Sergei Prokofiev

Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953): Great Russian composer, pianist and conductor admired as one of the finest composers of the 20th century, whose music, including the delightful Peter and the Wolf and the exuberant “Classical” Symphony, is widely performed and recorded. Prokofiev thought of himself primarily as an opera composer, and he started early: he wrote his first opera when he was only nine years old.

Prokofiev's Sonata No. 2 in D major for Violin and Piano, Op. 94a (1943), is the composer's arrangement of his Sonata for Flute and Piano, Op. 94 (1942). The adaptation for violin was made at the request of a close friend of Prokofiev's, the legendary David Oistrakh (1908-1974), one of the greatest violinists of the 20th Century.

• YouTube-1st Mvt.

• YouTube-2nd Mvt.

Romeo Bids Juliet Farewell, Op. 75, no. 10

His ballet, Romeo and Juliet, Op. 64 (based on Shakespeare’s play), was composed during 1935-36, but the premiere was delayed due to worries with Stalin’s regime. Prokofiev reworked some of the ballet music as Romeo and Juliet: Ten Pieces for Piano, Op. 75, which he first performed in 1937.

--Intermezzo Sunday Concerts, March 18, 2007 (Gary Smart)

Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major, Op. 26

PROKOFIEV.....................Piano Concerto No. 3 in C major, Op. 26

................................................Andante – Allegro

................................................Tema con variazioni

................................................Allegro, ma non troppo

Biographer Simon Morrison reckons that the concert music of Sergei Prokofiev is played more often in America than that of any of his contemporaries. To put some of Prokofiev’s achievements in perspective, he wrote his "Classical" Symphony No. 1 in 1917, three years before Stravinsky took up neoclassicism, and his brilliant Piano Concerto No. 3 in 1921, three years before Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue and five before Bartók's Piano Concerto No. 1.

Abandoning the political uncertainty of his homeland after the Russian Revolution, Prokofiev set out for the United States in 1918. He was well-known in Europe as both pianist and composer, and he met with similar successes in America. But a delay in the production of The Love of Three Oranges (1920), newly-commissioned by the Chicago Opera, brought financial hardship. Moving to France in 1920, Prokofiev completed a commission for Serge Diaghilev's Ballet Russes, and Chout (The Buffoon) premiered to great acclaim in May 1921. By summer's end Prokofiev had finished hisPiano Concerto No. 3, having sketched all but two of the work's main themes through the previous decade. When he returned to the States for the October opera premiere, he carried the new concerto with him, and both works were well-received in Chicago.

Prokofiev’s Third Piano Concerto is the most popular of the five he wrote, and among all 20th-Century concerted works for piano and orchestra (not counting Rachmaninoff's) only those by Gershwin and Ravel rival its popularity. A solo clarinet begins the expansive melody that serves as an introduction to the driving, toccata-like principal theme of the sonata-form first movement; the contrasting secondary theme is a quirky gavotte punctuated with castanets, and the lyrical melody from the introduction returns for development. The second movement presents a balletic theme with five variations. Prokofiev’s finale is a rondo (ABACA-coda), but the gorgeous "C" part becomes an interpolated slow movement that might have made Rachmaninoff proud, with an eerie midsection akin to the “night music” Bartók was beginning to explore.

Prokofiev identified four compositional precepts that guided him: (1) a commitment to Classical structures and developmental techniques, (2) a quest for new sonorities and melodic shapes, (3) rhythmic drive, and (4) lyrical expressiveness; he might have added: (5) a sense of humor. No work exemplifies these better than his Piano Concerto No. 3.

Selections from Romeo and Juliet, Op. 64 (1935)

Two households, both alike in dignity,

In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,

From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,

Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.

From forth the fatal loins of these two foes

A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;

Whose misadventured piteous overthrows

Do with their death bury their parents' strife.

And so begins the most famous play in the world ... with a spoiler.

William Shakespeare penned these lines circa 1595, and through the centuries his epic tragedy has inspired more authors, composers and filmmakers than any other secular work. Yet as late as 1935, Sergei Prokofiev apparently became the first to write a ballet about the ill-fated lovers. With his Romeo and Juliet, Prokofiev composed the only full-length ballet that approaches the popularity of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker.

The Ukrainian enfant terrible abandoned post-revolutionary Russia for the Decadent West in 1918. As his star grew brighter, Prokofiev received recurring invitations to resume permanent residency in Soviet Russia. By the mid-1930s, with performance royalties waning and homesickness waxing, Prokofiev began to take the invitations seriously. In January 1936, the Soviets denounced Shostakovich, their heretofore favorite composer, providing an unexpected lure: Prokofiev jumped at the chance to become the biggest sturgeon in the pond. That spring he settled his family in Moscow.

Prokofiev returned to Mother Russia carrying his most recent disappointment: Romeo and Juliet. The ballet already had been rejected by both Leningrad's Kirov Theater and Moscow's Bolshoi. The biggest obstacle was Prokofiev's happy ending, with Juliet reviving in time to stop Romeo from drinking poison. The composer said this was necessary because, you know, dead people can't dance. The ballet companies remained unconvinced, however, and feared government censure for corrupting the beloved story. Prokofiev eventually restored The Bard's dénouement, and the revised ballet premiered in Brno, Czechoslovakia in 1938. Two years later the Kirov gave the Russian premiere, and Romeo and Juliet finally danced onto the Bolshoi's stage in 1946. Since then it has never left the international repertoire.

While still struggling for his own happy ending with the star-crossed score, Prokofiev was determined to get the music before the public, even without toe-shoes. He performed selections as 10 Pieces for Piano, Op. 75, and arranged two orchestral suites; he later culled a third suite to coincide with the first Bolshoi production. It is common to mix movements from the suites to suit the needs of individual concerts—which brings us to now.

1. Montagues and Capulets combines the ominous Introduction to Act III with Dance of the Knights, which introduces the Capulet clan during the Act I ballroom scene. It is the ballet's best-known music, and its bellicose haughtiness aptly conjures the feuding families. The blustering halts as Juliet enters and greets Paris, an older suitor who wishes to marry her. She dances a minuet with him, and the chilly formality is brilliantly underscored with violaportamenti tracing a filigree of flute melody against an icy background including harp, triangle and celesta.

2. The Child Juliet takes place that afternoon before the ball, as the exuberant Juliet and her friends tease the nursemaid while they primp and preen. Lady Capulet interrupts their frolic, hoping to persuade Juliet to accept a marriage proposal from the wealthy Paris.

3. Masks takes us to the Capulet's ball along with disguised, party-crashing Montagues: Romeo, his cousin Benvolio, and Mercutio, Romeo's best friend.

4. Death of Tybalt moves into the morning streets soon after Romeo and Juliet secretly marry. Tybalt, Juliet's cousin, has challenged Romeo to a duel, but Romeo refuses because he alone knows they now are related. Mercutio accepts the challenge, but turns the duel into a comical dance. Amid the hijinks Tybalt surreptitiously stabs Mercutio. When Romeo realizes that Mercutio is dead, he pursues and kills Tybalt, punctuated by 15 violent chords. The Capulets bear their slain kinsman before the Prince of Verona to demand justice. Romeo is spared execution, but is banished.

5. Romeo at the Grave of Juliet presents the heart-wrenching grief of the teenaged groom who has no idea that his bride soon will rouse from her drug-induced trance. Amid death-theme variations comes a recollection of young love as Romeo prayerfully tries to resurrect Juliet's seemingly lifeless body. Laying her again to rest, he downs a fatal draught. Juliet awakens—Romeo's prayer has been answered too late.