Synopses & Reviews
This informative and wide-ranging guide places the original piano work in the context of Russian cultural life, considering in particular the work of the artist Victor Hartman, creator of the pictures that inspired Musorgsky's composition. A detailed synopsis takes the reader through each piece in turn, and subsequent chapters consider the musical language and structure. Michael Russ also describes the fate of the work in the hands of editors and performers and closes by surveying the best of the orchestrations, particularly Ravel's.
Synopsis
An informative and wide ranging guide which places Musorgsky's original piano work in the context of Russian cultural life.
Synopsis
This informative and wide-ranging guide places the original piano work in the context of Russian cultural life, considering in particular the work of the artist Victor Hartman, creator of the pictures that inspired Musorgsky's composition. A detailed synopsis takes the reader through each piece in turn, and subsequent chapters consider the musical language and structure. Michael Russ also describes the fate of the work in the hands of editors and performers and closes by surveying the best of the orchestrations, particularly Ravel's.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 94-95) and index.
Table of Contents
List of illustrations; Acknowledgements; Preface; 1. Pictures at an Exhibition and nineteenth-century music; 2. Musorgsky and Hartman; 3. Manuscript, publication and performance; 4. Looking at Musorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition; 5. Synopsis; 6. The musical language of Pictures at an Exhibition; 7. Harmony, scales, tonality and voice-leading in Pictures at an Exhibition; 8. Orchestrations and transcriptions of Pictures at an Exhibition; Appendix: list of principal transcriptions and orchestrations; Notes; Select bibliography.