Ouverture Burlesque

Tchaikovsky - Suite No.2, Hamlet, Overture in F major - Evgeni Svetlanov (1990)
Melodiya | USSR | SUCD 10-00019 | 1990 | 1 CD | EAC Rip | FLAC (img + cue), LOG | Covers (jpg 300 dpi) | TT 68:27 | RAR 278.84 MB MB + 3% Recovery
Classical / Orchestral

The USSR Symphony Orchestra owes its success largely to Evgeni Svetlanov, its artistic director, Lenin prize winner, USSR People's Artist, Hero of Socialist Labour — a gifted versatile musician, talented conductor, composer and pianist. For several years Svetlanov had a position with the All-Union Radio Orchestra, later taking over the USSR Bolshoi Theatre Orchestra. With Russian classics in the focus of his attention (his repertoire includes all of Russian music) Svetlanov constantly tackles works of different styles. Evgeni Svetlanov's name is well known all over the world.

Written at the request of Louis XIV in honour of his sisterin- law, Henrietta of England, Le Ballet royal de la naissance de Vénus was performed in 1665 with Henrietta herself as the goddess of love and youth. In twelve entrées, this grandiose spectacle, combining dancing, music and poetry, served the power of the king, while attesting to the magnificence of his court. Musically very inventive, it shows the culmination of the ballet genre, on which Lully was to draw in creating the tragédie en musique. To complete the programme, excerpts from Les Amours déguisés (Armida’s famous lament “Ah! Rinaldo, e dove sei?”), Psyché, Le Bourgeois gentil homme and Le Carnaval - from the latter, a piece recycled from Les Noces de village, a burlesque aria sung by the boastful village schoolmaster Barbacola, a basso buffo role that Lully wrote for himself.