DESCRIPTION:
Alexei Stanchinsky (1888 - 1914), 12 Sketches, Op.1 (1911 - 1913)

Performed by Nikolai Fefilov

00:00 - No. 1 Moderato
01:05 - No. 2 Presto
01:41 - No. 3 Vivace
02:15 - No. 4 Lento cantibile
04:20 - No. 5 Allegro
05:07 - No. 6 Andante epico
07:43 - No. 7 Adagio teneramente
10:13 - No. 8 Molto vivace
11:07 - No. 9 Largamente
13:35 - No. 10 Con moto
14:24 - No. 11 Allegro con spirito
15:09 - No. 12 Presto assai

Contemporary with Scriabin's Eighth, Ninth and Tenth Sonatas and Vers la flamme, Rachmaninov's Bells and Second Sonata, Stravinsky's Rite of Spring and Prokofiev's first two piano concertos, a handful of aphorisms comprise the later ones. An experience without precedent at once personal and inquiring - epic, nervy, voluptuous, abrasive, bleak, visionary, sombre, cynical... veiled by memories of Mussorgsky, of Scriabin, of the virtuoso Romantics of the European stage... a compound of retrospective vocabulary and futuristic language -- their spirit is extraordinary.

Stanchinsky wrote five piano sonatas: the form mattered to him and, like Medtner, he cultivated it with Imagination and Intensity. Provocatively, the two movement Second Sonata in G combines old-world Beethovenian baroque homage (a slow opening 6/16 "progressively tonal" Fuga) with new-age assault (a brilliant closing "toccata" in 11/8 - the "modo russico" of Mussorgsky's Pictures).

These sketches were the only of his works of his to be printed during his brief life, dedicated to his sister. The Moscow periodical Muzika, reviewing htem in 1915, opined "By the word "Sketches" is suggested somethign elusive, something merely sketched in and unfinished, fortuitous and casual. But these epieces of Stanchinsky are not accurately described, for the present us living throughts and feelings -- creative outbursts of the soul expressed in definite and strictly musical form. They do not in the least resemble an Opus 1, but seem rather to be the emanation of the vivid imrpessions of a profoundly experienced individual -- the essence of a mature and universal comprehension".

RIP Hexameron: March 31, 2007 - February 29th, 2016