Scriabin, three piano pieces

The year after finishing his studies at the Moscow Conservatory, the young Russian composer and pianist Alexander Scriabin, twenty years old, damaged his right hand forever, after forcing it to make a gigantic effort in his attempt to master a very difficult piece by the Hungarian master Franz Liszt. His ungratefully small hands, which barely reached more than an octave, could not stand the effort.

The son of a government official and of an outstanding pianist, the ten-year-old Alexander had started a military career in Moscow's Cadet School in 1882, which did not prevent him from simultaneously pursuing piano studies, in which he clearly stood out as to decide and secure his entrance to the Conservatory in 1888.

There he met another star pupil, Sergei Rachmaninov, with whom he shared the same tutor, although both musicians didn't forge a deep friendship, which is reflected in the different course their careers took. If at the end of their studies, the excellent pianist was Alexander, and Sergei a notable composer, in the maturity of life, Sergei will have become a piano virtuoso, and Alexander, due to of his hand injury, will find his place among the minor Russian composers of the post-romantic period.

Alexander Scriabin (1872 - 1915)

In his youth a great lover of Chopin, like this one Alexander Scriabin will compose music almost exclusively for solo piano ― not taking into account his five orchestral works and his piano concerto. He tried to innovate in the development of harmony, and his philosophy of music was marked by a great mystical sense, to the point of believing himself a messianic figure that would come to recompose everything.

At the end of his life, he flirted with dodecaphony, performing his own harmonic experiments, with independence from the Viennese masters but without reaching their height. Today, he is especially remembered for his early works, preludes and nocturnes, mainly the 24 Preludes of Opus 11, essential pieces in the piano repertoire of our day, full of lyricism that bring to mind Chopin's harmonies, by the way, but also the poetry of Schumann and the sensual romanticism of Wagner.

From the 2010 version of the Chamber Musical Festival of Santa Fe, New Mexico, we take this balanced and correct selection of three piano pieces by Alexander Scriabin, performed by the excellent Beijing-born pianist Yuja Wang.

The young musician, today 31, earned a fair place in the circuit of international career pianists, after making her debut in 2003 successfully replacing Radu Lupu at Beethoven's No. 4 concerto, and later, Martha Argerich, committed to concerto No 1 also by Beethoven which Miss Wang simply replaced by Tchaikovski's No. 1.
Petty souls, always present in every human activity, qualified her as a replacement pianist for sick colleagues. As for me, let everyone get sick.

The selection includes:
00:00  Prelude in B-major, Opus 11 No 11
04:50  Étude in G-sharp major, Op 8 No 9 (includes a slow section)
09:18  Poem, in F-sharp major, Op 32 No 1