Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky - Romances (Dmitri Hvorostovsky; Ivari Ilja)

Information

Composer: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky

1. None but the Lonely Heart, Op. 6 No. 6
2. Night, Op. 60 No. 9
3. At Bedtime, Op. 27 No. 1
4. I Opened the Window, Op. 63 No. 2
5. My Genius, My Angel, My Friend
6. Not a Word, O My Friend, Op. 6 No. 2
7. Why?, Op. 6 No. 5
8. To Forget So Soon
9. The Heroic Deed, Op. 60 No. 11
10. Death, Op. 57 No. 5
11. I Should Like in a Single Word
12. Oh, If Only You Could, Op. 38 No. 4
13. The Love of a Dead Man, Op. 38 No. 5
14. On the Golden Cornfields, Op. 57 No. 2
15. Tell Me, What in the Shade of the Branches, Op. 57 No. 1
16. The Fearful Moment, Op. 28 No. 6
17. Reconciliation, Op. 25 No. 1
18. Does the Day Reign, Op. 47 No. 6
19. Frenzied Nights, Op. 60 No. 6
20. Serenade (O Child, beneath thy window), Op. 63 No. 6
21. It Was in The Early Spring, Op. 38 No. 2
22. Dusk Fell on the Earth, Op. 47 No. 3
23. I Bless You, Forests, Op. 47 No. 5
24. Don Juan's Serenade, Op. 38 No. 1

Dmitri Hvorostovsky, baritone

Ivari Ilja, piano

Date: 2009

Label: Delos

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Review

Taking a break from his increasingly ambitious pursuit of demanding Italian roles such as Verdi's di Luna and Simon Boccanegra, Dmitri Hvorostovsky returns to a form long central to his art -- the Russian romans (art song). With Estonian-born pianist Ivari Ilja, the baritone presents two dozen songs by Tchaikovsky, one of the greatest masters of the genre.

The form and idiom suit Hvorostovsky admirably. I heard him sing some of these Tchaikovsky romansy at a Leningrad Philharmonic Hall recital in 1989, the year he won the Cardiff "Singer of the World" competition that catapulted him to fame. At that time, most of his countrymen had no clue who this handsome Siberian with the splendid, dark lyric baritone and admirable (if rather audible) breath control was; but they, and I, were duly impressed. Hvorostovsky recorded six of the most famous of these songs on a fine 1991 Tchaikovsky/Rachmaninoff recital for Philips with Oleg Boshniakovich, plus "My genius, my angel, my friend" (to a text by Afanasy Fet, one of the few first-rate poets represented here) on a 1995 collaboration with Mikhail Arkadiev, My Restless Soul. He and Ilja performed many of them touring in recital last season. Hvorostovsky's older-sounding but still exceptionally beautiful instrument and Ilja's elegant pianism strike a good balance.

Hvorostovsky's musicianship and sound have matured well, and these discs are most welcome for that. Though the texts are pronounced with clarity and understanding, he has never been and for the most part still is not the kind of song interpreter who digs deeply into text and illuminates shades of meaning within a single line. (For that, one would turn to the records of his idol, Pavel Lisitsian.) But there's a sense of feeling and connection in Hvorostovsky's marbled tone, and some performances here, including the Fet settings, transcend a generalized level of "anguish" or "nostalgia." None is less than a pleasure to hear. The selection inherently encompasses a considerable variety of mood; one relative rarity is the despairing, almost Mussorgskian "Love of a Dead Man," to a Lermontov text.

Delos's booklet offers a thoughtful, informative background essay by Maya Pritsker, as well as English translations, but non-specialists should realize that the five texts here attributed to "Tolstoy" are by Aleksei Konstantinovich Tolstoy (1817-75) and not by the author of Anna Karenina. Delos doesn't even include transliterated versions of the originals -- a disservice to Hvorostovsky's legion Russian and russophone fans, though, as Pritsker notes, most educated Russians know most of these songs very well. This generous, beautifully vocalized collection should please them as well as newcomers sampling Tchaikovsky's outstanding lyric output.

— David Shengold

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Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a Romantic Russian composer. He was the first Russian composer whose music would make a lasting impression internationally. Tchaikovsky wrote some of the most popular concert and theatrical music in the current classical repertoire, including the ballets Swan Lake and The Nutcracker, the 1812 Overture, his First Piano Concerto, Violin Concerto, the Romeo and Juliet Overture-Fantasy, several symphonies, and the opera Eugene Onegin. Despite his many popular successes, Tchaikovsky's life was punctuated by personal crises and depression.

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Dmitri Hvorostovsky (16 October 1962 – 22 November 2017) was a Russian operatic baritone. Hvorostovsky came to international prominence when he won the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World competition in 1989, which was followed by his opera debut in France, Italy, the US and the UK. He subsequently sang at virtually every major opera house, such as the Metropolitan Opera, the Berlin State Opera, La Scala and the Vienna State Opera, and was especially renowned for his role in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin. Hvorostovsky made many CD recordings, and a number of his performances were also filmed.

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Ivari Ilja (born 3 May 1959 in Tallinn) is an Estonian pianist. He studied at the Tallinn State Conservatoire with Laine Mets, and at the Moscow Conservatory with Vera Gornostayeva and Sergei Dorensky. Ilja is an internationally recognized accompanist; his collaboration with Dmitri Hvorostovsky, Irina Arkhipova, Maria Guleghina and Elena Zaremba has been particularly successful. He has also held solo recitals and performed as a soloist with several symphony orchestras. Ilja taught at the Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre since 1986, and and held the position of Head of the Piano Department from 2000 to 2015.

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