Rimsky-korsakov: Snow Maiden / Golden Cockerel / Mlada

Czecho-S

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Cat No: 8550486

Release Date: 12 January 1999

Label: Naxos - Nxc / Naxos Classics

Packaging Type: Jewel Case

No of Units: 1

Barcode: 4891030504868

Genres: Classical

Composer/Series: RIMSKY-KORSAKOV

Description
Nikolay Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov (1844 - 1908)Operatic Suites Snow Maiden (Snegurochka): Suite The Golden Cockerel (Le coq d'or): Suite Mlada: SuiteNikolay Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov originally intended a navalcareer, following the example of his elder brother. He showed some musical ability even asa very small child, but at the age of 14 he entered the Naval Cadet College in St.Petersburg in pursuit of a more immediately attractive ambition. The city, in any case,offered musical opportunities. He continued piano lessons, but, more important than this,he was able to enjoy the opera and attend his first concerts.It was in 1861, the year before he completed his course at theNaval College, that Rimsky-Korsakov met Balakirev, a musician who was to become animportant influence on him, as he was on the young army officers Mussorgsky and Cui, whoalready formed part of his circle. The meeting had a far-reaching effect onRimsky-Korsakov's career, although in 1862 he set sail as a midshipman on a cruise thatwas to keep him away from Russia for the next two and a half years.On his return in 1865 Rimsky-Korsakov fell again under theinfluence of Balakirev. On shore there was more time for music and the encouragement heneeded for a serious application to music that resulted in compositions in which he showedhis early ability as an orchestrator and his deftness in the use of Russian themes, a giftthat Balakirev did much to encourage as part of his campaign to create a truly Russianform of music. In 1871 he took a position as professor of instrumentation and compositionat St. Petersburg Conservatory and the following year he resigned his Commission in thenavy, to become a civilian Inspector of Naval Bands, a position created for him throughpersonal and family influence.Rimsky-Korsakov's subsequent career was a distinguished one. Atthe same time he accepted the duty of completing and often orchestrating works leftunfinished by other composers of the new Russian school. As early as 1869 Dargomizhsky hadleft him the task of completing the opera The StoneGuest. Twenty years later he was to perform similar tasks for the music ofMussorgsky and for Borodin, both of whom had left much undone at the time of their deaths.Relations with Balakirev were not always easy andRimsky-Korsakov was to become associated with Belyayev and his schemes for the publicationof new Russian music, a connection that Balakirev could only see as disloyalty. There wereother influences on his composition, particularly with his first hearing of Wagner's Ringin 1889 and consequent renewed attention to opera, after a brief period of depression andsilence, the result of illness and death in his family.Rimsky-Korsakov was involved in the troubles of 1905, when hesided with the Conservatory students, joining with some colleagues in a public demand forpolitical reform, an action that brought his dismissal from the institution, to which hewas able to return when his pupil and friend Glazunov became
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