Alexander Borodin: Works

Alexander Borodin (1833 - 1887) was a Russian Romantic composer, as well as a doctor and chemist. Together with Mily Balakirev, Cesar Cui, Modest Mussorgsky, and Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin sought to produce a uniquely Russian kind of classical music, rather than imitate earlier Western European models. Except perhaps for Cui, the members of this group influenced or taught many of the great Russian composers who were to follow, including Alexander Glazunov, Mikhail Ippolitov-Ivanov, Sergei Prokofiev, Igor Stravinsky, and Dmitri Shostakovich. They also influenced the two great French composers Maurice Ravel and Claude Debussy through their tonal language.

Borodin is best known for his symphonies, his two string quartets, the symphonic poem In the Steppes of Central Asia, and the opera Prince Igor. Music from Prince Igor and his string quartets was later adapted for the musical Kismet, which was first produced on Broadway in 1953 and won the 1954 Tony Award for best musical. A notable advocate of women's rights, Borodin was a promoter of education in Russia and founded the School of Medicine for Women in St. Petersburg.

Published in 1885, Borodin's Petite Suite is a suite of seven piano pieces considered by many to be his best piano work. Alexander Glazunov wrote an adaptation for orchestra. Borodin's original title was Petit Poème d'amour d'une jeune fille (Little poems on the love of a young girl). The Petite Suite consists of the following seven movements (with descriptions supplied by the composer):