The Glory of Russian Masterworks – Lecture 4: The Ballet Masters, Igor Stravinsky and Sergey Prokofiev

Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev: Russia has provided us with some of the most exciting and original music in the repertoire today. Vibrant colors, explosive energy, and passionate emotional drive characterize the works of these composers. Yet this tradition seemed to spring from nowhere barely 150 years ago, expanding meteorically in breadth and national confidence over an amazingly short period. As she explores the riches of Russian concert works, popular speaker and concert pianist Rachel Franklin combines lecture and piano demonstrations to also trace the turbulent historical movements that acted both as backdrop and engine for this fascinating musical evolution.

British-born Franklin has been a featured speaker for organizations including the Library of Congress and heard on NPR, exploring intersections among classical and jazz music, film scores, and the fine arts.

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Commissioned by the great impresario Serge Diaghilev, Stravinsky’s ballets crossed the fault line between Romanticism and Modernism and changed forever the way audiences understood dance. Hear samples of Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. Prokofiev composed his Romeo and Juliet under the malign supervision of Soviet apparatchiks but still produced a work of sublime romance and beauty. Franklin also explores his piano and symphonic masterpieces.