Page 209 - (DK) The Classical Music Book - Big Ideas Simply Explained
P. 209
NATIONALISM 1830–1920 207
MUSSORGSKY
TYPIFIES THE GENIUS
OF RUSSIA
PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION (1874),
MODEST PETROVICH MUSSORGSKY
he Russian composer Boris Godunov in January 1874,
IN CONTEXT Modest Mussorgsky’s which marked the public high point
T Pictures at an Exhibition of his career. The piano suite was
FOCUS is a piano suite in 10 movements. not performed in the composer's
Nationalism in 19th- Each movement was inspired by lifetime, but its intensity and
century Russian music
the work of fellow Russian Viktor complexity, and distinctly Russian
BEFORE Hartmann, an architect and artist. subject matter, helped to achieve
1815 In St. Petersburg, Mussorgsky belonged to a the ultimate ambition of the “Five”
Venetian-born Catterino Cavos generation of composers who, in to give Russian music its own
composes Ivan Susanin, the the 1860s, gave Russian music unmistakable voice. ■
first opera about Russian its first distinctive voice. He was
characters, based on Russian part of a group nicknamed the
history, and incorporating “Five,” also known as the “Mighty
Handful,” who sought to create
Russian folk music.
music without being confined by
1836 Mikhail Glinka’s A Life western European conventions.
for the Tsar has its premiere Besides Mussorgsky, the “Five”
in St. Petersburg. It is the first were Mily Balakirev (1837–1910),
all-sung opera by a native the group’s initial guiding spirit;
Russian composer. Aleksandr Borodin (1833–1887), a
scientist as well as a musician;
AFTER César Cui, best known as a critic;
1896 Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov and Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov,
undertakes the first of his who played a key role in mentoring
revisions of Mussorgsky’s a new generation of composers,
opera Boris Godunov. For including Aleksandr Scriabin The early, alcohol-induced death
decades, these remain the and Sergei Rachmaninoff. of Mussorgsky, painted here by Ilya
most-performed versions. Pictures at an Exhibition Repi in 1881, the year that he died, left
was composed shortly after the Rimsky-Korsakov and other composers
1922 French composer premiere of Mussorgsky’s opera to finish or revise his work.
Maurice Ravel produces an
orchestrated version of See also: Dvorˇák’s Symphony No. 9 212–215 ■ Le Sacre du printemps 246–251 ■
Pictures at an Exhibition. Romeo and Juliet 272 ■ Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony 274–279
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