Chamber music by Leonid Sabaneyev

[Alan Howe]

Here's an intriguing new release of music for piano trio by Leonid Sabaneyev (1881-1968):
http://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/Leonid-Sabaneev-1881-1968-Klaviertrios/hnum/4917010

[britishcomposer]

I think part of this has already been broadcast - perhaps a co-production with some radio station - but I missed it.

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Isn't Sabaneyev the chap who earned himself a notorious reputation in music history by publishing a review in the press of a new piece by Prokofiev the day following a scheduled concert....but unknown to him the concert had been unexpectedly cancelled? Tee hee!!!

Somewhere - but I've quite forgotten where - the incident gained a place in a novel. Anyone know which one?

[eschiss1]

Sounds vaguely like Schoenberg, who responded to what seems to have been a hack review of some early works of his and his pupils, from someone who apparently hadn't caught on to the fact that some of the works in the concert he was reviewing had been changed at the last minute, with pointed sarcasm...

[Alan Howe]

Isn't Sabaneyev the chap who earned himself a notorious reputation in music history by publishing a review in the press of a new piece by Prokofiev the day following a scheduled concert....but unknown to him the concert had been unexpectedly cancelled? Tee hee!!!

Somewhere - but I've quite forgotten where - the incident gained a place in a novel. Anyone know which one?

The very man! No idea which novel though...

[San-ia-Soone]

How interesting! I can't hear any Schoenberg influence here. There may be some harmonic traits, but obviously cannot be any inner connection -- there is nothing more different than Schoenberg and Sabaneyev. There is an article by him about his own musical philosophy ("The Composer-Critic" in Musical Times, 1927). Isn't he right when he says "A resemblance even between some of the elements of the harmonic lexicon cannot in this case be indicative, since the psychology of creative work does not depend on them at all. In the classical period, of course, all the composers used approximately the same harmonic colours, but nobody could therefore assert their mutual creative solidarity."

[petershott@btinternet.com]

Isn't he right.....? Well I, for one, can't answer that question since I've got no idea what it means!

I'm currently working out my response to this new CD of the Trios that arrived yesterday. What does rather put me off are the notes in the CD booklet. Utterly pretentious facile drivel I'm afraid. The account of the 1923-24 Trio - titled for reasons that aren't at all clear 'Sonata for Piano, Violin and Cello' - ends up thus:

"As a result, this work lies at the extreme outer limits beyond which no more art is possible and only the endless night of nameless terror waits."

So now you know!

This kind of balderdash is no way to sell a CD of possibly interesting music.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Who has perpetrated this twaddle? Or does he not dare to give his name?!

[petershott@btinternet.com]

One Chaim Farschele is the perpetrator. And you have my assurance that if you care to read the whole booklet far far worse awaits you. Can't resist one bit. Again, writing of the same work we get:

"Threnodies of the strings seek despairingly to rise above the formless depths of blackly swirling masses of sound, but are interrupted again and again by powerful surges of unsettling brutality. The formal strictness of this gigantic work, with its three themes, its three-part fprmal layout and its powerful triple fugue exactly at its mid-point is also the expression of a pitiless implacability from which there can be no escape. The few gentle insertions - ethereal sounds of seraphic euphony - are no more than mirages in the sea of despair, sensory illusions in the apocalypse of the present: the expected catastrophe has arrived and has effortlessly surpassed the wildest expectations. The times are marked by unprecendented cruelty and lawlessness with millions of people perishing through wars and starvation. Annihilation is final and complete."

How about that! And all in a piano trio. Haydn clearly didn't know what he was starting.

[Dundonnell]

That made me smile (in horror, of course ).

I have sent the quotation on to Malcolm MacDonald-whose cd booklet notes are always models of both good English and informative detail-because I thought it would amuse him too

[Mark Thomas]

Oh, Peter, you've made my little day! "Pitiless implacability", "mirages in the sea of despair", "seraphic euphony". What fun, and all over a piano trio!

[JimL]

One Chaim Farschele is the perpetrator. And you have my assurance that if you care to read the whole booklet far far worse awaits you. Can't resist one bit. Again, writing of the same work we get:

"Threnodies of the strings seek despairingly to rise above the formless depths of blackly swirling masses of sound, but are interrupted again and again by powerful surges of unsettling brutality. The formal strictness of this gigantic work, with its three themes, its three-part fprmal layout and its powerful triple fugue exactly at its mid-point is also the expression of a pitiless implacability from which there can be no escape. The few gentle insertions - ethereal sounds of seraphic euphony - are no more than mirages in the sea of despair, sensory illusions in the apocalypse of the present: the expected catastrophe has arrived and has effortlessly surpassed the wildest expectations. The times are marked by unprecendented cruelty and lawlessness with millions of people perishing through wars and starvation. Annihilation is final and complete."

And that's just the scherzo movement! > <

[Gareth Vaughan]

Annihilation is final and complete.

Where Chaim Farschele is concerned, let us fervently hope so!

[JimL]

They probably found the poor feller hanging after his next liner note project. 

[San-ia-Soone]

Isn't he right.....? Well I, for one, can't answer that question since I've got no idea what it means!

Well it means that when you hear a Schoenberg-like chord you can't say that it is the Schoenberg-like style

I'm currently working out my response to this new CD of the Trios that arrived yesterday. What does rather put me off are the notes in the CD booklet. <...>
This kind of balderdash is no way to sell a CD of possibly interesting music.

I agree, the annotations are... exaggerated (not to say more). The Sonate Op. 20 (or Second Trio) was performed in December, 1924 by Sabaneyev himself and two members of the Russian Beethoven Quartet. There was an article by Sabaneyev for this concert. Maybe his own characteristics would be more suitable than the revelations of mr. Chaim Farschele

The article is here: http://www.sendspace.com/file/9w5wc7
(however, there is a mistake in translation on p. 433: should be "bewitched by apollonism" instead of "satanism").

I can't wait for your own review for the pieces.