Mussorgsky & Prokofiev (Ilia Radoslavov)

PRE-ORDER ONLY. CD RELEASE and SHIPPING OCTOBER 21, 2022

This CD is partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.

Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition and Prokofiev’s Ten Pieces from Romeo and Juliet are wonderful works of programmatic music—i.e, instrumental music associated to a story, painting or some other “outside” referent. They are collections of tableaux, which, in the case of Prokofiev, draw meaning from Shakespeare’s play and, in the case of Mussorgsky, rely on their titles and the images they conjure.

They are also some of the most imaginative pieces for the piano. Consistent with the fanciful stories and images that inspired them, they call for sonorities that go from the tender and limpid to the overpowering, awe-inspiring; from the down-to earth to the profoundly reminiscent and evocative; from the everyday to the fantastic; and from the whimsical—through the mesmerizing experience of pure fantastic energy—to the impenetrably robust.

Modest Mussorgsky (1839-1881) Pictures at an Exhibition

Promenade

1. The Gnome

Promenade

2. The Old Castle

Promenade

3. Tuileries (Children Quarrelling at Play)

4. Bydlo

Promenade

5. Ballet of Unhatched Chicks

6. Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle

Promenade

7. Limoges. The Market (The Great News)

8. Catacombae (Sepulchrum romanum)

Con mortius in lingua mortua

9. The Hut on Hen’s Legs (Baba Yaga)

10. The Great Gate of Kiev

Sergei Prokofiev (1891 - 1953) Ten Piano Pieces from

Romeo and Juliet, Op. 75

1. Folk Dance

2. Scene

3. Minuet

4. Young Juliet

5. Masks

6. Montagues and Capulets

7. Friar Laurence

8. Mercutio

9. Dance of the Girls With Lilies

10. Romeo and Juliet Before Parting