Book Description

Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Pages: 44. Chapters: Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Modest Mussorgsky, Alexander Borodin, Mily Balakirev, Cesar Cui, Tchaikovsky and The Five. Excerpt: Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov (Russian: , Russian pronunciation: , 18 March 1844, - 21 June 1908) was a Russian composer, and a member of the group of composers known as The Five. He was a master of orchestration. His best-known orchestral compositions-Capriccio Espagnol, the Russian Easter Festival Overture, and the symphonic suite Scheherazade-are considered staples of the classical music repertoire, along with suites and excerpts from some of his 15 operas. Scheherazade is an example of his frequent use of fairy tale and folk subjects. Rimsky-Korsakov believed, as did fellow composer Mily Balakirev and critic Vladimir Stasov, in developing a nationalistic style of classical music. This style employed Russian folk song and lore along with exotic harmonic, melodic and rhythmic elements in a practice known as musical orientalism, and eschewed traditional Western compositional methods. However, Rimsky-Korsakov appreciated Western musical techniques after he became a professor of musical composition, harmony and orchestration at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory in 1871. He undertook a rigorous three-year program of self-education and became a master of Western methods, incorporating them alongside the influences of Mikhail Glinka and fellow members of The Five. His techniques of composition and orchestration were further enriched by his exposure to the works of Richard Wagner. For much of his life, Rimsky-Korsakov combined his composition and teaching with a career in the Russian military-at first as an officer in the Imperial Russian Navy, then as the civilian Inspector of Naval Bands. He wrote that he developed a passion for the ocean in childhood from reading books and hearing...