Music of the Russian Silver Age

Details

When:
No class on March 7

Where: Rincon Congregational Church

Cost: $185.00 for 7 session(s)

Type: In Person

Category:

• Humanities Courses
• Music & Theatre
• World History

Instructor: Alexander Tentser studied piano performance at the celebrated Gnessin Music Institute in Moscow. In 1990 he immigrated to the United States and earned his doctorate in musical arts at the University of Arizona.
Alexander Tentser

The Russian revolution of 1917 was a cataclysmic event that completely changed the course of the history in this country and had a profound influence all around the world. The Russian Silver Age is a time period in art history before and after the revolution, around 1880 to 1925. The Russian Golden age was the first true blossoming of arts during the first half of the 19th century, Pushkin and Gogol in literature and Glinka in music. In the end of the 19th century Russian poets and writers began experimenting with symbolism which initially developed in France. In music, symbolism found expression in mystical compositions of Alexander Scriabin and early works of Sergei Prokofiev. Gradually, in spite of the very popular following of the late Romantic Russian composers Sergei Rachmaninoff, Anton Arensky and Alexander Glazounov, a new generation of modernists developed it before and after the revolution. Modernism was strongly expressed in Stravinsky’s ballets Petroushka and even more so in The Rite of Spring which initially caused an immense scandal. Sergei Prokofiev’s operas The Fiery Angel and The Love of Three Oranges and his first three piano concertos were seen as extremely modernistic and cutting edge works at the time. After the death of Vladimir Lenin, the Communist Party clamped down creativity and persecuted modernism which they associated with the capitalistic values and lifestyle. The Silver Age ended around 1925 and a new era, often called “social realism” was officially pronounced in 1929. Hear the works of Sergei Rachmaninoff, Alexander Scriabin, Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev, Dmitri Shostakovitch and many others performed by pianist Alexander Tentser.