Composer of the Week: Rachmaninov

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Composer of the Week

Music: Classical

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An informative guide to composers' lives and their music.

An informative and accessible guide to composers' lives and their music.

Composer of the Week: Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943): Leaving Ivanovka

Leaving Ivanovka

Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943)

BBC Radio 3 - Composer of the Week, Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943), Leaving Ivanovka

Rachmaninov finds himself having to take on the running of the Ivanovka estate.

Rachmaninov finds himself having to take on the running of the Ivanovka estate, and buys a car to zip around the surrounding countryside when it all gets a bit much.

Donald Macleod explores Rachmaninov’s life in exile from Russia and attachment to the country estate he left behind: Ivanovka.

150 years ago this week, Sergei Rachmaninov was born: one of the finest pianists of his generation, touring the world in the 1920s and 30s as a musical megastar. Composing had been his real passion since childhood, and towards the end of his time in Russia before the Revolution, it was farming. Though St Petersburg and then Moscow was his base for much of his early life, it was Ivanovka – a country estate deep in the Russian countryside - that formed him. The house and the land surrounding it were a major source of his creative inspiration until his last visit in 1917. Donald Macleod explores how important Ivanovka was to Rachmaninov, and how he carried the precious memory of it with him when he left it behind for a life of exile

Rachmaninov finds himself having to take on the running of the Ivanovka estate, and buys a car to zip around the surrounding countryside when it all gets a bit much.  He's on the verge of buying a tractor too when the First World War breaks out - but from 1914 onwards his time at Ivanovka is running out.

15 Songs Op 26 No 10 - Before my window
Ekaterina Siurina, soprano
Iain Burnside, piano

Symphony No 2 (Mvt 2)
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Vladimir Ashkenazy, conductor

Songs Op 34 Nos 12 and 13
Asmik Grigorian, soprano
Lukas Geniušas, piano

Piano Concerto No 3 (Mvt 1)
Yuja Wang, piano
Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela
Gustavo Dudamel, conductor

All-Night Vigil (Excerpt: 4, 5 and 6)
Latvian Radio Choir
Sigvards Kļava, conductor

Composer of the Week: Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943)

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Donald Macleod surveys the musical life of Russian composer and pianist Sergei Rachmaninov

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Sergei Rachmaninov (1873-1943)

Leaving Ivanovka

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