TWENTIETH CENTURY RUSSIAN PIANO MUSIC. • Vladimir Yurigin-Klevke, piano. • RUSSIAN DISC RD CD 10 015 [DDD]; 57:36. Produced by Tatiana Vinnitskaya. (Distributed by Koch International.) GUBAIDULINA Ciaconna. PART Partita. SHOSTAKOVICH Preludes, op. 34: No. 1 in C; No. 2 in A Minor; No. 3 in G; No. 14 in C♯ Minor; No. 15 in E♭ Minor; No. 16 in B Minor; No. 17 in A♭; No. 24 in D Minor. SHCHEDRIN Preludes and Fugues: No. 10 in C♯ Minor; No. 12 in G♯ Minor. KARAYEV Preludes: No. 1 in C; No. 2 in C Minor; No. 3 in G; No. 5 in D; No. 6 in D Minor; No. 8 in A Minor, No. 10 in E Minor; No. 15 in D♭; No. 19 in E♭; No. 23 in F. Modern music, yes, but all of these genres existed when J. S. Bach was writing his music for the keyboard. Thats the interesting paradox behind this intriguing disc. I suspect that Vladimir Yurigin-Klevkes name will be unfamiliar to all but the most obsessive pianophiles. Born in Moscow in 1948, he studied at the Moscow Conservatory under Heinrich Neuhaus and Yakov Zak, and he won the 1969 National Piano Competition of Contemporary Soviet Music. In spite of his excellent training and credentials, he hasnt done much concertizing outside of the former USSR, but maybe this CD will create more of a demand for him. It certainly deserves to. Yurigin-Klevke is a powerful, athletic player in the Soviet manner, and he also can play with extreme sensitivity and pathos (for example, hear his reading of the tenth Shostakovich Prelude). It would be hasty for me to heap accolades on him on the basis of just this one disc, but I definitely would like to hear more. Russian Disc, are you listening? Much of this discs allure comes from the unusual material that it contains, although I think it was teasing of Russian Disc and Yurigin-Klevke to give us only excerpts of the three sets of preludes, especially when there was room to include at least another twenty-five minutes of music. The alternately poignant and pungent set by Shostakovich has been recorded in toto (Tatiana Nikolayevas recording on Hyperion is a good recommendation) but as for the Shchedrin and Karayev, if complete recordings exist of these works, theyre not readily available to Westerners, at least per the somewhat unreliable Opus catalog. Kara Karayevs brief preludes are influenced by Chopins, almost to the point of near-quotation or parody in the E-Minor Prelude. Rodion Shche-drins preludes and fugues are more similar to Bachs, but of course the harmonic and rhythmic language that Shchedrin uses is far more convoluted. None of these works are mere conservatory fodder; theyd be as welcome on anyones recital program as their models would be. (I can dream, cant I?) Sofia Gubaidulinas eclectic Bach-meets-shock Ciaconna (1961) is on the same high level that we are coming to expect from this composer as we get to know her better. Veritable machine-gun volleys of notes give way to a weightless melancholy typical of this composers music. Arvo Parts Partita was written earlier in 1958-59 or 1965; the discs documentation isnt clear. At any rate, this work predates the tintinnabuli period that most of us associate with Part, and it even predates his twelve-tone period. The notes describe the Partita as “neoclassical,“ an appellation that I find somewhat far-fetched, but suffice it to say that the work is strongly constructed and serious without being really characteristic. Apart from the rather metallic tone in the pianos upper registers, Yurigin-Klevkes program has been captured well by Russian Discs engineers. More than six pages of erudite and helpful text are devoted to the composers and their music, something we never would have seen in the bad-old good-old days. Recommended, if it isnt obvious already. Raymond Tuttle This article originally appeared in Issue 18:6 (July/Aug 1995) of Fanfare Magazine.
Posted on: Fri, 24 Oct 2014 19:09:34 +0000
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