Sergey Lyapunov was part of the generation of mostly lightly nationalist Russian composers trained by the Mighty Handful, in this case Mily Balakirev. Before long he became better known as a pianist than as a composer, and most of his music was forgotten. But the Naxos label has specialized in finding the nuggets among the gravel, and they've come up with one herein Lyapunov's Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 61. The work was composed in 1915, toward the end of his life, and apparently reflects a process in which he left ...
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Sergey Lyapunov was part of the generation of mostly lightly nationalist Russian composers trained by the Mighty Handful, in this case Mily Balakirev. Before long he became better known as a pianist than as a composer, and most of his music was forgotten. But the Naxos label has specialized in finding the nuggets among the gravel, and they've come up with one herein Lyapunov's Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 61. The work was composed in 1915, toward the end of his life, and apparently reflects a process in which he left some of his more generic Russian late Romantic influences behind. The chief attraction is in the violin writing, which is highly idiomatic despite the fact that the violin wasn't Lyapunov's instrument. The solo part is dense and extraordinarily difficult, suggesting a transfer of the Lisztian language of Lyapunov's piano concertos to the violin; the dense figuration breaks off only for ultra-sensuous romantic melody. Russian violinist Maxim Fedotov does the work justice with a vigorous,...
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