Ustvolskaya - Piano Sonata No. 5 (Part 2/2)

Piano Sonata No. 5 in ten movements (1986)

"Composed no less than twenty-nine years after its predecessor, it is soon clear that it engages with the same spiritual preoccupations, although the musical style has become more radical in the intervening years. The repeated clock-like chords of the Fourth Sonata find their counterpart in the Fifth's obsessive Db in the centre of the keyboard, which like a sun at the centre of a planetary system binds together all ten movements. This one note is pivotal, able to attract lines inwards towards itself and to radiate power outwards, driving the music forward.

Ustvolskaya's mastery of large scale structures is nowhere more apparent. The ten short movements play without a break, related in numerous ways, but it is a single powerful drama that unfolds in these ten linear images.

The fifth movement, at the heart of this sonata, is one of the composer's most challenging musical statements. The two clusters reiterated at terrifyingly high but carefully graded dynamic levels are revealed as the source of a rich and abundant resonance, rather than the flat wall of sound they at first appear to be. Locked within their stark insistent power is, I believe, the core of Ustvolskaya's vision, poised between the insight which arises when the human spirit is reduced to absolute zero, and when, in physical response, the instrument is taken to the extreme limits of its tonal capacity."

Galina Ustvolskaya (1919-2006) was a relatively obscure 20th-century Russian composer. Before the 1970s she was virtually unknown to the West and only recently have scholars and performers taken an interest in her music. From 1939 to 1947 Ustvolskaya studied with Shostakovich, who praised her music and unique compositional voice; he even quoted some of her themes in his own music. It was later revealed that there was a romantic relationship between teacher and pupil, and that Ustvolskaya declined Shostakovich's proposal of marriage.

Although Ustvolskaya, like many composers operating in the Soviet regime, appeased the State by writing propaganda pieces, she also wrote modern absolute music "for the drawer." She has been called by one critic "the lady with the hammer" owing to her tendency for dissonant counterpoint and tone clusters. Many of her works reflect her fervent devotion to Christianity, and are characterized as austere, esoteric, declamatory, and without clear influences from other composers.

Category:

Music

Tags:

• galina
• ustvolskaya
• schnittke
• gubaidulina

[RaRaLandEQ]

@4StringTheory hehheh. That is true. Mijn Nederlands is niet volkomen onberispelijk, ik woon er maar 10-11jaar, maar het was inderdaad veel meer gewelddadig gespeeld dan deze uitvoering(?).

Heb jij ook Gubaidulina gezien bij de MGIJ? Ik wil zo graag Mutter's uitvoering van "In Tempus Praesens"

bijwonen... al heb ik wel Lamsma's interpretatie van "Offertorium" gezien in de Concertgebouw Amsterdam, vond ik Lamsma een echte tegenvaller

[4StringTheory]

@RaRaLandEQ Ja, ik heb er al kaartjes liggen voor de Ustvolskaya symposium en concerten!

Haha, laat je niet gek maken door de macho muziek psychopaten, ik begrijp wat je bedoelt met de ffffff

en de ff want toen ik dit stuk in Amsterdam(of misshien was het Utrecht) had gehoord, speelde het

(conservatorium) pianiste werkelijk met veel meer kracht. : ) En ja, Gubaidulina is super lief vrouwtje.

[RaRaLandEQ]

@xXLeDrewXx Thank you : ) I'm honoured

[xXLeDrewXx]

@RaRaLandEQ So you know nothing about music? Well done.

[RaRaLandEQ]

Am i crazy or does this pianist' ff sound just as loud as her/his ffffff? Not to mention the ff sound even louder due to the cluster.

Saw a piece of hers performed by Reinbert de Leeuw's team here(Amsterdam) years ago where they were slamming throughout the piece with a huge hammer (figured that's why Schönberger called her "The Hammer").

They are having a Ustvolskaya festival here in Amsterdam at the Muziekgebouw end of May. Working there is great. Got to meet Gubaidulina once too. An angel!

[lovesGenet]

pianist is afraid of making ugly sounds but its what she wants . why else write fffff! This woman is a god.She has influenced my work !!!