César Cui - Kaleidoscope; Violin Sonata (Peter Sheppard; Aaron Shorr)

Information

Composer: César Cui

• (01) Kaleidoscope, 24 pieces for violin & piano, Op. 50
• (25) Violin Sonata in D major, Op. 86

Peter Sheppard, violin
Aaron Shorr, piano

Date: 1994 (01-24), 1995 (25-27)
Label: Olympia

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Review

Cesar Cui is best known as the least known of the Russian moguchaya kuchka, the 'mighty handful' of Balakirev, Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin, Mussorgsky and himself, and perhaps as a critic whose pen was widely feared. His services to Russian music included the completion of Dargomizhsky's Stone Guest and Mussorgsky's Sorochinsky Fair; his own music languishes, even his opera William Ratcliff (among 15). He was not Russian at all, and once observed that, being half-French and half-Lithuanian, he had no feeling for Russian music. He was indeed kaleidoscopic, as the suite here suggests.

The pieces that take note of Russian interests do so from afar – possibly a sly allusion to Glinka's Kamarinskaya with the changing background of ''Danse rustique'', a re-use of one of the Serbian tunes Tchaikovsky had included in his Marche slave. At the centre is a sequence, ''Barcarola'', ''Prelude'', ''Mazurka'', ''Valse'', suggesting Chopin in title, but only in title: there is no appreciation of Chopin's originalities. These are, in fact, salon pieces, many of them not too hard on the fingers, and all of them easy on undemanding ears. The Sonata is an extended version of them, deploying an amiable melodic manner while not troubling itself with matters of formal organization. Peter Sheppard and Aaron Shorr take it all as lightly as it deserves.

-- John Warrack, Gramophone

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César Cui (18 January [O.S. 6 January] 1835 – 13 March 1918) was a Russian composer and music critic of French and Lithuanian descent. He was a member of group "The Five", although Cui's works are not so nationalistic as those of the other members. As a writer on music, Cui contributed almost 800 articles between 1864 and 1918 to various newspapers and other publications in Russia and Europe. As an officer of the Imperial Russian Army he rose to the rank of Engineer-General (compared to full General), taught fortifications in Russian military academies and wrote a number of monographs on the subject.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9sar_Cui

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Peter Sheppard Skærved (born 1966) is a British violinist, who has regularly appeared as a soloist in over 30 countries. He is the dedicatee of well over 200 works for solo violin and the only British violinist to have been invited to play on Paganini’s violin il Cannone more than once. Sheppard Skærved records for NMC, Chandos, Naxos, Metier, Toccata, and has won awards from the BBC Music Magazine, been nominated for a Gramophone Award, as well as a GRAMMY for a concerto recording in 2007. He plays on a 1698 Stradivari owned by Joseph Joachim from the collections of the Royal Academy of Music.

http://www.peter-sheppard-skaerved.com/biography/

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Pianist Aaron Shorr has established an international career as soloist, chamber musician and educator. As well as appearing regularly at London’s South Bank, he has toured extensively as a recitalist and chamber musician worldwide. He has worked as duo partner with Peter Sheppard Skærved for over a decade, and their recordings of Beethoven have won universal critical acclaim. Shorr has given countless premières, including works by Hans Werner Henze, George Rochberg, Sadie Harrison, David Matthews, Paul Moravec, Elliott Schwartz, Jörg Widmann and Kenneth Hesketh, among others.

http://www.naxos.com/person/Aaron_Shorr/12159.htm

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