Herman Galynin - Piano Music, Vol. 1 (Olga Solovieva)

Information

Composer: Herman Galynin

• (01) Sonata Triad
• (04) Suite
• (09) Four Preludes
• (13) Waltz
• (14) Dance
• (15) Scherzo
• (16) Spanish Fantasy
• (17) Three Pieces from The Tamer Tamed
• (20) At the Zoo

Olga Solovieva, piano

Date: 2008

Label: Toccata

https://toccataclassics.com/product/galynin-piano-music-1/

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Review

Invention and energy abound: this piano music should be better known

Herman Galynin (found as German Galïnin in New Grove) was a pupil of Myaskovsky and Shostakovich in the 1940s. His death in 1966 at the age of 44 was much mourned by Soviet musicians. But his career had been blighted by illness (Louis Blois’s essay queries the widespread assumption of some kind of mental disorder) and by the aftermath of the 1948 anti-formalism campaign, which together meant that his output never blossomed in the manner of his near-contemporaries Boris Tchaikovsky and Mieczyslaw Weinberg.

To the best of my knowledge, no Western sheet-music publisher has yet taken Galynin under their wing, and there would surely be a market for his attractive invention, quick-witted energy and steely substance, expressed in idiomatic piano-writing that steers clear of flashy opportunism. All the music on this disc comes from the composer’s teens and twenties (some of it he revised near the end of his life), and its debts to Prokofiev and Shostakovich – occasionally also to Scriabin – are heavy and numerous. On the other hand, it is interesting to note that Galynin was into the “DSCH” motif well before Shostakovich made open use of it as his monogram, and the “Waltz” and “Dance” would make delightful encore pieces. In any case, this is need-to-know repertoire for anyone seeking fresh perspectives on Soviet music.

Olga Solovieva plays with fiery conviction throughout, and the recording quality and documentation testify to admirable team-effort. I am slightly surprised that all of Galynin’s piano music does not fit on one disc, so there must be more of it than I am aware of. In any case, roll on Volume 2.

-- David Fanning, Gramophone

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

German (Herman) Galynin (30 March 1922, in Tula, Russia – 18 June 1966, in Moscow) was a Russian composer. He studied at the Moscow Conservatory under Dmitri Shostakovich and Nikolay Myaskovsky (in composition) and Igor Sposobin (in music theory). Galynin was awarded the Stalin Prize in 1951 for his "Epic Poem" (1950). Despite falling seriously ill with schizophrenia in 1951, he remained an active composer. Galynin's work is a bright phenomenon in Soviet classical music though still underestimated, unfortunately, in his homeland and largely overlooked in the West.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Galynin

***

Olga Solovieva is a Russian pianist and teacher who was born in Moscow. She graduated from the Gnessin Academy of Music and took there a post-graduate course as an assistant to Leonid Blok. Solovieva teaches the Chamber Ensemble at the Gnessins College of Music, Moscow, and regularly has given master classes in Russia, Belgium and Ireland. She was prizewinner at several international competition and has performed in Russia and abroad, collaborating with renowned musicians and ensembles. Her discography includes many recordings for Naxos, Northern Flowers, Toccata Classics and Albany Records.
https://www.naxos.com/person/Olga_Solovieva/11697.htm
https://www.olga-solovieva.ru/

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

FLAC, tracks

Links in comment

Enjoy!