This Week in Classical Music: April 21, 2025. Prokofiev and Maderna. Two influential composers were born this week, Sergei Prokofiev and Bruno Maderna. Only 29 years separate them (Prokofiev was born on April 23rd of 1891, Maderna – on April 21st of 1920), about the same age difference that separated Haydn from Mozart, but it’s difficult to think of more different composers. Prokofiev, even if hugely talented, was conservative in his writings; Maderna, on the other hand, was one of the most adventuresome modernist composers of his time. We’ve written about Prokofiev many times, for example here, here, here, and here: you wouldn’t be wrong to surmise that we like Prokofiev a lot. We haven’t missed Maderna (here), but we’d like to add a bit to our previous post. Sometime around 1946, Maderna composed a Requiem. The score was lost and then rediscovered in 2009. Requiem is Maderna’s early piece, mostly tonal in style. Here are two first parts of it titled Requiem (introduction) and Kyrie eleison (Lord have mercy). This recording is from the world premier performance made in 2013 by the Robert-Schumann-Philharmonie and the MDR-Rundfunkchor Leipzig chorus under the direction of Frank Beermann. Maderna wrote many concertos for different instruments, but it seems the oboe was his favorite: he wrote three oboe concertos. Here’s Maderna’s First Oboe Concerto, from 1962-63. The great Heinz Holliger is the soloist; Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra is led by Gary Bertini.
Yehudi Menuhin, one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century, was also born this week, on April 22nd of 1916 in New York. And of course, we’ve written about him before (here, for example). Menuhin’s musicianship was impeccable from the earliest days of his career till the end of it. The same could not be said about his technique. We heard him live in the late 1980s, and it was too late: by then, his technique was shaky, and it overshadowed the overall impression. But when you listen to some of his older recordings, they are wonderful. Here’s one of them, the 1966 live recording of Bach’s Violin and Keyboard Sonata No. 4 in C minor BWV 1017, which Menuhin made with Glenn Gould. Idiosyncratic (no doubt that Gould had something to do with this) but absolutely worth listening to.
Prokofiev and Maderna, 2025
This Week in Classical Music: April 21, 2025. Prokofiev and Maderna. Two influential composers were born this week, Sergei Prokofiev and Bruno Maderna. Only 29 years separate
them (Prokofiev was born on April 23rd of 1891, Maderna – on April 21st of 1920), about the same age difference that separated Haydn from Mozart, but it’s difficult to think of more different composers. Prokofiev, even if hugely talented, was conservative in his writings; Maderna, on the other hand, was one of the most adventuresome modernist composers of his time. We’ve written about Prokofiev many times, for example here, here, here, and here: you wouldn’t be wrong to surmise that we like Prokofiev a lot. We haven’t missed Maderna (here), but we’d like to add a bit to our previous post. Sometime around 1946, Maderna composed a Requiem. The score was lost and then rediscovered in 2009. Requiem is Maderna’s early piece, mostly tonal in style. Here are two first parts of it titled Requiem (introduction) and Kyrie eleison (Lord have mercy). This recording is from the world premier performance made in 2013 by the Robert-Schumann-Philharmonie and the MDR-Rundfunkchor Leipzig chorus under the direction of Frank Beermann. Maderna wrote many concertos for different instruments, but it seems the oboe was his favorite: he wrote three oboe concertos. Here’s Maderna’s First Oboe Concerto, from 1962-63. The great Heinz Holliger is the soloist; Cologne Radio Symphony Orchestra is led by Gary Bertini.
Yehudi Menuhin, one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century, was also born this week, on April 22nd of 1916 in New York. And of course, we’ve written about him before (here, for example). Menuhin’s musicianship was impeccable from the earliest days of his career till the end of it. The same could not be said about his technique. We heard him live in the late 1980s, and it was too late: by then, his technique was shaky, and it overshadowed the overall impression. But when you listen to some of his older recordings, they are wonderful. Here’s one of them, the 1966 live recording of Bach’s Violin and Keyboard Sonata No. 4 in C minor BWV 1017, which Menuhin made with Glenn Gould. Idiosyncratic (no doubt that Gould had something to do with this) but absolutely worth listening to.