Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 05/03/2005, uploaded on 01/08/2009

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Islamey (Fantasie Orientale)      Mily Balakirev

This piano fantasy is by founding member of The Five, Mily Balakirev, and has assumed an infamous and yet irresistible reputation in the piano repertoire. Balakirev wrote this piece after a series of visits to Armenia and the Caucasus region.

The piece has three main sections. The opening introduces the main thematic material of the fantasy, which is embellished by use of double thirds, octave figurations, and other devices. The second part of the work is perhaps the most distinctively oriental of the three, with the slow, dreamy and exotic writing in stark contrast to the bombastic and fiery outer parts. In the third section, the piece returns to the thematic material of the opening, eventually arriving at a breathtaking coda as thrilling to the pianist as it is to the audience.

Islamey was premiered by pianist Nikolai Rubinstein, and championed by pianists such as the great Franz Liszt. This piece has retained its reputation as a technical warhorse for the pianist; the writing is pianistic and natural for the most part, full of octaves, scales, and double notes.    Sonya Bach

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.