Review: RUSSIAN PIANO MUSIC OF THE REPRESSIONIST ERA. Larry Sitsky, piano, at James Fairfax Theatre, NGA, Oct 9 1994. Reviewed by Tony Magee

Fascinating, entertaining, astonishing, educational, witty, humorous....... Larry Sitsky packs so much into his concert presentations, its somehow easy to forget that he is also a masterful pianist and interpreter.

This piano recital, and lecture that followed, dealt with music from Russian repressionist composers, an era sometimes referred to as "The Silver Age Of Russian Art". Mr Sitsky's new book, Music Of The Repressed Russian Avant-guard, 1900 - 1929, was launched at the conclusion of the Lecture.

As Mr Sitsky explained, whilst the composers represented are not household words today, the music is important because it accompanies significant economic and social change within a society. These composers were literally plunged straight into the public eye as fitting accompaniments to revolution - "a revolutionary society must have revolutionary music". So for a time (1900 - 1929), this avant-guard music became very much part of the establishment, and although it's demise came almost as quickly as its rise to popularity it has left a significant mark on the map of 20th century classical music.

But who are these "repressionist" composers? Mr Sitsky's book deals with a large number, but for the purpose of his recital, we were treated to examples from five.

Nicolai Roslavets' (1881 - 1944) second sonata (1915) opened the concert. This piece is particularly noteworthy as the point at which the composer formulates his own identifiable method of composition. He also developed, independently of Schoenberg, theories of 12 note serialism.

Five short pieces (1914) from Arthur Lourie (1892 - 1966) followed which demonstrated the composer's experiments with atonal music. In his later works he abandoned this for a modal style of writing.

Three pieces by Leonid Polovinkin provide the earliest examples of "fiddling" with a piano. In the second of this set of three, objects were placed on the strings of the Yamaha CF-3 concert grand. The piece featured dramatic arpeggiated chords with heavy use of the sustain pedal. These were punctuated by staccato notes, which combined with the object on the strings produced a wonderful percussion effect.

Polovinkin was heavily influenced by the French impressionists and this was certainly evident in these pieces, particularly the third one which could have been 

mistaken for Debussy.

My second encounter in a month (see Muse Crits, October '94) with Alexander Mosolov (1900 - 1973), came in the form of his Sonata No 1 (1924). The music is composed in rhythmic blocks which are often repeated and is referred to as 'constructionist' music.

Much of this music is hair-raisingly difficult, but nothing presented a problem for Mr Sitsky. He carried each piece off with flair and style, while also being able to administer the most delicate of sounds and emotions when required. All-in-all, a captivating performance presented with the charming humility that is Larry Sitsky.

First published in Muse Magazine Nov 1994