Credits:

Giorgio Koukl

Description:

Lurie, a composer from Belarus, Russia, was a leading composer in the Soviet musical world until the 1920s, but he disagreed with the national government and went into exile while on a business trip to Berlin. He went to Germany, France, and then to the United States, where he wrote many works that were strongly influenced by Stravinsky. He was also interested in the art of his generation, and several of his works have titles associated with works of art. Because of this background, the performance and publication of his works were long banned in the Soviet Union, but a revival finally began in the 21st century. Koukl's second album contains a variety of small pieces, and while the works from the 1910s, such as the enchanting-sounding "Syntheses" and the expressively titled "Piano in a Child's Room," show Scriabin's influence, the works from the 1920s and 1930s were mostly composed for his friends and are relatively intimate. However, many of the works from the 1920s and 1930s were composed for his friends and have relatively familiar tunes. As in the first collection, Koukl's expressive performance is a masterpiece of French and Spanish works. Naxos Japan