Soviet Chamber Music - Schnittke, Part, Gubaidulina, Ustovolskaya

Portents of dissent and change pervade the chamber music of the Soviet Union’s later years. Many of its composers – including Arvo Pärt, Sofia Gubaidulina, Alfred Schnittke, Viktor Galina Ustvolskaya – were writing music that began to break from the “Socialist realism” mandated by the Ministry of Culture, and laid the groundwork for new directions in post-Warsaw Pact music.

Northern Flowers returns to international availability David Geringas’s perfectly curated program of late Soviet chamber music with cello, coupled with one of the earliest Western recordings of music by Ustvolskaya, the provocative Composition No. 1 that plumbs the extreme ranges of piccolo and bassoon with piano.

Alfred Schnittke: Sonata for Cello and Piano
1 I. Largo 3:13
2 II. Presto 6:08
3 III. Largo 8:40

4 Sofia Gubaidulina: In Croce for cello and organ 13:47

5 Viktor Suslin: Sonata for Cello and Percussion 13:04

6 Arvo Pärt: Spiegel im Spiegel 8:14
David Geringas, cello
with
Tatjana Schatz, piano (1-3, 6) • Edgar Krapp, organ (4) •
Markus Stekeler & Willem Zien, percussion (5)

A co-production with Bayerischer Rundfunk
Recorded in 1985 (1-3) and 1986 (4) at Bayerischer Rundfunk, Munich; 1986 (5) at
the Musikhochschule Munchen, and 1990 (6).
Producers: Wolfgang Schreiner (1-3, 5), Eberhard Schnellen, Es-dur (6)
Balance Engineer: H. von Knobelsdorff (1-3, 5); Ulrich Kraus (4)

Galina Ustvolskaya: Composition No. 1 "Dona nobis pacem"
7 I. 6:53
8 II. 6:19
9 III. 3:47
Bernd Osten, piccolo • Walter Hilgers, tuba
Werner Hagen, piano
Recorded December 1993 in Studio 10, NDR Hamburg
Producer: Gerald Götze
Engineer: Johannes Kutzner
Technical Assistants: Sabine Kaufmann, Suse Wöllmer