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Reinhold GLIERE (1875-1956)
The Gliere Orchestral Collection
CD 1
Symphony No. 3 in B minor, Op. 42 Ilya Muromets (1911) [78:08]
CD 2
Symphony No. 2 in C minor, Op. 25 (1907) [45:54]
The Zaporozhy Cossacks, Op. 64 (1921) [18:06]
CD 3
Symphony No. 1 in E flat, Op. 8 (1900) [34:18]
Suite from The Red Poppy, Op. 70 (1927) [26:14]
CD 4
Suite from The Bronze Horseman (1949) [46:14]
Horn Concerto, Op. 91 (1950) [23:55]
CD 5
Overture: Gyul’sara (1936) [16:58]
Concert Waltz, Op. 90 [5:59]
Overture: Shakh-Senem (1925) [15:57]
Ballad, Op. 4, arr. Derzhanovsky [5:43]
Overture on Slavonic Themes [9:42]
Heroic March for the Buryiat-Mongolian ASSR, Op. 71 (1936) [11:12]
Overture: Holiday at Ferghana, Op. 75 (1940) [9:05]
Peter Dixon (cello) Richard Watkins (horn) BBC Philharmonic/Sir Edward Downes, Vassily Sinaisky (CD 5)
rec. Manchester 1991-96.
Full track-list at end of review
CHANDOS CHAN10679(5)X [5 CDs: 78:08 + 64:09 + 60:40 + 70:16
+ 75:30]
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Reinhold Glière is a really fascinating composer. His interest
in folk music, considerable teaching abilities (Prokofiev, Khachaturian,
Mosolov, Knipper and Miaskovsky were among his pupils), willingness
to tow ‘the party line’ in terms of music ideology and avoidance
of involvement in the post-revolution disputes between the Association
of Contemporary Music (ACM) and the Russian Association of Proletarian
Musicians (RAPM), kept him out of trouble with the Soviet authorities
throughout his life, unlike so many others. Born on 11 January
1875 (30 December1874 by the old calendar) in Kiev to a father
of German descent and a mother of Polish origin, Glière changed
the spelling of his name from Glier in 1900, giving rise to
the erroneous myth that he was of Belgian extraction. Though
his father was an instrument-maker he did not want his son to
study music, preferring him to become a doctor. Having insisted
on his choice, he enrolled at the Moscow Conservatoire and was
taught, among others, by Arensky, Ippolitov-Ivanov and Taneyev.
Graduating in 1900 he accepted a teaching post at the Gnesin
School of Music where the 11 year-old Prokofiev was in his class.
Because of his interest in folk music he was often called upon
to go to some of the far-flung regions of the USSR to assist
local composers “create” a national musical style. Of course,
it had to fit the socialist realist remit of “art that serves
the people” mostly meaning that it should be readily understood
by all sections of the people and be uncomplicated in its rhythmic
style. Above all, it must be completely devoid of any “formalistic
tendencies”, therefore not avant-garde. In this capacity he
visited both Azerbaijan to develop the first prototype of an
Azerbaijani national opera from which emerged his Shakh-Senem,
since considered the cornerstone of the Soviet-Azerbaijani
opera tradition (!), and Uzbekistan, where he worked alongside
Uzbek composer Talib Sadykov, producing the overture Gyul’sara
and the opera Leyli va Medzhnun. He was the recipient
of three awards before the Revolution and many afterwards, including
from Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan and several Stalin prizes. Here
was a man who knew how to keep his musical nose clean. However,
this does not mean that his music is unworthy of exposure. It
should be remembered that it was the storm of protest from the
cultural watchdogs, including Stalin himself following the premiere
of Shostakovich’s ‘Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk’ that eventually
led to the composition of his 5th symphony, subtitled
“a Soviet artist’s reply to just criticism” which has since
become his most popular work throughout the world.
This boxed set of Glière’s orchestral music is a great opportunity
for those to whom his name is little known to discover some
tremendous music of great power and beauty.
The first CD in the set offers a great recording of Glière’s
most well-known work, his Symphony No.3 Ilya Muromets.
In the 12th century it was Ilya Muromets who was
chosen to defend the Kievan Rus, the cradle of the modern nations
of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, from the Tatar invaders. The
legend has it that Ilya, a farmer’s son, was lame until the
age of 33 when two gods, disguised as pilgrims came to tell
him he was cured and to rise and assume the role of a bogatyr
(knight-errant) and set forth to defend the land. The character,
however, is said to have been based on a real warrior who lived
c.1150-1204 and who was made a saint. The symphony is a huge
musical canvas requiring fourfold woodwind, eight horns, five
trumpets and an elaborate percussion section. The accompanying
booklet makes the interesting point that whilst the other two
huge symphonies of the early years of the new century, Rachmaninov’s
Second (begun in 1907) and Scriabin’s Third “The Divine Poem”
(1903) were introverted works full of Rachmaninov’s own gloom
and Scriabin’s strange and very personal philosophy, Glière’s
symphony is an arm’s-length telling of a story full of fantastical
landscapes, gods and evil giants. The first movement tells of
Ilya’s transformation from indolence to knight and his seeking
out of the god Svyagotor who, as Ilya’s mentor, gives Ilya his
own super-human strength before expiring. Ilya then gallops
on towards Kiev. The movement is an introduction to Glière’s
brilliant use of the orchestra that is evident throughout his
output. He was a wonderful tunesmith who had a incredible facility
for producing lush orchestration that moves the story on in
an almost ‘Hollywoodian’ fashion – he would certainly have been
in great demand had he ever been able to work there. This music
could not be anything else but Russian; it has so many of the
musical threads that underline its Russianness: I use ‘Russian’
in its widest sense since Glière was Ukrainian. Muted strings
and contrabassoon describe Ilya’s inertia before an upward turn
in the music, accompanied by harps, herald the two gods’ appearance
and the first big climax sees Ilya off on his way to find Svyagotor
and then onward to defend the Kievan Rus. The meeting with Svyagotor
is accompanied by martial music that then forges forward to
the second great climax to show the god’s passing on of his
strength to Ilya who then gallops off towards Kiev. It seems
that all heroes have to be tested while on their quests and
Ilya is no exception. The third movement (part II) concerns
his meeting with Nightingale the Robber, a strange name for
what is in fact an ogre who is bent on destroying anyone who
chances upon him and who resorts to using his beautiful daughters
as bait. Ilya, however, is made of considerably stronger stuff
and turns the tables on Nightingale, who uses a fearfully sounding,
piercing whistle to kill his victims. Ilya ends up trailing
him behind his horse, having shot an arrow into his right eye.
All these events are brilliantly conjured up in some truly vivid
music beginning with low woodwind and strings playing near the
bridge to produce the effect of a cold, desolate landscape.
Into this nightmarish world Ilya appears heralded by distant
fanfares and Nightingale’s daughters begin their attempts to
beguile Ilya not only with their beauty but gold, silver and
pearls - all to no avail as our hero is resistant to all such
attempts to seduce him. This is a man on a mission and the wiles
of these fantastical characters are not going to interfere.
The music here is lush in the extreme bringing comparisons with
Scriabin’s Divine Poem. This then gives way to some powerful
blasts from the brass section to signal the final struggle with
the terrible Nightingale and Ilya’s triumph over him and we
leave the frightening forest that remains so even without its
ogre. What a contrast we now have at the Court of Vladimir the
Mighty Sun. The music radiates regal pomp as well as warmth
as a festive scene is depicted before horns and cellos herald
Ilya’s arrival and his felling of the proudest of the princes
with Nightingale’s whistle before slicing off the robber’s head.
It was interesting to read David Nice’s assessment of this section
which he writes strikes the first truly Russian note in the
symphony while I felt it had that identifying stamp from the
word go. I certainly agree with him when he says that this movement
is one that Rimsky-Korsakov or Glazunov would have been proud
to have claimed as their own. It is further proof, I think,
that Glière has been unjustifiably overlooked when compared
to them.
The climax of this massive symphony comes in two parts depicting
Ilya’s heroic deeds and his demise. Firstly he and his bogatyrs
battle for twelve days against the Tatars in a mighty swirl
of sound that incorporates Ilya’s theme from the first movement
and then a new, noble melody signifying that Ilya and his men
are triumphant. However, as the old saying goes “pride goes
before a fall” and in their celebrations the victors shout that
there is no army either earthly or heavenly that they could
not destroy. They are humbled by the two ‘pilgrims’ that first
sent Ilya out on his quest. They are part of a celestial army
which appears and against which the bogatyrs struggle in vain.
They are vanquished in a battle that leaves the army obliterated
and Ilya turned to stone. The wall of sound that underpins these
events is truly monumental in scale and every element of the
huge orchestral forces is brought to bear to depict them. The
final defeat of the bogatyrs sounds like the hammers of hell
might well sound with Ilya’s theme ‘leaking’ out from under
it to emphasise the weight of the forces brought to bear against
him and his warriors. Eventually the music slows and low-playing
strings and brass bring the dark nature of the end into focus.
The symphony is over. There cannot be many other instances in
the history of music in which a story is so vividly portrayed
and one cannot fail to be in awe at Glière’s ability to tell
the story so brilliantly. I really hope this issue helps bring
this symphony out of the shadows and into the light it so richly
deserves.
The above sentiment goes for the other works in this set because
anyone who doesn’t know Glière’s music and is tempted to think
that he may have been a ‘one trick pony’ is easily disabused
by the second disc which contains two works: Symphony no.2 and
The Zaporozhy Cossacks. His Second Symphony, written
in 1908, is as lavishly scored as the one just examined. It
was a commission from Serge Koussevitzky, who had recently migrated
from being a double-bassist to conductor and publisher. It begins
with portentous sounds from horns and bassoons against a background
of low strings announcing the movement’s main theme carried
along on wave after wave of gloriously colourful melodies fully
developed; Glière is not one of those composers who sprinkles
themes around without doing anything with them – he wastes nothing
which makes the music such a satisfying experience. You are
never left with the feeling that you could have done better.
The second movement begins with a lighter sound from woodwind
and tiptoeing strings before a charming tune is introduced by
a solo horn then taken up by the whole orchestra. The sound
becomes bigger and more grand, as we’re beginning to expect
from this composer and the movement ends in a mighty climax.
The third movement is interesting and unusual in that it comprises
a theme, a very Russian folk-like sounding melody, that is filtered
through a set of six variations. These make for delightful listening
and comparisons have been made with Tchaikovsky in that Glière’s
music often sounds balletic but as we shall see with The
Red Poppy suite that’s no surprise as he could ‘do ballet’
as easily as most other musical genres he chose to tackle. Whatever
instrument he chooses to carry a theme he seems to know the
instrument so well that nothing ever sounds false or incongruous.
Woodwind plus harp and strings bring this set of variations
to a close on a note of serene harmony. The finale begins with
an eastern-sounding theme reminiscent of Borodin’s Polovtsian
Dances which I’m sure explains how he came to be encouraged
to go to some of the far-flung republics of the USSR later in
the century to help them develop their own classical music.
This theme is treated to an exploration by various instruments
and again woodwind is often the section of choice when Glière
wishes to give his audience something sweet to enjoy. Even the
xylophone is brought into the picture as the theme mounts in
intensity to become a veritable battleground of exciting sounds
and the work ends with a crescendo from the brass section making
a powerful full-stop to a mighty, well constructed and ultimately
satisfying symphonic journey.
The Zaporozhy Cossacks is a piece written
as late as 1921 and later revised as a ballet-pantomime
in 1926 which tells the story as depicted in Ilya Repin’s famous
painting of The Zaporozhy Cossacks writing a mocking letter
to the Turkish Sultan of 1891. To quote from the website
of the National Museum in Stockholm “The narrative relates to
events in 1675 when the Turkish Sultan Mohammed IV sent the
Zaporozhye Cossacks a threatening, haughty ultimatum, ordering
them so surrender immediately “of their own volition and without
resistance” or to perish at his hand. The Cossacks composed
a scathing reply, brimming with humour and scorn: “We do not
fear your troops, we will fight you with this earth and water”
they wrote, adding “highly obscene curses and insulting names”.
David Nice in his article in the accompanying booklet says that
the listener would be forgiven for thinking that this work predates
the symphony since it is written in a less sophisticated way
but when you understand the pressure composers were under to
produce music ‘that speaks to the people’ in the Soviet period
it really comes as no surprise that this work fits neatly into
the ‘socialist realist’ framework. What matters is does it work
as a musical picture of the events as described above? The answer
is a resounding yes; ‘it does exactly what it says on the tin’
and in typical grand Glière style. The introduction sets the
scene with a grandiose sweep of sound culminating in a patriotic
Russian tune which describes the Cossacks’ pride and determination
in the face of the letter received from the Turkish Sultan.
This then segues into the writing of their reply which is read
out to all. This again merges into cleverly depicted laughter
as the Cossacks mock the Sultan’s letter. The penultimate section
is a series of Cossack dances. Anyone who has ever seen The
Red Army Choir and Dancers will immediately recognize the format
in which different dancers appear centre-stage to perform their
dance, giving way to subsequent dancers who perform theirs,
each trying to outdo the others. It could easily have come straight
from one of their discs. The finale reprises the patriotic tune
as if to emphasize that the Cossacks are not to be messed with!
In fact although the Ottoman Empire succeeded in beating the
forces ranged against it in the shape of the Polish-Lithuanian
Commonwealth of which the Cossacks were a part, the Polish-Ottoman
War (1672-1676) as it is known, weakened both sides and the
Ottoman Empire began to crumble. By 1699 it had lost a great
deal of the territory it had held for two centuries.
It is not until we reach disc number three that we get to Glière’s
First Symphony which is coupled with a much later work,
his Suite from The Red Poppy, which had its premiere
a full 27 years after the symphony. Another of David Nice’s
articles in the accompanying booklet tells how in 1927, when
that premiere took place along with Glière’s pupil Prokofiev’s
The Love for Three Oranges, Prokofiev told his old friend
and teacher how he and Dukelsky - another pupil who went on
to make his name in the USA as Vernon Duke - would go for walks
together and amuse themselves recalling their youth by humming
the tunes from Glière’s first and second symphonies. Nice says
that the two young men could hardly have chosen better models
to study than “these two well-made symphonies”. I absolutely
agree with that assessment as his first symphony has all the
hallmarks of a master craftsman with no hint of a young man
who is still exploring the symphonic genre. The symphony begins
with the statement of a strong and lovely theme that is thoroughly
exploited throughout the first movement, and it is the facility
for full exploration of themes that I find so incredibly satisfying
about Glière’s music; no musical stone is left unturned in milking
every drop of melody from his themes. Each movement in fact
is dominated by grand themes which make for a richness that
is so exciting. Whilst the orchestral forces here are so much
smaller than those used in his monumental third symphony the
sound he gets from his orchestration is still writ large. This
first main theme that begins in grandiose style is later given
a much lighter, merrier treatment in almost dance style before
being pulled back to being serious once more with the help of
brass, then finishing on a more songlike, gentle note. The second
movement begins with a balletic theme reminiscent of Tchaikovsky
or even Delibes before a Russian folk song emerges to take control
in 5/4 time but again with ballet-style treatment coming through
every now and then in a struggle to assert itself. The third
movement begins in a much more sober and reflective mood heavy
with the melancholy nature of the “Russian soul”. It’s chock
full of gorgeous melodies, whilst the finale doesn’t disappoint
either. The latter’s introduction is full of Russian tunes which
descend into a more sober mood before being dragged back into
the light with echoes of the main theme from the first movement.
The work finishes, to quote David Nice, with “a model ending
to a blueprint symphony”.
As explained at the start of this review Glière always ensured
he kept well within the aesthetic constraints of socialist realist
diktats. The Suite from The Red Poppy
is a perfect demonstration of this. It comes from the first
truly Soviet ballet, despite, as David Nice writes, owing “far
more to the lure of a glamorised China”; it is “Soviet” in the
sense that it was written to appeal to all sections of society.
The story tells of the love between a Soviet sailor and a Chinese
girl who is killed by the sailor’s capitalist rival, aided by
the dastardly British imperialist commandant of the port, as
she tries to escape her homeland on board a Soviet ship. As
she dies she gives her compatriots a red poppy and exhorts them
to use it as their mascot in their fight for freedom - remember
the red carnations that fighters stuck into the ends of their
rifles during the Portuguese revolution of 1974. It is ironic
that the Soviet authorities changed the ballet’s name in 1949
to The Red Flower so that no one would mistakenly associate
the poppy with the Marxian phrase “Religion is the opium of
the people” and see it as a metaphor for communism. The suite
begins in rattling fashion with Heroic Coolie Dance in
a quite convincing pastiche of Chinese music, followed by the
setting out of the young couple’s love for each other, during
which the opening bars of The Internationale are heard
to emphasise the music’s revolutionary credentials. There follow
two dances, both Chinese in flavour. Part IV is entitled “Phoenix”
and is a lovely melody played on the solo violin of the BBC
Philharmonic’s leader Dennis Simons, backed by the orchestra.
It’s heavy with melancholy. The penultimate section is a waltz
which is every bit as convincing as anything from the pen of
the great Johann Strauss. The finale is a hugely satisfying
and rumbustious Russian Sailor’s Dance which brings back
more memories of the Cossack Dance in The Zaporozhy Cossacks.
It must surely be a record to have ten distinct markings in
a piece that lasts under four minutes! It is a Russian folk
theme with variations played at different speeds from serious
and sonorous to frantically lively. It conjures up a mental
picture of dancers slapping their leather boots as they perform
leaping and twirling ‘acroballetics’ - my invented word to describe
acrobatics married to ballet. I would travel a long way to see
the whole ballet as it should be as much a spectacle for the
eyes as well as it is for the ears.
Disc four of this excellent set begins with the suite from The
Bronze Horseman which is from another of Glière’s
ballets. It proved so popular that it threatened to eclipse
The Red Poppy. Based on Pushkin’s work of the same name
it tells of a St Petersburg youth. His beloved drowns in the
River Neva and he then taunts the bronze statue of the city’s
founder, Peter the Great, that stands only yards from the river.
The statue comes to life and chases and finally kills him. Awarded
a Stalin Prize in 1950 it perfectly fitted the socialist realist
remit and Glière avoided being put on the blacklist being drawn
up at the time which included his pupils Prokofiev, Miaskovsky
and Khachaturian as well as Shostakovich. In fact the finale
entitled “Hymn to the Great City” was broadcast over loudspeakers
at the main Leningrad railway station, much to Shostakovich’s
horror; why when he also wrote plenty of “acceptable” socialist
realist music! For me, though it includes plenty of pleasant
music with Glière’s characteristic lavish orchestral scoring,
it is the weakest of the works on offer in this set and with
the inclusion of four dances in its thirteen movements the suite
doesn’t amply describe the story.
The Concerto for Horn and Orchestra, Op.91,
destined to be Glière’s last completed orchestral work, is unusual
in that there were few examples of horn concertos from Russian
composers prior to this and Glière turned to isolated examples
such those by Goedicke (1929) and Shebalin (1930). Interestingly
it had been Shebalin who had been encouraged early in his student
days to show his work to Glière who thought highly of it, and
to Miaskovsky, Glière’s pupil who in turn became Shebalin’s
professor. As we have seen in previous examples of Glière’s
music this work begins with a strong and memorable theme introduced
by the orchestra and immediately taken up by the horn. Coming
before the recapitulation the cadenza, here specially written
by the soloist Richard Watkins for this recording is very lovely
and only hinted at by the composer who leaves it up to the soloist
to come up with their own, as did its dedicatee Valeri Polekh,
solo horn-player in the Bolshoi Theatre for over forty years.
The Andante is beautifully lush and halfway through indulges
the listener with some good old fashioned Hollywood sentimentality
as pointed out by Rob Barnett in his review of this concerto
when it came out on the Koch
Schwann label with Marie Luise Neunecker as soloist. The
finale is again packed with full-blooded tunes that test the
soloist’s abilities and concludes a very satisfying work with
more than an echo of Richard Strauss, whose second horn concerto
had been written some ten years before. The work proved to be
the end of Glière’s career as well as one of the last hurrahs
for the romantic concerto.
The final disc in the set, conducted this time by Vassili Sinaisky,
rather than Sir Edward Downes, is of overtures and orchestral
works and shows the reasons why Glière had been selected to
go to places like Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan to help develop
those countries’ music and where in both those cases he would
have the title of ‘People’s Artist’ conferred upon him. He had
an innate ability to crystallise the folk elements he found
there and to fuse them into something resembling a “national”
sound. Towards the end of the first piece on the disc, the overture
Gyul’sara, strongly stated and exciting Tajik
folk dances are given the Glière treatment to great effect.
Next comes a simple Concert Waltz that,
nevertheless, is big on tunes and as romantic as you could possibly
want. It looks over its shoulder back to pre-revolutionary days
where such a work would have had deserved success. Shakh-Senem
is an overture to the opera of the same name which became,
as mentioned at the beginning of this review, the cornerstone
of Soviet-Azerbaijani opera tradition. Once again it demonstrates
Glière’s facility for distilling the local strains of folk music
into something altogether more grand. There is much that is
reminiscent of Khachaturian’s ballet Gayaneh here and
perhaps that is because we in the west cannot so clearly differentiate
between music of the Central Asian countries (Khachaturian was
from Armenia) but more likely it is because the central core
of the music from those areas involves the Persian tradition.
It was to remove that connotation that once again the cultural
watchdogs stepped in and renamed the opera The Worker of
Baku for Russian consumption eight years after its premiere
in that city in 1926. The Ballad, Op.4 is a very
early work by comparison with most of the music in this survey,
dating as it does from 1902 only two years after Glière’s graduation.
Here it was originally written for cello and piano and is presented
in a version orchestrated by Derzhanovsky. As such it is highly
effective and affecting with beautifully fluid lines permeating
its pages. The Overture on Slavonic Themes
sounds as if it came from 19th century Bohemia
as soon as it begins, despite the fact that it dates from 1941;
there is something particularly ‘Czech’ about it rather than
sounding generally Slav. It would not be out of place being
played at the Prague Spring Festival, alongside the traditional
festival opening (and closing) work: Smetana’s Ma Vlast.
The Heroic March for the Buryiat-Mongolian ASSR,
Op.71 is a typical offering in the socialist realist tradition.
It was written in 1934-36 but is more of a tone poem than anything
else. Buryatia as it is known today is one and a half times
the size of Great Britain but with a population of under a million
and lies in south central Siberia along the side of Lake Baikal.
The music is inventive and incorporates what sounds distinctly
Chinese in parts but then China is not far away geographically.
The piece employs Glière’s skill once again in seeking out folk
melodies to ally with western musical traditions to produce
something understandable to all. Echoes of ‘God save the Tsar’
in the central section are subdued by assertions of the indigenous
people’s melodies buoyed aloft on a wave of powerful sound and
underscored with strains of The Internationale. Glière
is in fact clearly stating that the people’s future can only
be assured by its becoming an ASSR within the mighty internationalist
Soviet Union. In Holiday in Ferghana he
calls for the inclusion of two regional instruments: the safail
a kind of Tajik tambourine and the nagara which is a small drum
heard in its opening moments. Ferghana is in Uzbekistan and
the piece is connected with the construction, almost all by
hand (!), of the Ferghana canal which was completed in 1939
after almost ten years. As Ferghana lies on the ancient silk
route the musical influences here are widespread but clearly
folk infected and use Glière’s understanding of Uzbek tunes
to the full. Interestingly according to David Nice’s article
it was dedicated ‘to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on its Fiftieth
Anniversary and to Dr Frederick Stock its celebrated conductor’.
This was surely quite a brave thing to do at the time it was
written, but it was that orchestra that gave its first performance
on 20 March 1941. It is typical of what this set has encouraged
us to expect from this fascinating and inventive composer whose
brilliant orchestration abilities make everything so listenable.
All the works in this set are given highly committed performances
by the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra under Sir Edward Downes (discs
1-4) and Vassili Sinaisky (disc 5) and with Richard Watkins
as brilliant soloist in the Horn Concerto and Peter Dixon as
cello soloist in the Ballad. All involved are clearly
enjoying the sumptuous nature of this wonderful composer. These
are thrilling performances bringing to life some rarely heard
music that needs greater exposure. I sincerely hope this issue
helps give that.
I have so much enjoyed reviewing this set as it has really helped
me discover Glière, whose output is so consistently exciting
and whose lush scoring and gorgeous melodies make for really
satisfying listening. However, it requires the listener to put
aside any preconceived ideas and prejudices about ‘Soviet hack
music’ and toadying to the authorities. No composer, however
much they are prepared to compromise their principles could
write so much music as convincingly original as Glière did if
it was not what they wanted to write. I urge anyone who is at
all interested in the music of the Soviet period and the early
20th century Russian tradition, who loves big sounds
and who does not know this composer, to give this set a try.
I can guarantee they will not be disappointed; on the contrary
they will find much to admire, marvel at and enjoy.
Steve Arloff
see also review by Rob
Barnett (October 2011 Recording of the Month)
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