How about this beautiful Violin Concerto in B minor? - played by Gil Shaham, no less!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulzuzTUWtaE
Hmmm, I'm not sure there's much substance to it at first hearing, but FWIW here's Shor's Cello Concerto, also on YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhdHyRzkHJ4).
You're probably right. Nice, but not deep.
I'm with Alan & Mark, perfectly pleasant, but probably won't make anyone forget Beethoven. At the same time, isn't it delightful to hear something composed in this day and age, that doesn't sound like a plane crashing into a train wreck?! :o
That was my reason for posting about it!
... and to that extent I agree, of course. Shor has written extensively and many of his works are available on YouTube - here's his own list of them (https://alexeyshor.com/works/). There's also a Naxos CD of a couple of his orchestral pieces. The music all seems to be extremely approachable, with an almost classical clarity of texture, but judging by the two or three pieces I've heard there isn't much beneath this surface polish.
I was wondering if people had heard any more of this composer since he was last raised here. There seems to be rather a lot of controversy surrounding him, not least accusations of ghostwriting, and being a means of spreading malign Russian influence. I'm curious! If his work is ghost-written, or computer generated, then I'm not going to buy his CDs! His real name is apparently Alexey Vladimorovich Kononenko.
https://timesofmalta.com/article/many-passports-and-alias-mystery-orchestra-composer.1014534 (https://timesofmalta.com/article/many-passports-and-alias-mystery-orchestra-composer.1014534)
https://timesofmalta.com/article/malta-philharmonic-orchestra-ceo-defends-russian-backer-saying-hes.940959 (https://timesofmalta.com/article/malta-philharmonic-orchestra-ceo-defends-russian-backer-saying-hes.940959)
All I can add here is to advise caution, especially with regard to any allegations which might have been made about his music. For the time being I suggest that we stick to commenting on the music rather than engaging in speculation.
Returning to his compositions, they often sound to me like the sort of film music one hears all the time on ClassicFM here in the UK - i.e. attractive, but insubstantial. I'm not convinced there's anything here to get too excited about, either positively or negatively. If great claims were being made about his music, I'd be more concerned, but this doesn't seem to be the case.
Bizarrely, the day after my above post, an investigative journalist published a huge 36-page exposé into Shor in the online classical music Van Magazine, it's jaw-dropping.
https://van-magazine.com/mag/alexey-shor-kononenko-ishkhanov-russian-influence-classical-music/ (https://van-magazine.com/mag/alexey-shor-kononenko-ishkhanov-russian-influence-classical-music/)
...and inaccessible to non-subscribers, as far as I can see.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Monday 16 September 2024, 11:48...and inaccessible to non-subscribers, as far as I can see.
Hmmmm - I'm not a subscriber but I could open it. Possibly you've read other articles on there recently and there's a limit as to how many free ones you can open per month.
Perhaps you could copy and paste it in another post...
I can't access it either. And I certainly haven't read any articles on the site before.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Monday 16 September 2024, 17:47Perhaps you could copy and paste it in another post...
It's 36 pages long so would definitely exceed the character limit per post many times over. I can easily save it as a pdf and put up on mediafire and put the link here if of interest? (And it certainly is a very interesting if disturbing read.)
How about a summary - main points only? Or the final paragraph of the article...
I have a subscription to VAN magazine and have just tried copying and pasting the full text of the article, without illustrations, to see if I could make it fit in here. While this would work, I am loath to do it as it would be an infringement of copyright IMHO.
It sounds impractical to me, so unless someone has the time to make a summary of the article, I'd say let's wait until we can find another source or report.
Here's a thread from another online forum:
https://www.good-music-guide.com/community/index.php?topic=33425.0
Dear oh dear. Am happy to DM the article to anyone interested. I am still working (it's 22:15 here) so really wouldn't have time to precis an already-well-written article, sorry.
No hurry, of course. Thanks.
If you send me the article by PM I'll produce a summary.
Basically, the article reveals that:
(i) The music is has little substance (although there's little discussion of it);
(ii) The composer's influence stems from connections with Putin's Russia;
(iii) This influence not only facilitates the promotion of his own music but also serves as a propaganda tool of the Russian state;
(iv) His enormous wealth has enabled him to 'buy' the services of high-profile musicians.
Frankly, it's all very distasteful. A good way of registering our distaste might be to cease all discussion of his music.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Tuesday 17 September 2024, 10:25it's all very distasteful. A good way of registering our distaste might be to cease all discussion of his music.
Agreed.
Glad to see that Private Eye shares our view:
THE [sic] Yehudi Menuhin School in Surrey is famous for educating children of advanced musical
talent; and for the past two years it has had an "associate composer" called Alexey Shor, described
by the school's music director, pianist Ashley Wass, as an artist of "exceptional craftsmanship"
whose involvement with the school was an "exciting opportunity".
Not everyone would agree. A Times reviewer in January 2020 described Shor as a "self-taught
composer" writing "would-be melodious 19th-century pastiches lacking all guts and spine". But
there's more to it than banal music, as pointed out in a recent investigation by online magazine VAN.
"Shor" was actually born Alexey Kononenko in the old Soviet Union and grew up not as a musician
but as a mathematician and eventual hedge-fund analyst who made a great deal of money - which
he has since used to pay for performances of works composed in his spare time.
In 2014 Shor obtained Maltese citizenship, a standard way for Russians to gain access to the EU,
and got involved with Konstantin Ishkhanov, an oil and gas baron who set up something called the
European Foundation for Support of Culture (EFSC), based in Malta. This funded a Malta
International Festival - to which western critics were shipped out expecting something Maltese, only
to find it run by Russians, featuring Russian or Armenian artists who played interminable amounts
of music by yes, er... Alexey Shor.
With bizarre quantities of money splashing around for such a niche classical music event, and half
the audience arriving in dark glasses and black limousines, it was, to say the least, er, an
atmospheric event. Just over two years ago the EFSC relocated to Dubai under the name Classical
Music Development Initiative, from where it now promotes music competitions with immense
prizes as well as performances of music by Shor and concert tours by pianist Wass.
It's all most... unusual. The Yehudi Menuhin School might do well to reconsider the "exciting
opportunity" of its ongoing connection.
(from Issue No.1635, 25 October-7 November 2024, in the "Music & Musicians" column on page 20...I wonder who writes that column?)
Thanks, Christopher. It's all very murky and, musically, moribund. Best avoided.