Today we present part two of our new program about the Russian musical
highlights of the 20th century.
The 20th century has been very hard on Russia where the tangle of
dramatic upheavals spawned a plethora of artistic masterpieces which have
literally redrawn the cultural image of our planet. In this series we'll
try to recreate the musical history of this outgoing century. The year
was 1903...
...In January 1903 Alexander Skryabins's Second Symphony was
played for the first time at the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory.
The premiere created a big stir with critics dismissing the new work by
the controversial 30 year-old composer as "too abstruse and not interesting"
and others extolling it as a work of genius and the music of the future.
Conductor Vasily Safonov, Skryabin's onetime Conservatory teacher,
could not be happy enough with his former student's compositions. Inaugurating
Skryabin's First Symphony in Moscow in 1900, Safonov theatrically raised
the sheet music above his head and called it "the 20th century Bible."
He also ventured to conduct Skryabin's Second Symphony even though
many seasoned musicians had told him they were not a bit impressed
by Skryabin's new work. Composer Anatoly Lyadov drew an immediate parallel
with Richard Wagner who was not very much liked in Russia back in those
days. He said that technically, Skryabin's Second Symphony was even harder
to comprehend adding that "now that we have Skryabin, Wagner is no
more than just a suckling infant..."
Vasily Safonov ignored all these barbs and, certain that the
new symphony was bound to hit the big time, he put his whole soul into
this work... There was a mixed reaction to the new symphony's premiere
with some people applauding like mad and others booing and noisily making
for the exit doors... The critics just couldn't make enough fun of the
Second Symphony.
"They should have called it a cacophony, not a symphony"
fumed one such critic. "There is no consonance there and all you can
hear for about 40 minutes is one long series of horrible disharmonies."
And more: "One can only wonder why such a well-known conductor
like Vasily Safonov could take up such a piece of rubbish, this terrible
concoction of wild-sounding notes and a total lack of melody."
It's hard to believe all this initial criticism of Alexander
Skryabin's Second Symphony which is now appreciated as an absolutely clear
and beautiful piece of music... On March 26th a group of lovers of piano
music gathered in the Small Hall of the Moscow Conservatory to listen to
a performance by the young but already popular pianist Nikolai Metner.
It was going to be the first solo performance by Nikolai Metner,
the darling of Moscow's concert-going public who only recently had graduated
with honors from the Conservatory's composers' and pianistic departments
and, just a month before, had performed Pyotr Tchaikovsky's First Piano
Concerto with a symphony orchestra.
On that day Metner was playing only his own compositions, something
he did all his life. Considering himself a composer and only then a pianist,
he uses each performance as an opportunity to popularise his compositional
talents. Voluntarily forsaking the financial comfort of a performing musician,
Nikolai Metner realised he would never be rich knowing all too well that
no one had ever earned a fortune writing music in his lifetime.
His first solo concert was a resounding success as was amply
proved by an appreciative article that appeared in the following day's
edition of the Russkiye Vedomosti newspaper:
"The 23 year-old pianist Nikolai Metner was playing yesterday
and his performance bristled with energy, so young and fresh. Technically,
he is no slouch either and his own compositions were very good and warmly
welcomed by the large audience." In 1903 the prominent Moscow music
publisher Pyotr Yurgenson opened in one of his stores a special room where
people could read music magazines free. The reading room offered a large
selection of music publications in Russian, Czech, German, French and English
and they were also planning to open a reference department with dictionaries,
catalogues and calendars available to the readers. The Imperial Academy
of Sciences launched a project to publish songs recorded by the well-known
collector of Russian folk songs Yevgeniya Linyova in villages throughout
central Russia. The first issue consisted of 22 songs each conveying the
characteristic features of each tune. Several versions of each were given
as they existed in various parts of central Russia. A Russian Symphony
Society was established in New York with a view to familiarizing the American
public with the best Russian compositions. The initial programs included
performances of music written by Mikhail Glinka, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov,
Pyotr Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rakhmaninoff all conducted by Modest Altshuller
12 years after he graduated from the Moscow Conservatory. Russian pianist
Alexander Ziloti and cellist Anatoly Brandukov offered a very successful
series of performances in Leipzig and Frankfurt given as part of a series
of concerts organized by Germany's "Museum" music
society. The program consisted exclusively of compositions by
Pyotr Tchaikovsky who was then the best loved composer in Germany. Also
in 1903 the white-columned and very prestigious Hall of St.Petersburg's
Noble Assembly was playing host to concerts given by the hugely popular
Gypsy singer Varya Panina. Before that she would only sing in restaurants
but her popularity had since surged so high that she could now easily fill
any concert hall, even the Imperial Mariinsky Theater.
Varya Panina first hit the stage at the tender age of 14. She
started off singing with a Gypsy choir at a restaurant frequented by rich,
free-spending, merchants. Completely illiterate, the young girl learned
her songs off records, but the way she sang them would send shivers down
the spines of her numerous fans. Among her admirers were Leo Tolstoy, Anton
Chekhov and even Emperor Nicholas the Second. Varya Panina went out on
stage wearing somber, expressly unflashy attires. She was absolutely plain
and unwomanly and her voice was coarse and low. And still, her capacity
audiences were going wild, showering her with flowers and paying exorbitant
fees. Varya Panina was one of the richest women in Russia, but she was
never happy always plagued with illnesses. She died early from a heart
failure never living to celebrate her 40th birthday...
THE RUSSIAN MUSICAL HIGHLIGHTS of
the year 1903 was prepared for you by Olga Fyodorova.
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