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Three (or more…) Kreutzer Sonata’s

February 22nd, 2007 | No Comments | Posted in beethoven, classical music, janacek, shostakovich

Sarah Chang. She played the Kreutzer Sonata this one time. Relevant huh?Well, you see, it got to to thinking, it did. It being the subtitle, the alternative name, to Janacek’s string quartet number one. It’s called “The Kreutzer Sonata”, which initially seems more than just a little weird, as it’s not a sonata at all. Now, the other piece of information I gleaned from somewhere in my limited musical past and experience is that Beethoven’s violin sonata number 9 is also named this. Far more appropriately.

The really interesting thing is that the Janacek isn’t named after the Beethoven piece. Not directly anyway. It snakes through Tolstoy first. You see, apparently the T-dog (yeah, I’m calling Tolstoy the T-dog, you got a problem with that, fool?) wrote a book - also called The Kreutzer Sonata - referring to the emotional intensity of the Beethoven piece. Janacek’s version is based on that book. Confusing huh?

Even more confusing, but somewhat unifying, is that Sasha Chorny wrote a poem called The Kreutzer Sonata, referring to T-dog’s version, which Shostakovich set to music in op. 109, Satires (Pictures of the Past). In that song he uses a musical reference to Beethoven’s version. The Kreutzer Sonata really gets around.

Anyway, I now feel like I should go listen to the Beethoven and read the Tolstoy book.

A Bit o’ Birthday Janacek

February 21st, 2007 | No Comments | Posted in bartok, classical music, janacek

Yet another item in the deluge - the cascade, the inundation of CD’s I’m having thrown all over me at the moment - arrived today. It arrived dressed merrily in a snazzy green get-up fresh from the fertile fields of Amazon, that’s the first time that gift wrap has been on this end of a gift exchange from me. Cheers to the folks in Sheffield for the Janacek. My first Janacek (perhaps that should be in all caps for historical significance) in fact. I don’t know precisely, exactly, 100% Janacek. What a playful little lion he is.why it was on my wishlist to begin with. I suspect late night NPR sessions are behind it.

Anyway, it sounds like whatever forces stuck it on the list were not misguided, it’s a goodun

Since I don’t know a blind bloody thing about old Leos J, a bit of Wikipedia skimmage was necessary. He was actually born really early, 1853, just a bit after Tchaikovsky, and before Elgar, Mahler, and Debussy (according to this timeline). Apparently he didn’t really do much that was very appreciated until after 1900, when he was about 60. On first listen this seems to gel pretty well, it sounds like firmly 20th century tonality to me.

Actually, the string quartets (which is what I, like, got) sound quite similar to Bartok. Old Janacek was apparently into folk song and modal tonality as well. Nicely, it doesn’t sound quite as vicious as Bartok can, it’s more smoothly romantic and continuously melodic, a bit Shostakovichy even. It sounds promising. The quartets have wickedly enticing names as well: “The Kreutzer Sonata” and “Initmate Letters”. I like named pieces.