Genius or Madness? Part Deux

Great Composers: Genius or Madness?

Part Deux

1873

Your good and highly talented friend, Viktor Hartmann dies suddenly of an aneurysm at the tender age of 39. Modest Mussorgsky is grief-stricken, as is the entire art community in Russia. An exhibition is arranged the very next year in St. Petersburg, Russia, to show over 400 of Viktor’s works. Mussorgsky is so moved at viewing his friend’s art that he composes the incredible Pictures at an Exhibition in just six weeks. Fifteen piano pieces are based on a promenade, walking past various scenes, brought to life from the animated drawings and vivid watercolors.¹

The motif for the Promenade opens the collection, and returns in various forms as interludes between the individual pieces. The music depicts these subjects:

The Gnome

The Old Castle

Tuileries                      (Children quarreling after play)

The Oxcart                   (Bydlo)

Ballet of the Chicks in their Shells

Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle (Two Polish Jews, one rich, one poor)

The Market Place in Limoges

Baba Yaga’s Hut       (The Hut on Fowl’s Legs)

The City Gates          (The Great Gate of Kiev)

The closing rondo, the City Gates, is depicted in this Hartmann watercolor:

²

Mussorgsky’s translates the magnificence of the view with broad chords and a grand motive.

Pictures at an Exhibition was not published until years after Mussorgsky’s death. It has been arranged for orchestra a number of times. It is a glorious tribute to honor the life of a good friend and great artist.

¹http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pictures_at_an_Exhibition#Gallery_of_Hartmann.27s_pictures (23 February, 2014)

² http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hartmann_--_Plan_for_a_City_Gate.jpg  (25 February, 2014)