Search - Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Kocian Quartet, Prague Wind Quintet :: Rimsky-Korsakov: Quintet for Piano and Winds; String Sextet

Marvelous European Art...

Sébastien Melmoth | Hôtel d'Alsace, PARIS | 12/01/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

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Rare disc features two exceptional chamberworks by Russian great Nikolai R.-Korsakov (1844-1908).



Mozart of course invented the genre of Wind-Piano Quintet with his exquisite masterwork K.452 which he himself highly esteemed in a letter to his father, calling it his finest work to that date.



Mozart: Quintet for Piano and Wind Instruments; Piano Quartet in G minor; Sonata for Two Pianos /

Mozart: Piano Quintet, K452; Adagio and Rondo, K617; Beethoven: Quintet for Piano and Winds, Op. 16 /

Mozart: Oboe Quartet; Horn Quintet; Piano and Wind Quintet /



Youthful Beethoven, following his "hero" Mozart, produced a Wind-Piano Quintet (Op. 16) for the same ensemble and in the same key (Eb). Unfortunately, this homage has been too often misconstrued as imitation--which of course it is absolutely not. Beethoven's Piano Quintet is an utterly original work of art featuring many echt-Beethovenian characheristics in embryo. It is a charming, richly mammalian thing: warm of milk and blood with bigger bones and more muscle than Mozart's cool, hollow-boned and flighty avain piece.



Mozart, Beethoven: Quintets for Piano & Winds /

Mozart, Beethoven: Quintets For Piano & Winds [Germany] /



Withal, it's probably safe to say that R.-Korsakov's Quintet (in Bb--a good key for wind instruments) is Mozartian in ethos, featuring wonderfully ideomatic part-writing and hints of that perfumed Orientalism we so admire in much Russian music. A fairly substantial work, it runs nearly :30mins.



Korsakov's String Sextet--(like the Quintet)--dates from the year 1876. In the delightfully Spring-like key of A-major, the work is divided into five parts with movement IV (andante expressivo) being the works aesthetic apex. Playing time :33mins.



Like Mendelssohn's Octet, this type of mutiple string ensemble can be subdivided into two ensembles (in this case, two string trios) which play in tandem with each other. Korsakov's Sextet joins a small but unique genre with masterworks by Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Dvorak, Reger, Schoenberg, et alii.



Brahms: Complete String Quartets, Quintets & Sextets

Tchaikovsky: Souvenir de Florence; Arensky: Quartet in A minor

Max Reger: String Sextet in F

Schoenberg: Transfigured Night / String Trio

Dvorák: String Quintet, Op. 97; String Sextet, Op. 48



(The Gustav Moreau-ean cover-art doubleplus bonus.)

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