Stravinsky, Prokofiev, and Shostakovich

Stravinsky = (initially) avant guard, cerebral, subsequently classicist - equivalent - any number of modern jazzers (eg Archie Shepp?) Roxy Music, John Zorn.

Shostakovich = accessible, melodic, deeply felt, in the tradition (not avant) but fresh, creative = The Beatles, Sun Ra.

Personally Shostakovich is my man. Stravinksy is probably the correct answer for ILM approval.

_Peter & The Wolf_ is purty (though I fail to see the hollow emotional toffee center to this piece).

Shost wrote an awful lotta half-redeemed hackwork. I like the good bits lots, but the boring bits are truly boring.

Prok's "love of three oranges" is something everyone who doesn't know prok has heard (bits of)

In fact come to think of it, given the widespread liking for eg Boards of Canada et al round these parts, this may not be so.

Some of Prokofiev's stuff was also pretty "out there." His opera The Fiery Angel is IMHO one of the freakiest operas ever written, right up there with Don Giovanni and Wozzeck, both in terms of the music and the visuals. And then there's The October Cantata, parts of which are close to pure cacophany (esp. the "Voice of Lenin" part). And then there's The Scythian Suite, Prokofiev's "answer" to Stravinsky's Rites of Spring, and anyone who's interested should get a recording of the full soundtrack score for Alexander Nevsky (as opposed to the cantata, the form in which most people know that piece) which has some really far-out stuff (i.e., the percussion on "The Battle On The Ice: The Ice Breaks").

I think Prokofiev also sort of suffers from being thought of as "safe," insofar as he's associated mostly with Peter and the Wolf, Lieutenant Kije, and The Love of Three Oranges. All of which are great, but detracts from his more out- there stuff (not to mention the boldness of some of his rhythms).

Rumors that Bo Derek is President Bush's choice for the Kennedy Center's board of trustees appear to be true. But when we called to congratulate her yesterday, the "10" star told us: "I'm not supposed to talk about it until it's announced. . . . I don't think it's a good idea to mess with the White House, do you?" Point well taken.

Who can guess the relation between Bo Derek and any of three Russian composers in this thread's header? (And please try to suppress the laughter over the latest example of Dubya's goofy and militant philistinism.)

Orbit OTM about Shostakovitch. Sadly, I had a book of all my classical music CD's stolen so I can't ref. which songs, but I had a CD of his quartet pieces that totally rocked. Fast tempos. On my favorite one, there was a piano doing a repetitve chord pattern underneath the strings that gave it a very pop music kind of structure. I also really, really love his Jazz Suites (music used in Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut.)

Anyways, the thread I was going to start was "Can anyone explain what seperates 20th century "modern" Russian classical music from other forms?"

That stuff is the only classical music I really get. I can't listen to Bach or Beethoven very much. I guess that would be Baroque and Romantic period? Well, it just sounds kind of meandering to me. Also, I don't know much about the context, except it was probably made in a very cloistered ruling class/church kind of context which doesn't really inspire me to care for it.

Shostakovitch and Prokofiev are my favorite composers, and Mussorgsky and Stravinsky are some of the others I can listen to and get. I do like the context that stuff was made in. (Just going over old art history classes) but they were part of the modernist movement in art and they had a lot of interconnections between painting, film and other cool stuff like that. Especially french impressionism. Thats the one reason I like them, and then there's the music experimentation (I don't know much about) incoporating new forms like the aforementioned Jazz Suites, stuff that is easier to relate to through pop culture nowadays.

i've been listening to the score of Romeo et Juliette for work these past few days, and i just don't get Prokofiev. i don't get it. it's often so...fruity?

Prokofiev = technically dazzling, flash, intermittently beautiful, emotionally shallow.

emotionally shallow otm, at least this one. is there anything else of his that's worth trying?

5th symphony is the one thing by him I really love

I guess overall I like Shostakovich the most of the three although Rite of Spring beats pretty much anything ever

"Peter and the Wolf" still doesn't do much for me, but on the strength of his piano sonatas (specifically No. 7) alone, I'm going with Prokofiev.
-- Eric H. (Eric H.), Saturday, 10 January 2004 23:51 (4 years ago)

I was wrong about "Peter and the Wolf," obviously. It helps to hear it done properly with a good orchestra and not think about it in Disney terms.

All three are fantastic, but I'm not aware of Stravinsky writing much piano music, so the other two have a leg up.

Shostakovich had some fantastic piano music. Fantastic without being impossible to play, even.

thx hurting

oh yeah actually I guess Peter and the Wolf is pretty awesome

I have a Paul Jacobs recording that includes a few Stravinsky piano pieces. They haven't really stuck with me.

HMV had some very cheap Shostakovich the other week. I bought some. Who knows, I might even listen to it one day.

I urge you all to check out Prokofiev's "October Cantata", it's nuts

is there anything else of his that's worth trying?

Piano concertos, especially no. 2.

I like Prokofiev's 'Classical Symphony' as performed by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra (on DG). Well worth checking out.

prokofiev symphony no. 7

is there anything else of his that's worth trying?

Piano concertos, especially no. 2.

Plus all of his piano sonatas, especially no. 3 and no. 7

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AdBi5IBrto

Didn't know you were into CM, Eric!

This thread is mostly embarrassing though.

I mean "Stravinsky = rock" is like wat

Virtuosic piano music is the only thing I like better than roller boogie.

And I'm not exactly sure what "emotionally shallow" sounds like, but it sure as hell ain't the last two minutes of that 3rd movement! Or the seven before that!

I had a bad experience with the PCs a while back — one of the only times I've had an immediate "TURN IT OFF!" reaction to CM that I wasn't predisposed to dislike, but it could have just been a bad performance/recording. Last year I listened to the 3rd symphony and really liked it. I have a complete set of the symphonies on my shelf waiting to be listened to, but I haven't felt like the mood has been right yet.

Can I vote Ravel here?

I mean "Stravinsky = rock" is like wat

Well things like Rite with their rhtyhms, then you factor in riots and the like. 'Rock' in the sense he made a noise half the population won't understand.

I've also heard the Strav = Madonna thing (as in he changed his style a few times)

I dare someone to call Prokofiev M.I.A.

The Rite is part of his early Russian style, which essentially ended with Les Noces (around 1920 iirc). The next major work he did after that is Pulcinella, which hardly "rocks", great as it is.

My favorite I.S. work is probably Orpheus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1ZI4SIAuMA

Every time I see this thread title I think "Niggas pull ya card and argue all day about who's the best MCs: Stravinsky, Prokoviev and Shostakovich"

Anyway, what is/are the best recordings of the Shostakovich Piano Preludes/Fugues? Listening to Ashkenazy now and I like it well enough but I feel like there's probably a slightly older, less *glassy* sounding recording.

I mean an older one that I'd like better.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KStjdclOpzI

Not complete, but there are a good portion of them spread across two different Richter recitals and the playing is boggling, unbeatable.

I agree that Ashkenazy's sound is frustratingly glassy; it always has been even in the analog era. Other digital recordings which got great reviews are Jenny Lin on haenssler and scherbakov on Naxos. I don't have them but they are probably better engineered than Ashkenazy's.

Lol xp

I read that as Jeremy Lin a few times

JL knows far more about classical recordings than anyone else on ilx so i'd take his recommendations

ashkenazy is the only famous pianist who i just don't like, his bartok piano concerto recordings didn't sound right at all

It has to be Shostakovich for me, as he is unmatched when it comes to emotional power and expressiveness. The adagio from the Leningrad symphony is one of the most heartbreakingly beautiful pieces of music ever composed. But otherwise, Symphonies 5 and 11, the 1st violin concerto (esp, the 3rd mvmt), 1st cello concerto - all not far behind.

Stravinsky I like, but more for the neoclassical stuff - his Cantata is peerless, and his Mass and Symphony of Psalms are also spiff. I like the Firebird best of the early ballets, mainly cause of that monumental finale, up there with Sibelius 2 for exhilaration levels. Rite of Spring and Petrushka I have found impressive, but for some reason immune to love.

Prokofiev - 5th symphony, esp. 3rd mvmt has such delicious liquid caramel textures. Underrated: his Sinfonietta, which is in a similar vein to the Classical Symphony, but richer and better. The two violin sonatas are also tops. The war piano sonatas are still a bit of an enigma. 5th piano concerto agreeably bonkers.

I went to a performance of the Shostakovich Trilogy and I swear that among the pieces that were played, I heard what was undeniably the Doctor Who theme. But listening directly to the pieces listed, I couldn't find it again. Was I just hallucinating?

Prokofiev = technically dazzling, flash, intermittently beautiful, emotionally shallow. Rock/pop equivalent - prog, possibly King Crimson
Stravinsky = (initially) avant guard, cerebral, subsequently classicist - equivalent - any number of modern jazzers (eg Archie Shepp?) Roxy Music, John Zorn.
Shostakovich = accessible, melodic, deeply felt, in the tradition (not avant) but fresh, creative = The Beatles, Sun Ra.

Personally Shostakovich is my man. Stravinksy is probably the correct answer for ILM approval.

― arfarf, Monday, December 3, 2001 8:00 PM (seventeen years ago) bookmarkflaglink

getting really into Prokofiev's piano music after running across it on a box set of Yevgeny Kissin's RCA albums and I think the above read is incorrect -- I do think Shostakovich is sort of more traditionally "emotional" (scare quotes meaning no disrespect there, just to indicate that in Shostakovich there's sort of a readily-available path into its emotional world) but I think the read of Prokofiev as "cold"/"technical" needs a closer look. the piano sonatas are full of rich, contemplative music alongside dazzling pyrotechnics, the balance depends a lot on who's playing them. I'm currently in awe of this set:

https://open.spotify.com/album/2yda98v022EhyTTk7jAAI5?si=crVTUdgtSai4Gtsdd2c3kw

Yeah I had a Prokofiev piano music recording in rotation for a while not too long ago and it impressed me at first and then wore off pretty quickly. Shostakovich is still my fav but I'm less often in the mindset to delve into his dark moods.

i like the first 3 or 4 sonatas and then they start to get a bit too slippery for me

Love Prokofiev’s solo piano works especially ESPECIALLY in Frederic Chiu’s exhaustive cycle on harmonia mundi; I sure wish Chiu would record more but I guess he just tours and teaches now. Yeah there’s a wealth of different vibes to be found in SP’s piano stuff.

JCLC you were doing a series of solo piano masters faceoff polls which left off with the Debussy ravel Satie cohort but if taken to the next generation imo it’d be Prokofiev v Bartok and Prokofiev would take it (just)

I think a certain goon tie would lobby extensively on behalf of Bela B. and he'd have a good case!

The Prokofiev piano sonatas have become an obsession, they're honestly so rich; in some, he sounds like he's been listening to/playing Gershwin & it's kind of thrilling when the connection hits -- and I'm now digging into the concertos, which are also great

I really love his solo piano stuff and it’s oddly neglected. I’m crazy about Frederic Chiu’s cycle which brings a coiled but sensuous approach

An obv Halloween suggestion for any piano student who can tackle it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkXyE9CZ_lk

Ha, my theory as to why Prokofiev's solo piano works is "oddly neglected" comes right back to "Diabolical Suggestion". Every teen pianist rushes to play it because it's such a ridiculous thing but Sergei wrote it when he was 17? It's like a piece of juvenilia upstaging all the later, better work

I adore Visions Fugitifs myself

With Prokofiev’s piano music I think there was always the difficulty aspect of it. Supposedly until the last couple decades there were only a handful of pianists who had the chops to play his Third Concerto.

xp yeah, it sounds like a piece a teen would write, for better and worse

Playing Prokofiev on piano is basically an act of unlearning everything you learned

not sure why i couldn't get into prokofiev on my last pass. the 2nd and 3rd piano concertos sound tremendous now

It's been too long since I enjoyed the quiet sections of that third piano concerto

(Meaning listened to them, of course, not that I haven't enjoyed them every time I do listen to them)

Re:Stravinsky, in the past couple years the Violin Concerto seems to be having a moment. It seems every prominent violin soloist is performing and recording it. It’s become almost as ubiquitous as Brahms’. Recordings in the last year alone include Isabelle Faust, Frank Peter Zimmermann, James Ehnes, and Vilde Frang.

I saw Hillary Hahn do that one back when I was in college. My friend and I tried to get her to hang out with us afterwards, lol.

FTR, I am the same age as her.

not sure why i couldn't get into prokofiev on my last pass. the 2nd and 3rd piano concertos sound tremendous now

yeah -- his stuff seemed kinda clinical to me when I was younger, about two years ago I listened to one of the sonatas that Kissin did on a live set, idk which because I have one of those "here's 40 CDs you'll like" things of him from RCA, and it knocked me over and I got really into his piano sonatas and kinda lost my mind, getting multiple complete sets -- they're really a wonder, you can tell he's listened to Gershwin and Ellington and is interested in the wider world of music, they're just amazing pieces.

but if you get to see Shostakovich quartets live, boy those can be transporting experiences