Lera Auerbach Is In My Hands
Well, kind of. The actual American/Russian not-very-much-older-than-me composer chick isn’t, but a brand spanking new copy of one of her CD’s of piano compositions is. It’s called “Preludes and Dreams”, which is appropriate since it contains her 24 preludes for piano (Op. 41), a piece called Ten Dreams (Op. 45), and finally “Chorale, Fugue and Postlude” (Op. 31). It has a whopping 37 tracks, more than any other classical (and probably non-classical) CD I own, which makes me slightly worried about the Ballet Unfocusing Effect as I might call it from now on if I remember.
The BUE is what happens when there are two many separate movements which don’t particularly tie together. It means I often have a hard time digesting and appreciating a ballet (which is often independent 4 or 5 minute chunks) than I do a symphony (which is a wonderfully massive cohesive whole).
I shall reserve any kind of harsh judgment on Auerbach’s pieces though, they do seem to have a cohesive, similar, large-scale sort of feel to them. They’re all completely suicidal and miserable sounding. the first one of the “Dreams” is subtitled “As in a nightmare”, well, that pretty much applies across all of the Dreams and from what I can tell after a couple of listenings all the Preludes and in fact the entire CD.
This is not cheerful music.
It has the bleakness of Schnittke, but with the spacious semi-tonality of late Shostakovich. However, it isn’t nearly as grating and strident as the Schnittke which I have heard, which is a good thing. The smoothness makes it more powerful, more directly emotional. Schnittke often feels like someone dragging a rusty saw through my brain (which is just what you need, occasionally) whereas this is music to sit in a corner and go quietly insane to. It’s quiet and contemplative, but fundamentally restless and somewhat disturbing. It reminds of some of the bleakest bits from Shostakovich’s 15th string quartet, but for piano.
Hmmm. Maybe I’m not really selling it. I actually really do like it a lot! It’s definitely meaty, challenging stuff, not fluff with a bit of atonality thrown in to please the academics. It feels like it has real staying power. I think Auerbach is going to be major. Mosey on over to the listening room on her website to see if you might like her stuff.