This new CD from Onyx Classics is the first new release for several years from the amazing Moscow Soloists and their charismatic director, the great Yuri Bashmet. The disc couples the most famous of the Rudolf Barshai arrangements of the Shostakovich string quartets (No. 8) with two little known chamber symphonies by friends of Shostakovich, the Sviridov being a world premire recording. Bashmet and his group will be touring this repertoire in the US this February.
Settings of A. Blok's poems occupy a special place in Georgi Sviridov's work. For many years the composer has addressed his favourite poet discovering still newer facets of Alexander Blok's poetry. G. Sviridov has the honour of discovering another great poet of Russia, Sergei Esenin, for music. One of these discovering was "Cast Off Russia".
There is no Esenin's work of the same name. Poetical images created a kind of a large fresco which the composer so masterfully sets in motion with the rhvthms of his music. Music and melody enhance Esenin's poetry, full of images, which is like a song not in genre or form, but as an inherent creative pulse, as an irresistible urge to pour out his feelings in a song.
"Five Choruses to Lyrics by Russian Poets" are five small poems. "Poem in Memory of Sergei Esenin" is one of the 20th-century's major musical compositions. The "Poem" is a highly original composition both in its concept and its artistic embodiment, with a lot of new discoveries. G. Sviridov interpreted anew one of the greatest Russian poetic works of the 20th century. He was able not only to see in Esenin a fine lyricist but a truly national poet, who shared his country's lot during the fateful years of its history. Addressing himself to Esenin. Sviridov was the first to speak seriously in music of the fate of Russian people during the revolution.