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High-class Russians since Scryabine

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Author Topic: High-class Russians since Scryabine  (Read 446 times)
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guest54
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« on: June 01, 2011, 07:54:08 am »

Knowing that many Members here entertain an admiration of the achievements of Scryabine and his followers, may I draw attention to a most interesting series which has recently become available on the Avax? It comprises at least eighteen CDs of Roslavets's things, and works of Shcherbachoff, Basner with his inspired lyricism and five quartettes, Falik, Amiroff the creator of the symphonic mugam, Zhivotoff, all the symphonies of Arapoff, Knipper, and Popoff, plus Protopopoff, Lourie, Mossoloff, Feynberg, and much more more recent.

What a lot there altogether is! perhaps its careful audition will turn Britain's present-day composers back to the path of virtue.
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Reiner Torheit
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« Reply #1 on: June 01, 2011, 09:02:08 am »

Lourie is worth investigation (I'm sure the others are too).  His career arch straddled meetings and alliances with many of the most influential figures of his era.  In the 1920s - when the soviet border was still open to all-comers- he went to Berlin to meet and study with Busoni.  He never subsequently returned to his job in Moscow as Head of Music at Lunacharsky's organisation of Soviet Arts. (Lunacharsky himself is another pivotal figure who fell foul of soviet blockheads).  Lourie subsequently worked extensively with Stravinsky as his assistant,  including preparing piano scores of Stravinsky's works for publication.

However, Lourie's subsequent emigration to the USA during WW2 (no doubt prompted by the Nazi invasion of Paris in 1941, where he was residing) was a flop, and put a blight on his remaining career.  His inventiveness and creativity seemed to fizzle out, in favour of attempted crowd-pleasing music which failed to please crowds.  He continued to compose, but his scores went unplayed.

The juiciest of Lourie's fruits - as is ever the way - hangs beguilingly beyond reach. His opera THE BLACKAMOOR OF PETER THE GREAT - based, allegedly, on Pushkin's work of the same name - has never been performed.  By some peculiar happenstance the Lourie archives- all of his compositions, sketches, correspondence etc - mysteriously transferred to Switzerland, where its alleged curators maintain a complete silence, and refuse to answer to correspondence.

The composer's younger relative Lev Lourié is a highly respected poet, author, and man of letters in St Petersburg. His writings on St Petersburg's cultural scene and local history during the "lost years" of soviet misrule are not only fascinating reading, but something of a high-point of distillation of literary style in Russian.  Given the Lourie family's friendships with Blok, Bunin, Mayakovsky and Pasternak,  this is really no surprise.
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autoharp
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« Reply #2 on: June 07, 2011, 11:56:28 am »

This looks to be a most interesting collection. Many thanks for the pointer.
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guest2
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« Reply #3 on: June 08, 2011, 07:31:00 am »

Welcome back Mr. A! It's good to see that both you and Mr. T are still around.
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