Tone Poem Tuesday

I heard this frankly amazing piece the other day on the radio, and I promptly listened to it three more times as soon as I got home from driving about. The work is the Russian Overture by Sergei Prokofiev, and it is simply a collection of tunes, some of which are actual Russian folk tunes and some of which are original themes of folkish nature composed by Prokofiev himself. Prokofiev isn’t the type of Russian composer we often think of: he doesn’t pour out songlike melody like a Borodin or a Tchaikovsky or a Rachmaninov. His is a more modern sensibility, a reaction against Romanticism but still without the full-on nods to the modern of a Stravinsky. I found this work an infectious listen, with its occasional singing, its frequent playfulness, and its variability between intimate song and boisterous showmanship.

Here is the Russian Overture by Prokofiev.

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