March 2025 - Russian Symphony March Madness!

[ChamberNut]

Resurrecting an old tradition, some may remember (WAY back in 2013/2014), I dedicated March to be a month to listen to Russian symphonies.

I plan on doing one per weekday (weekends I'm too busy doing other things and rarely have time for music listening). Thus, this equates to 21 days (21 symphonies).

My plan is 21 different composers.  If anyone wants to join, there aren't any rules. If you want to listen to 5 per day, or none, have at 'er. 

[ChamberNut]

This will be exciting (for me), as I don't know symphonies of 21 different Russian composers. Thus, many of these will be first listens! I'm going to have to do a little research. 

[hopefullytrusting]

This will be exciting (for me), as I don't know symphonies of 21 different Russian composers. Thus, many of these will be first listens! I'm going to have to do a little research. 

Myaskovsky.
Done.

[ChamberNut]

Myaskovsky.
Done.

He's on my list as well.

[ChamberNut]

My initial listening list, in no particular order (and subject to be changed):



Rimsky-Korsakov - 2 (Antar)
Taneyev - 2
Kalinnikov - 2
Prokofiev - 7
Stravinsky - Psalms
Rachmaninov - 1
Tchaikovsky - 3
Shostakovich - 4
Glazunov - 4
Miaskovsky - 24
Popov - 1
Borodin - 2
Kabalevsky - 2
B. Tchaikovsky - 2
Schnittke - 6
Roslavets - Chamber Symphony Auerbach - Symphony No. 1 (Chimera)
Scriabin - 3
Arensky - 2
Balakirev - 2
Gliere - 3
Juon - A major

[Cato]

For me, every month is Symphony by a Russian Composer Month!

Consider:

Alexander Tcherepnin: Symphony #2  (4 total)

Vyacheslav Ovchinnikov: Symphony #1 (4 total, available on YouTube)

Lera Auerbach (Russian-American): Symphony #1 (Chimera)

[ChamberNut]

For me, every month is Symphony by a Russian Composer Month!

Consider:

Alexander Tcherepnin: Symphony #2  (4 total)

Vyacheslav Ovchinnikov: Symphony #1 (4 total, available on YouTube)

Lera Auerbach (Russian-American): Symphony #1 (Chimera)

Good, then you will have no issues with participating!    I may "sub" a few off my list for yours.

[Cato]

Good, then you will have no issues with participating!    I may "sub" a few off my list for yours.

None! 

[ChamberNut]

My own list is ready for beginning Monday. Including what will be 9 "first listens!"

Rimsky-Korsakov - 2 (Antar)
Taneyev - 2
Kalinnikov - 2
Prokofiev - 7
Stravinsky - Psalms
Rachmaninov - 1
Tchaikovsky - 3
Shostakovich - 4
Glazunov - 4
Miaskovsky - 24
Popov - 1
Borodin - 2

First Listens
Kabalevsky - 2
B. Tchaikovsky - 2
Schnittke - 6
Auerbach - Symphony No. 1 (Chimera)
Scriabin - 3
Arensky - 2
Balakirev - 2
Gliere - 3
Juon - A major

[Cato]

My own list is ready for beginning Monday. Including what will be 9 "first listens!"

Rimsky-Korsakov - 2 (Antar)
Taneyev - 2
Kalinnikov - 2
Prokofiev - 7
Stravinsky - Psalms
Rachmaninov - 1
Tchaikovsky - 3
Shostakovich - 4
Glazunov - 4
Miaskovsky - 24
Popov - 1
Borodin - 2

First Listens
Kabalevsky - 2
B. Tchaikovsky - 2
Schnittke - 6
Roslavets - Chamber Symphony Auerbach - Symphony No. 1 (Chimera)
Scriabin - 3
Arensky - 2
Balakirev - 2
Gliere - 3
Juon - A major

Tomorrow I hope to hear the First Symphony of Nikolai Roslavets!

[Cato]

From the "What Are You Listening To" topic: I should mention that the orchestra is a student group from England and the performance took place in 2022.  They are not bad (the strings waver somewhat).

Perhaps a professional orchestra will tackle it soon!

For Symphonies by Russian Composers Month! 

This apparently is the world premiere of an early one-movement symphony from 1910 by Nikolai Roslavets, whose life as a composer was ruined by the Communists ("formalism" "anti-revolutionary") in the late 1920's.


From the notes:

"...As a work from the composer's student years, it reflects a period in the composer's life where he was searching for his own individual voice. While it still has a foot in the romantic school of Tchaikovsky there is clear exploration into the more adventurous styles of Scriabin which Roslavets was fascinated by at the time...."

[ChamberNut]

@Cato

Thank you for starting the festival! 

[Cato]

@Cato

Thank you for starting the festival! 

No problem!

Here is another Symphony #1, by Alexander Tcherepnin: the work is often cited as the first symphony to have an all percussion movement, the Scherzo.

I revisited it this morning, after the Roslavets First:

[pjme]

Thanks for the Roslavets!

I took a plunge into mystery vaults of YouTube and am listening to Mikhail Nosyrev's 1978 Symphony nr. 3  (ca 35 mins.)
Dark, tormented, angry, very tense and difficult music - Nosyrev spent 10 years in a gulag.....

More on his symphonies :

http://www.nosyrev.com/articles

The conception of the three-movement Third Symphony, created just a year after the monumental Second Symphony, develops, to some extent, the ideas of the latter. Dodecaphonic themes, super polyphony, a supremely sharp harmonic language become the composer's habitual expressive means. True, against sharply modern soundings more common, sometimes diatonic intonations and chords are used.

[André]

@ ChamberNut: Boris Tchaikovsky's 2nd (and all his other ones): chef's kiss.

I would participate, were it not for being engaged in my own musical Marchfest. Currently going through a British Symphonic Music set and will probably continue with more of the same. 20th century English symphonic music is the perfect foil for same period's German/Austrian symphonic music.

Very tangentially, it reminds me of my last european trip last October, which included visiting the war cemeteries of Normandy. You wouldn't imagine the huge difference of impression/feelings the german and allied cemetaries gave off. I feel the same level of difference can be heard and felt musically.

[Cato]

This popped up on YouTube, so I thought I would give it a chance this morning: certainly a conservative piece for 1907, but a fine work nevertheless.


Ippolitov-Ivanov: Symphony #1 

For Americans, the last movement has a theme resembling the start of the Hymn of the U.S. Marine Corps (From the Halls of Montezuma), which theme was adopted/adapted from an 1859 opera by Jacques Offenbach!  I think it unlikely that Ippolitov-Ivanov knew anything about the opera.   

[Karl Henning]

A first listen!

[Karl Henning]

Probably a first listen, too:

[Cato]

It is time to explore Miaskovsky: this morning Symphony #1 in three movements!

The three-movement structure reminds me of the Rachmaninoff Third Symphony, but his work came almost 40 years after this one.

[Karl Henning]

Cross-post:

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov
Symphony № 3 in C Op. 32
Bergen Phil
Dmitri Kitaenko