Notes and Editorial Reviews
Martin Anderson's determination and unerring judgement are well
kent. I first remember meeting him as long ago as the Ole Schmidt
Havergal Brian Gothic concert at the Royal Albert Hall in 1980.
After that his activities within the Havergal Brian Society
kept us fitfully in touch. I continue to follow and celebrate
his Toccata Press which has a deeply distinctive catalogue including
studies of Franz Schmidt, Percy Grainger, Ronald Stevenson and
Havergal Brian not to mention producing (to date) two extraordinary
anthologies of the music journalism of Havergal Brian. Some
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years ago Toccata moved into recording. They now have a catalogue
as individual, challenging even astonishing as the written word
side of the venture.
Typically, the essay for this Vasilenko disc is well written,
diligently referenced with footnotes and extendw across 12 pages
in English only. These are by the violist here and are the exact
antithesis of the sort of perfunctory journalese to which some
liner-notes resort.
Vasilenko is another neglected figure who was active during the Soviet
years. He has a long catalogue to his name. Two of his pictorial
nationalist suites were recorded on Marco
Polo. The Viola Sonata has been recorded before, once by
Georgy Bezrukhov. It was he who extraordinarily also gave us
a Melodiya LP of one of the York Bowen viola sonatas. How did
that come about? The second recording is on Naxos played by
Igor Fedotov. Vasilenko wrote five symphonies, concertos for balalaika,
trumpet, cello, harp, clarinet, piano and horn, operas and ballets,
seven each and much else.
The Viola Sonata is not lengthy but across its four movements
it is a work of great and sometimes astonishing fervour which
often makes you sit bolt upright with some surprising compositional
coup. It is well up there with the Arthur Benjamin Viola Sonata
(Dutton have just issued the three Benjamin string concertos in the works and the viola concerto is the viola sonata in orchestral dress).
The four Lute pieces and six comprised in Zodiakus
reflect the tangy antiquity of the originals: sometimes genteel
but at other times impressively virtuosic as in the inspirational
and somewhat Bachian Knights (tr. 9). The pin-bright
Bach influence can also be sampled throughout Zodiakus
along with various ancient dance forms. These are always fluently
and freshly done. The 1952 Four Pieces are similarly
nicely done but with none of the retrospection of the Lute
and Zodiakus sequences. The Etude, for example,
wittily picks up on Rimsky's Bumble-Bee.
Lullaby and Sleeping River are typical
in their moods of their titles. In their steadily swung quasi-Delian progress
these are touching and telling creations. Oriental Dance brings
us into contact with the long Russian tradition of the music
of the near-Asian republics - Gliere, Borodin and Ippolitov-Ivanov
are the forebears but Vasilenko is freshly inventive. This is
not a reheated confection.
Whether or not through Toccata's cleverly devised Discoveries
Club you should track down this stylishly done disc. It will
more than suit if you have any interest in the multiple torrents
of musical activity over which the USSR presided. Do not be
too quick to deride it all as communist tosh no matter how ‘reassuring’
such generalisations may be in the face of a
huge world closed to the West for so many years yet now bewilderingly
open for exploration.
-- Rob Barnett, MusicWeb International
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Works on This Recording
1.
Sonata for viola & Piano, Op. 46 by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Nicholas Walker (Piano),
Elena Artamonova (Viola)
Written: 1923
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 8 Minutes 37 Secs.
2.
Lullaby, for viola & piano by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Nicholas Walker (Piano),
Elena Artamonova (Viola)
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 4 Minutes 1 Secs.
3.
Pieces (4) on Old Lute Music, for viola & piano, Op. 35 by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Nicholas Walker (Piano),
Elena Artamonova (Viola)
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 14 Minutes 11 Secs.
4.
Sleeping River, for viola & piano by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Elena Artamonova (Viola),
Nicholas Walker (Piano)
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 2 Minutes 21 Secs.
5.
Oriental Dance, for viola & piano, Op. 47 by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Elena Artamonova (Viola),
Nicholas Walker (Piano)
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 5 Minutes 35 Secs.
6.
Suite Zodiakus I.A.S., after Unknown Authors of the 18th Century, for viola & piano by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Elena Artamonova (Viola),
Nicholas Walker (Piano)
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 12 Minutes 11 Secs.
7.
Pieces (4), for viola & piano by Sergey Nikiforovich Vasil
Performer:
Elena Artamonova (Viola),
Nicholas Walker (Piano)
Written: 1953
Venue: Duke's Hall, Royal Academy of Music, Lon
Length: 8 Minutes 12 Secs.
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