This past Thanksgiving, I drove through the northern Virigina area, so for a time I was able to listen on my radio to WETA’s annual countdown of their listeners’ Top 100 classical music favorites. I was only able to hear a handful of the selections, so when I got home, I pulled up their website to view the complete Top 100 list, HERE.
I was familiar with 97 of the 100 works, so I thought I would listen to the three I've never heard. Last week, I listened to Marin Marais’ “The Bells of St. Genevieve,” #41 on the list. My comments and rating are HERE. This week I listened to Vasily Kalinnikov’s Symphony Number One, #94 on the list. Next week I will listen to #100, Florence Price’s Symphony Number Three in C Minor. I’m somewhat but not completely surprised that Kalinnikov’s symphony made the Top 100 list. On the one hand, it’s not a frequently played piece in the standard classical repertoire (at least not that I’m aware of); on the other hand, it employs a lot of bold brashness especially with blaring brass and lush strings in the final movement so I can understand why this is a crowd pleaser. For me? I liked it. I didn’t love it – but yes, I liked it. Kalinnikov’s symphony is made up of four movements:
The first movement begins with a main theme played in unison strings, and I don’t know if there is such a thing as a “Russian boat song” genre – similar perhaps to sea shanties but more in line with the Volga boat song – but it has a definite feel of a Russian boat song, and soon it moves into a Russian-boat-song-meets-Broadway fusion. There is a second theme developed later in the piece before returning to the opening theme, so the opening movement to the symphony is a bit long. Hmm…maybe Kalinnikov should have just concentrated on that first theme and then moved on. The second movement opens with quiet, pulsating strings, and then an oboe glides in with a melody as graceful as Saint-Saens’ “The Swan.” Though much of the piece was reminiscent of Saint-Saens’ magnum opus, Kalinnikov’s work ever quite reached that level of greatness. The third movement is a scherzo and contains Russian folk-music influences. As a result, it’s bouncy and more cheerful than the opening and second movements. The initial “boat-song” theme from the first movement opens the final movement, and it quickly moves to a more joyful rendition of the motif (predictably so as the key has changed from G minor to G major). Kalinnikov then revisits and transforms themes from the other two movements as well before concluding with a festive ending played by the full orchestra. For me, though, a more festive – and memorable – work for full orchestra is Dmitri Shostakovich’s “Festive Overture.” Kalinnikov’s symphony is worth a listen to, though, and I suspect it would be a fun and exciting piece to hear performed live.
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A New Hope:As the header above says, each week I will listen to a piece of classical music that I've never heard before, and then I will report out what I thought about it. Archives
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