Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 10/30/2007, uploaded on 01/24/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

In this recital program, we see how early 20^th Century Russian composers influenced the music of American composers of the mid-late 20^th Century.

Embraceable You        George Gershwin (arr. Earl Wild)

Toccata                         Antheil

The last two works, the Wild and the Antheil, appear to meld together the musical worlds of Russia and the U.S.  Earl Wild is one of the great American pianists of the 20^th Century.  Here is his version of a Gershwin songtranscribed as though by Rachmaninoff, full of virtuosic figuration and lush, jazzy sonorities.  George Antheil, an American who found his way to Paris, idolized Stravinsky and included among his friends Ernest Hemingway, Man Ray, and James Joyce.  In his Toccata (1948), he combines the percussiveness of Stravinsky or Prokofiev with the open-sounding harmony of his American contemporary, Aaron Copland.     Gideon Rubin

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.