Russian composer Georgy Sviridov was a student of Shostakovich, but except in the Music for Chamber Orchestra (1964), and not even in all of that, there's not much of a resemblance. Sviridov seems to revel in taking genres and styles that might easily become trite and making something fresh from them. Nowhere is this more notable than in the opening three-part Sneg idyot (Snow Is Falling), to texts by Boris Pasternak. Sample the opening section, which could almost be a singsong exercise for schoolchildren, alternating ...
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Russian composer Georgy Sviridov was a student of Shostakovich, but except in the Music for Chamber Orchestra (1964), and not even in all of that, there's not much of a resemblance. Sviridov seems to revel in taking genres and styles that might easily become trite and making something fresh from them. Nowhere is this more notable than in the opening three-part Sneg idyot (Snow Is Falling), to texts by Boris Pasternak. Sample the opening section, which could almost be a singsong exercise for schoolchildren, alternating between a couple of notes and harmonies, but remains distinctive. The titular song cycle is a setting of poems by Sergey Yesenin that are nationalistic in the best way, with lovely evocations of the Russian landscape and soul; the title, taken from the song of the same name, is not a political critique, but a beautiful evocation of flight. The vocal lines are deliberate and dignified, again simple and more tonal than even Shostakovich, but distinctive. There is a competing version of the...
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