Jurjans' Symphonic Allegro

[Mark Thomas]

Thank you so much, Latvian, for the upload of Jurjans' Symphonic Allegro. This is what UC is all about, discovering through someone else's kindness an unknown but enjoyable work from a formerly totally unknown (to me at least) composer. A welcome reward after a couple of rather trying days. It's a surprisingly Beethovenian sound-world, though, given it's date and Latvia's place in the Russian Empire at the time.

[Alan Howe]

How fascinating to hear this music. A great upload: thanks so much. As Mark suggests, the piece seems to owe quite a lot to Beethoven (Symphony no.7 - first movement) in the same way as the Hungarian Beliczay's Symphony in D minor is indebted to Beethoven's 9th (first movement). A reminder, perhaps, of a shared musical heritage before nationalism took things in a different direction. Wonderful!

[Christo]

One thing remains inexplicable. Andrejs Jurjāns is acceptible, as a clearly Romantic composer. But from now on, everything he started - the whole Latvian 'national' school of composers, from
Jāzeps Vītols, Alfrēds Kalniņš and Jānis Mediņš all the way up to Imants Kalniņš and Pēteris Vasks, is excluded from this forum.

An effectual ban on almost all Latvian music then (and for that matter, Finnish, Estonian, Lithuanian, Irish, Icelandic, Ukrainian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Turkish, Chinese, Japanese, Australian, and Latin-American ASO music).

[Alan Howe]

Sorry, but this is both off-topic and factually inaccurate. I can't see why you might imagine that we would exclude a Latvian composer such as Vitols (or Ivanovs), nor why we might exclude (from the nationalities you mention) such composers as Tobias and Kapp A. (Estonian), Kajanus, Pingoud, Merikanto (early), Madetoja and Melartin (Finnish), Ciurlionis (Lithuanian), Field, Stanford, Harty (Irish), Sveinbjörnsson (Icelandic), Glière (Ukrainian), Caudella, Enescu (Romanian), Alfred Hill (Australian).

[Christo]

As a music lover for whom there is no useful boundary between 'Romantic' and Neoclassical music, these happen to be names I've been living with for quite a while, many thanks for reminding me of them.  However, I don't think Madetoja and Enescu would qualify, given your criteria. And Glière isn't Ukrainian but - culturally speaking - a Russian (notwithstanding his Belgian name). 

Actually, your little exposé - many thanks for that - helps underlying my point here: by mentioning the few odd names that could fit the 'Romanticism' criterium, you make clear that the vast majority of composers from these national schools don't qualify. However, that makes for a completely arbitrary dividing line, seperating the 'Romantic' founding fathers from their pupils and often more professional successors, thereby exluding most of the national schools from outside Central and Western Europe from this forum.

[Alan Howe]

Well, we aren't really interested in national schools as such, but in the range of music that might usefully come under the heading "Romantic". We would certainly disagree about the exclusion of Enescu and Madetoja - we'll be including them as late, late Romantics. I imagine we would probably admit Jazeps Medins (1877-1947) as well - he is described as a late Romantic here:
http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Jazeps+Medins
So, although we are drawing a boundary, it's one that makes sense to listeners who want to hear predominantly consonant, tuneful, beautiful music. Medins' Symphony No.2, for example, may have been written in 1937, but it could easily have come from 20-30 years before...

[JimL]

...Medins' Symphony No.2, for example, may have been written in 1937, but it could easily have come from 20-30 years before...

His 3rd as well.

[Alan Howe]

Thanks, Jim. Let's return to Jurjans...

[Latvian]

I'm glad you enjoyed this work. I hadn't listened to it myself for a couple of years, but when I ha ppened to click on my MP3 file for background music while sitting at my work desk this morning, I was reminded of what an enjoyable and accessible piece it was. What better way than to inaugurate the new Downloads section?

In response to comments in this thread, Jazeps Vitols was most certainly a Romantic composer. Even though he lived to 1948, hardly any traces of 20th Century developments crept into his style. He was, however, a solidly-trained, brilliantly imaginative composer who wrote much memorable music. Indeed, I would certainly include many other Latvian composers.

While painfully disappointed by recent developments on this board, I have to recognize that this is indeed a labor of love for the moderators, and if the board had strayed too far from their passions, then they are certainly within their rights in redirecting it (although the transition could have been handled more elegantly). After all, running the board is on their time, and on their dime.

For the record, after a lifetime of collecting (45 years) and having found many "treasure troves" of music over the years, I still believe that UC in its previous state has been the single most valuable resource I've ever encountered. The scope of my familiarity with "unsung" composers has been broadened vastly (and it was already quite extensive, I thought!). I hope that Sydney Grew's board will complement UC with a broader range of music more in line with my interests. But I will continue to frequent UC, participate in discussions, and upload and download music here, because I dearly love Romantic music as well. I believe there is still much of value here, and the potential for a great deal more, within the new parameters.

[Latvian]

Pardon my digression in the previous post. Perhaps it should have been said in a different thread. It occurred to me after I'd hit the Post button that I never finished my comments on Jurjans:

Mark and Alan mentioned Jurjans' debt to Beethoven. This is very much in line with life in Latvia in the 19th Century. Though occupied by the Russian Empire since the late 1700s, there was still a very substantial German merchant class in Latvia in the 19th Century, to the extent that German culture was probably more prevalent and pervasive in the region than Russian. The earliest native composers of Latvian music, Janis Cimze and his brother Davis Cimze, were the first to incorporate Latvian melodies in their compositions (predominantly choral music), but their styles were still very heavily influenced by German music. I've performed much of their music over the years, and while it has a great deal of Latvian flavor, and I love hearing, singing, and conducting it, I have to admit that it's still very Germanic in its treatment of Latvian ethnic musical material, and somewhat primitive in its expressive of the Latvian ethos. But, it was a start, and a very important one, and it was in that climate that Jurjans took things a step further, drawing somewhat closer to a sense of "Latvian-ness" in his style. It really wasn't until the Russian-trained Jazeps Vitols came on the scene that Latvian music realized its full potential as a cultural force in the Latvian Awakening that led to eventual political independence.

Wonderful music, nonetheless. I'll try to post more of Jurjans' music soon, since this work went over so well.

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks once again for the upload and in particular for all the background on the artistic situation in Latvia in Jurjans' time. I'm also especially grateful for your understanding of our position. For what its worth I agree that the transition was too abrupt and indeed it was my intention for it to be a more gradual process but, without going into detail, our hand was forced and we felt that we had little choice but to make the change straight away to protect the forum's content.

[TerraEpon]

I guess with the limit on both what's able to be posted and WHO is able to be, it means I can at least DL everything now rather than having strict limits...

[Alan Howe]

Thanks, Latvian, for the fascinating background to Jurjans. If you have anything that might enlighten us further as to compositions by the composers we would be interested in, we would certainly like to hear from you.

[Christopher]

I love this piece, thank you very much for uploading it.  Is anyone else getting Schumann's Manfred overture, at least at the beginning?  I am anyway.  Good things obviously happen in threes - I was in Latvia two weeks ago and I bought a CD called Highlights of Latvian Classics, which contains two pieces by Jurjans - Barcarola (1907) and Achikop (1894) - both very pleasant pieces.

[isokani]

Dear Latvian
I am very pleased to hear this piece of Jurjans at last. I had heard about it many years ago when researching the roots of Latvian art music. And it's tantalising to think this would have been the first Latvian symphony, but the composer found other things to do.

On a related but slightly different topic. Vitols did become quite neo-classical in his later works, such as the piano sonatina op.64, but I would agree that this, and other later pieces, are not exactly heavily influenced by modernist contemporary trends.