Conducted by Yuri Temirkanov, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra performs Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov‘s Scheherazade, Op. 35, a symphonic suite composed in 1888. Recorded during the 2013 Annecy Classic Festival and published by the EuroArts channel.
Movements (with the starting times in the video):
- 0:55 I. The Sea and Sinbad’s Ship
- 10:45 II. The Story of the Kalender Prince
- 23:40 III. The Young Prince and the Young Princess
- 33:52 IV. Festival at Baghdad. The sea. The Ship breaks against a cliff surmounted by a bronze horseman
In its fourth edition, the Annecy Festival has become a major player in the national and international cultural landscape. In residence at the 2013 Annecy Classic Festival, the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Russia’s oldest symphony orchestra joins forces with its iconic conductor Yuri Temirkanov.
Temirkanov conducts the orchestra in a performance of Rimsky-Korsakov’s lush Sheherazade, with its intoxicating scents and the glowing, oriental colors – a journey through One Thousand and One Nights.
Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra
The work is based on One Thousand and One Nights (a collection of West and South Asian stories and folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age, it is often known in English as the Arabian Nights), Scheherazade is one of his best-known orchestral compositions.
The Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra was formed in 1882. It was initially known as the “Imperial Music Choir” and performed privately for the court of Alexander III of Russia. By the 1900s it had started to give public performances at the Philharmonia and elsewhere. Richard Strauss conducted the orchestra in 1912.
After the Russian Revolution the orchestra was taken over by its members, who changed the name to the “State Philharmonic Orchestra of Petrograd”. In the 1920s the orchestra began receiving support from the state, and began to be known internationally as an excellent orchestra. Guest conductor appearances were made by Bruno Walter, Ernest Ansermet and Hans Knappertsbusch at this time. The city of Petrograd was renamed Leningrad three days after the death of Vladimir Lenin, the founder of the Soviet Union. Around this time the orchestra was renamed the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra.
The orchestra gained its most fame under the lengthy directorship of Yevgeny Mravinsky. The orchestra made few tours to the West, but it recorded a number of studio and live recordings under Mravinsky. Furthermore, it was under Mravinsky that the orchestra premiered seven of Shostakovich’s symphonies.
In 1991 the orchestra gained its current name after its home city returned to its original name of Saint Petersburg. Today it is an internationally recognized symphony orchestra under the directorship of Yuri Temirkanov.
Yuri Temirkanov
Yuri Khatuevich Temirkanov (born December 10, 1938 in the Caucasus city of Nalchik) is a Russian conductor of Circassian (Kabardian) origin.
Yuri Temirkanov has been the Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic since 1988.
After winning the prestigious All-Soviet National Conducting Competition in 1966, Temirkanov was invited by Kirill Kondrashin to tour Europe and the United States with legendary violinist David Oistrakh and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra. Yuri Temirkanov made his debut with the Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra in early 1967 and was then invited to join the Orchestra as Assistant Conductor to Yevgeny Mravinsky. In 1968, he was appointed Principal Conductor of the Leningrad Symphony Orchestra where he remained until his appointment as Music Director of the Kirov Opera and Ballet in 1976.
Maestro Temirkanov is a frequent guest conductor of the leading orchestras of Europe, Asia and the United States. He holds the distinction of being the first Soviet artist permitted to perform in the United States after cultural relations were resumed with the Soviet Union at the end of the war in Afghanistan in 1988.
In addition to leading the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic, Maestro Temirkanov served as the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s 11th Music Director from 2000 until 2006 and is currently the Principal Guest Conductor of the Danish National Symphony Orchestra and Conductor Laureate of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London. In 2015 he was assigned by Teatro La Fenice the price “A life for music”, unofficially known as the “Nobel Prize for musicians”.
Sources
- Saint Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra on wikipedia
- Yuri Temirkanov on wikipedia
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