Judging by the recording
data in the heading above this album
appears to be a reissue. The four-page
sleeve-note has only one page in English
with minimal information. I suspect
it was first released on the Russian
Melodiya label at that time for the
Melody logo on this recording appears
the same, to my memory.
Arensky’s melodious
Suite No. 1 was written in 1885. Svetlanov
delivers a performance that beguiles
and excites. The opening movement ‘Variations
on a Russian Theme’ (a song entitled
‘Having Waved With A Broom’) passes
through introspective musings on folk-like
material to martial elements à
la Tchaikovsky to a stirring fugue.
Svetlanov’s ‘Dance’, second movement,
charms; it is a waltz - more Russian
than Viennese - with a whimsical, rustic
central section. The jolly ‘Scherzo’
is all headlong abandon, the woodwinds
chuckle away and the strings gambol
along merrily before a tender calm slows
the merrymakers. The ‘Basso ostinato’
has a warm nostalgic glow while ‘March’
is a glorification delivered one imagines
with tongue-in-cheek pomposity, certainly
the woodwinds respond cheekily. The
whole is quite delightful.
Arensky’s Suite No.
3’s nine variations are based on a meditative
consolatory theme. The theme is first
discussed between woodwinds and strings
before progressing through variations
characterised by; a light-hearted waltz
- reminding me of the style of the English
light music composer Eric Coates, then
a sterner triumphal march, softening
as it progresses towards old soldiers’
nostalgia (?), a quite enchanting music-box-like
18th century minuet, sparkling
with celesta and pizzicato strings,
a stately gavotte, a tripping, chattering,
busy scherzo, a solemn and most dignified
funeral march, a lovely dreamy nocturne
with solo piano - somewhere between
Chopin and Rachmaninov - and, finally,
a colourful and celebratory polonaise.
Arensky’s opera, Nal
and Damajanti was written in 1903
and staged at the Bolshoi Theatre one
year later. The notes reveal nothing
further. I suspect this was an opera
that would appeal to families. The music
glistens as it opens as though suggesting
a world of magic, perhaps a wintry one.
Soon a romantic melody surfaces sounding
like the Suite No. 3 waltz and, strangely,
something Eric Coates might have written.
As the pace develops the fantasy continues
and the Eric Coates similarities persist
for a while - Coates’ Cinderella
music, for instance - before the
music becomes charged with foreboding,
wild and cataclysmic. Arensky’s orchestration
is interesting including glittering
piano arpeggios.
Enchanting, exciting,
tuneful music delivered in style.
Ian Lace
for details
USSR Symphony Orchestra/Evgeny Svetlanov
