - Prières - No. 2 03:27
30 Obukhov - Prières - No. 3 03:22
31 Obukhov - Prières - No. 4 01:15
32 Obukhov - Prières - No. 5 02:13
33 Obukhov - Prières - No. 6 00:52
34 Stanchinskiy - Prélude V 01:49
35 Stanchinskiy - Prelude and Fugue in G minor - Prélude 03:35
36 Stanchinskiy - Prelude and Fugue in G minor - Fugue 02:04
37 Stanchinskiy - Canon in B minor (1908) 00:57

With the artistically, politically and socially fascinating period of transition from Tsarist Russia to the Soviet Union, Stalin is the source of the works on Roger Woodward's new recording Music of the Russian Avant-Garde (1905-1926).

After Woodward's successful re-release of preludes and fugues by Shostakovich from 1975, here follows a new recording in a review of little-known compositions that Woodward had not attended to since his student days in Warsaw in the early '70s. At that time, he succeeded in getting access to rare works, often almost lost, from the hands of Lina Prokofieva, Prokofiev's widow, and the archives of Polish Radio.

These include three exquisite preludes by the son of Alexander Skryabin, Julian, who composed these shortly before his death after eleven years as a prolific composer. Until his studies in philosophy at Marburg Phillips University in 1909, Boris Pasternak who is better known as the author of Dr. Zhivago, was mainly active as a composer.

This is music with the greatest conceivable span, from echoes of the late Romantic period to an anticipation of the later contemporary music in Western Europe with elements of Russian sacred music of the Znamenny-singing and synthetic chords (sintetakkord), as in the work of Roslavets and influences of esoteric schools of thought, as they had come to be expressed in the theosophical ideas of the time.

The recital includes works by Nikolai Obukhov (1892-1954), Aleksandr Skryabin (1872-1915), Julian Skryabin (1908-1919), Boris Pasternak (1890-1960), Aleksandr Mosolov (1900-1973), Nikolai Roslavets (1881-1944) and Aleksei Stanchinskiy (1888-1914).

As an author, Woodward's essay gives a good insight into the life and art of the time.



Celestial Harmonies 132552

[chill319]

Jenny Lin has recorded a similar disk, "Preludes to a Revolution," including works by Stanchinsky, Anatoli Alexandrov, Oboukov, Ivan Wyschnegradsky, Feinberg, and Roslavetz. They're all fine miniaturists in the Scriabin mold. (And Lin plays them as well as anyone could, I think.) I find the works by Oboukov particularly imaginative, which makes the generous selection of his music on the Woodward disc here very tempting indeed.

[Alan Howe]

There are so many inaccuracies in this description -- they defy belief!

I'm afraid this is not really a very helpful response. If there are inaccuracies, please correct them!