Prokofiev
Another favorite Russian composer of mine (along with Shosty). Sergei P. was fond of 
making his music sound like machines whirring away in a big Russian factory: aggressive and driving, but in playful sort of way. This machinistic style inevitably, and suddnely, switches into a grand, lush melody. Expect the unexpected with Prokofiev, he likes twists and turns and weird angles and “wrong” notes. His music is like walking along a ledge - it always feels like the tonality is about to give way, but never quite does.
He uses dissonance, rapid tempo changes, and sharp contrasts in melody. He’ll go from stone-cold headstrong factory sounds to swooping romantic melodies in a heartbeat. These are all on top of a strong, traditional-ish sense of melody and tonality though, he never gets too far from the romantic and classical foundations which preceeded him. Nothing like the freaky twelve-tone serialists.
He was oppressed by the Soviet regime just as Shosty was, but lived outside of Russia for the first part of his life. He ended up dying the same day (and of the same condition) as Stalin did. All the real flowers were used up for Stalin’s death and at his funeral there were just paper ones. Poor old Sergei.
Musical Snippets
- Romeo and Juliet, the Montagues and Capulets - This is a pretty famous piece. A big serious, pounding, bassline and serious Russian strings doing there thing over the top. (buy at Amazon)
- Piano Sonata No. 7, First movement - A piece for solo piano. It starts off with a skittish little melody which gets attacked by a dissonant beast of and interruption. Mechanical and on the edge, but not as mechanical as… (buy at Amazon)
- Symphony No. 2, First movement - This symphony is known as “Iron and Steel”, and you can kinda see why listening to the absolutely brutal start. It took me many listens before I understood this piece even a bit, but am now completely in love with it. This is about as crazily factory-like as Prokofiev gets. (buy at Amazon)
- Symphony No. 1, First movement - This on the other hand is from his “classical” symphony in which he emulates one of the original bad boys of classical, F. J. Haydn, a contemporary of Mozart. It’s an entirely different affair, a light, smirky melody with a definite tang of Prokofiev about it. (buy at Amazon)
- Symphony No. 7, First movement - This is his last symphony. It’s an example of his lyrical (meaning it sounds kind of like the way somebody would sing) style of melody writing. (buy at Amazon)
