MUSSORGSKY: Pictures at an Exhibition [CD de audio] Gewandhausorchester Leizig, Markevitch, Warenberg, Gvetadze, Ashkenazy and M

Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition is one of the most famous and performed piano cycles in romantic literature. The program of this wide-ranging work includes a series of original and intriguing musical frescoes, which the Russian composer wrote after visiting an exhibition of one of his best friends, the painter Viktor Hartmann, where he was deeply impressed by the menacing figure of the evil Gnome, the mysterious appearance of the Old Castle, the attractive vitality of the chicks hatching from the egg, the quarrels of the children, the crowded market square full of charlatans, the gloomy and disturbing atmosphere of the Catacombs (“Cum mortuis in lingua mortua "), the brutal strength and horrifying features of the witch Baba Yaga and the imposing mass of the great gate of Kiev. The Pictures at an Exhibition is such a sumptuous and picturesque work that it is difficult to resist the temptation of making an orchestral transcription, a fact that is confirmed by the numerous arrangements written over the years, among which Maurice's stands out. Ravel, one of the most brilliant and fanciful orchestrators that the history of music can remember. In any case, the piano version offers ample space for the performer to highlight his creativity, as can easily be seen in this version that is both authoritative and fanciful by the Russian pianist Alexander Warenberg. In addition to the two versions of Pictures at an Exhibition, this album features Mussorgsky's A Night on Bald Mountain orchestrated by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and the more intimate but no less delightful piano cycle The Seasons by Ciaikovsky. Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Alexander Warenberg, piano