Latvia VIII: Young Composers

"It is most difficult to create music without involving it with your personal grief, national sufferings, political intrigues, or illustrative scenes. It is a discussion concerning the ecology of the soul. Sounds should speak about external processes, of beauty and the laws of physics, about the untouchable and that which is not possible to explain in words." (Andris Dzenitis) 

In an earlier post, I pontificated about the apparent dearth of avant-garde music from Latvia. Well, a bit of digging around shows that there is an avant-garde tendency in Latvia after all. The tendency has been gathering pace over the last decade and is leading some of the younger generation of the country's composers away from the 'holy minimalist', 'neo-romantic' and 'nationalist' trends that have been the dominant elements in the music of the older generation towards music that draws its inspiration from the post-war Western European avant-gardists. Now that anti-modernist Soviet censorship is history and the urgent imperatives of national liberation have been satisfied, it seems to be the case that some young Latvian composers feel free to follow their own creative urges - as you can see from the quote above from Andris Dzenitis. Perhaps (adding a further layer of speculation), the country's entry into the European Union has encouraged this new outward-looking, pan-European spirit. And now a question: Is the avant-garde in Europe, which has been under threat from the tsunami of 'new tonality' for a couple of decades now, receiving a fresh lease of life from the East?  

Here are some of the young composers driving this new trend, followed by a piece of theirs to illustrate their art:

Santa Ratniece (b.1977)

Fuoco Celeste

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuco9p_jgqM

Ruta Paidere (b.1977)

Das Feuer wahrnehmen 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9IOAf_jTZ3M

Andris Dzenitis (b.1978)

Les Livres de ton Silence   

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlYK09VvJJ0

Austra Savicka (b.1985)

Two Reflections

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nD2uDhwL17Q

Laura Gustovska (b.1986)

Warmth Lucidity Peace

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEMVg7uDClo

Latvia VII: Ēriks Ešenvalds, again

Well, I've sought out more music by the contemporary Latvian composer Ēriks Ešenvalds in an attempt to gain a broader perspective on his music. I'm very glad I listened -thanks to the promptings of a reader.

Legend of the Walled-in Woman from 2005 is the place to start. The legend is an Albanian one, telling of how two brothers tricked a third into bringing about the death of his wife following a prediction by their mother that their newly-build castle would be safe from invaders if one of them sacrificed a wife. The piece's starting and finishing point is that Albanian folk song and the sounds of its phrases echo over rich drone-like accompaniments at the start. It's hypnotic. The central section gives the lie to any assumption that Ēriks is a simple, easy-to-pigeonhole composer. Here the music begins to move in a way that reminds me rather of Ligeti's Lux aeterna, demonstrating his understanding of avant-garde vocal writing and clustered harmonies, while remaining sumptuously melodically - as if those melodies are echoing in a long and deep memory. The soprano solo (later duet) as we move towards the closing section floats hauntingly. It's a rich and very beautiful piece that packs a considerable emotional punch and must he heard. (For a live performance you might also want to try this).

I was also bowled over by Aizej, lietiņ ('Go Away, Rain!') - a piece for mixed choir, this time based on Latvian folk music.and including an instrumental ensemble which consists of a pair of kokles (Latvian zither-like instruments), reed pipe, accordian and drums. The 'seeing' element is not an incidental one in Go Away, Rain! as Ēriks Ešenvalds encourages movement among the singers as the work reaches its remarkable climax where, drawing on the avant-garde again, a passage of aleatory writing where modal phrases are repeated in an extraordinary polyphony - a joyous, ecstatic clamour - out of which emerges a jubilant-sounding hymn. Before we reach that thrilling point, we've heard the magic solo soprano (in duet with the reed pipe) of the opening and the chorus stirring entry behind her. The accordion launches the delightful second section, a punch-the-air passage with a great tune. Janáček's Glagotic Mass springs to my mind here. And I can think of no higher compliment than that. (For another take on this enchanting piece, please try this).

As you have (hopefully) seen, Ēriks Ešenvalds is a composer capable of moving crowds (in more ways than one). Another remarkable piece of his is Sanākam, Saskanam. A solo singer with violin, mixed choir and ensemble gather together (the choir in potentially infinite numbers!) and so it begins. The process behind it could be said to be minimalist, in that a phrase is set in motion and is repeated with minimum development against a unchallenging harmonic oscillation between two harmonies. The effect, however, is maximalist. Please bear with me as I make a comparison to Ravel's Bolero. The Ravel is one of the most artful masterpieces in music, despite its composer's modesty about it and (some of) the critics' subsequent sniffiness. It is essentially one long crescendo, repeating and repeating but ever subtly changing its colour as it does so. The tension it builds is physical in its impact and when the repetition and the harmonic stasis is suddenly heaved into a new key the effect is electrifying. Ravel's piece then hurtles towards collapse. Something similar is happening with Sanākam, Saskanam - except that there is no catastrophe at the end. Far from it. I won't spoil the surprise though. Please listen for yourself and get caught up in the intoxicating event. The meaning of the title eludes me but its sock-it-to-'em effect doesn't! Joy!!

Another captivating piece by our man is Stars, a gorgeous setting of a poem by the American lyric poet Sara Teasdale. The choir project the readily-enjoyable, deliciously-blurred melodic lines and their richly-packed harmonies (like amplified Poulenc) whilst around them, like the stars in the night sky above us, tuned glasses and Tibetan singing bowls cast the spell of eternity - the effect of the latter, though achieved through ancient instruments, is strange, electronic-sounding even.

The illusion of electronics caught me out with A Drop in the Ocean. I assumed the choir were singing against a backdrop of pre-recorded electronic music. Far from it. That strange, whale-like/Northern Lights-like backdrop is achieved by human beings, whistling and breathing. Magically. The modernist effects, which also include counterpointing speech-like and song-like writing, are employed without a trace of pretentiousness and the music's rich tonality is worthy of Britten. This is warm, melodically appealing and (at times) intensely dramatic music based on the words of Albania's most-beloved daughter (as far as the rest of the world is concerned) Mother Teresa. Bless her.

As I've re-listened (and re-listened, etc), the utter magic (and genius) of  Ēriks's unaccompanied O salutaris hostia has hit me more and more. In another of my (probably) unlikely (but spot on!) comparisons, this is  music of Fauré-like intimacy and sensuousness. We are so attuned to the pessimistic, cynical mood of our age that we (I?) perhaps fail to appreciate that contemporary music can hit the heights that music of the past hit so lastingly. This piece will last. It has very little of the avant-garde about it (hence my comments in that earlier post of mine) but, as we care so little (he says optimistically) about ideological positioning these days, I say "Meh!" to that. This is one of the most beautiful pieces ever written.

Talking of Fauré, whose heart-ingrained Requiem is one of music's great treasures, Ēriks Ešenvalds has composed an In Paradisum that partakes of that piece's - and its equivalent movement's - consoling spirit. A choral piece with what in Baroque music would be term obbligato parts for cello and violin. The violin's part (which. at times, draws on modernist playing techniques) has something of the 'bird of paradise' about it. It's another example of the composer drawing on avant-garde techniques for immediately engaging purposes. Not many can pull that off...

...and for a purely instrumental of that, why not try his Eskiz ('Sketch') for violin and piano?

I suspect I've still only just scratched the surface of Ēriks Ešenvalds's music. Plus he's still younger than me (drat him!) and there's bound to be much more magic to come.

Latvia VI: Pēteris Vasks, the Main Man

I'm sure there are many more fascinating Latvian composers out there, and I will keep my eye out for them; however, you will have noticed that one Latvian composer has been missing. It's his time now. Yes, it's the popular contemporary composer Pēteris Vasks (b.1946), above - whose music has spread far and wide, carrying with it the good name of Latvia.

The music of Pēteris Vasks is in a lot of ways the embodiment of so many of the recent trends in Latvian music which I've been trying to outline. It isn't very radical. You could call it conservative even. (Aren't labels annoying?) When it first began getting noticed here in the U.K., I saw review after review slamming the composer's music as empty and reactionary. One headline (if I remember rightly in The Sunday Times) read "Vacuous Vasks". Another critic (I think in the BBC Music Magazine) called his music something like "second-hand Pärt". Yes, even Pärt wasn't widely considered 'a good thing' back then!

This probably resulted (in part) from the general critical antipathy at the time (twenty years ago) towards tonal, non-modernist contemporary music - or at least the kind that wasn't American-style minimalism. Twenty years on and that has all changed. Those critics of 1990 didn't realise that their confidence in what was the 'right' sort of contemporary music to be writing was the last gasp of certainty for an attitude which had prevailed for over thirty years. Composers like Pēteris Vasks helped lead the way in finishing off the old avant-garde regime. Tonality, consonance, tunefulness and writing audience-friendly music that aimed to touch the listener's soul were back and they've swept onwards in this age of globalisation. Whether that's an unmitigated 'good thing' is another question. I'd be happier with as much plurality as possible - the lion of the avant-garde lying down with the lamb of the post-avant-garde, both of them thriving and confident. That's what we now have to some extent, but the avant-garde lion does seem to be being gradually driven out of the pride, leaving all the uneaten lambs behind baaing out their sweet little C major motets. OK, that's enough of that metaphor!! - and more than enough philosophising!! (I might start drawing analogies between all this and the fall of the Soviet Union if I'm not careful. I'm not Richard Taruskin, so I'd better not bother.)

Of course, another reason for that critical disdain (twenty years ago) could have been that the critics simply didn't like the music they were hearing and thought it wasn't very good. There's always that possibility. Taste is very important in music. The music of Vasks won't be to everyone's taste. The music of any of these Latvian composers won't appeal to everyone. I can imagine many of you actively disliking or being bored to death by some of these composers. (Others I find it harder to imagine).

I'm sure there must have been a radical avant-garde in Latvia - indeed, I've read that Vasks started out writing such music and there are traces of it in his music - but it seems to have disappeared without leaving that much of a trace behind. Has it really though? Or is this just a case of looking where the light is? If YouTube and the non-Latvian music world (especially record companies) chose not to bother with it, does that mean it doesn't still exist? I can't tell from here in snowy England.

(Update: Answer, yes there is an avant-garde. It has been growing in the last decade. A later post will introduce some of its leading lights.)

Down to the music. A fairly early (and popular) example of Pēteris Vasks's music is the string orchestral piece Cantabile from 1979. Here we have fully composed, tonal sections of music which strike a strong Mahlerian note, singing out their melodic lines with heavy-laden harmonies and undisguised emotion. These alternative with the sort of 'controlled chance'/'aleatory' passages we find in, say, the music of Lutosławski - though they sound more more 'added on' or 'imposed' (like cries from within or without). This isn't music that aims to appeal to critics and academics. It is aimed squarely at you, the listener, and your emotions. So is Musica dolorosa, written in memory of the composer's sister. The Mahlerian angst couldn't be more directly communicated. And Vasks's Lauda speaks straight to the heart in the other direction, aiming to lift up your spirits.

You will recognise as Lauda grows and develops that it is using folk melodies to build its climaxes. The piece aimed to raised the Latvian spirit too. Folk melody is an element Vasks readily embraces. His gentle, elegiac Cor Anglais Concerto breathes the air of rural Latvia. The Violin Concerto (Distant Light) has folk elements too, though they take their place in a 40-minute span that laments, cries out and consoles.

As in several of the other recent Latvian composers we've encountered, a strong dose of eclecticism can be found in the music of Pēteris Vasks and parts of this Violin Concerto might remind you at various moments of all manner of other composers. Such eclecticism may not be to your tastes. An uncharitable critic from The Times (in the early 1990s) wrote this (of another Vasks piece):

"From this Latvian composer came the mixture so often peddled around the Baltic: spoonfuls of 'holy minimalism', sprinklings of folk song, a visitation from Shostakovich's ghost." 

I can see what he means. That said, holy minimalism can be good. So can sprinklings of folk song. And I wouldn't mind a visitation from Shostakovich's ghost. (I'd like to thank him).

There's a vast amount of Vasks out there in Youtubeland, so I'm going to finish this post here and let you hunt it out for yourselves.

As ever on these journeys, I've found a lot of wonderful, unfamiliar composers and many magical pieces of music. I've enjoyed a huge amount of it, even if I've never quite come across a masterpiece  - or a composer - to place in the highest tier of the Museum of Musical Greatness. Latvian music remains largely hidden from the world, despite Vasks, but there are so many treats to be had from exploring it - in all its variety - that you would be depriving yourselves (as music lovers) if you didn't give the links on these posts a thorough clicking!

Latvia V: An Eclectic Mix

Miscellany time.

Marģeris Zariņš (1910-1993), above, is my first Latvian Neo-Classicist. At times.

I very much enjoyed his Partita in Baroco Style for mezzo soprano and instrumental ensemble from 1963. There's more than a touch of Stravinsky about it; however, it's a touch of two Stravinskys, as it were - the Neo-Classical Stravinsky as if coloured in by the Russian-period Stravinsky. What makes it so different to Stravinsky is its unpretentious good humour. This fascination with turning the music of the past into something 'of our time' continues with his grand Variations on a theme BACH for organ from 1969 - though it strikes a more serious note and partakes rather more of the Romantic age than either the Baroque or the late 1960s. (Reger would have approved).

Apparently however, he also pursued a Kodaly-like path of freshening up the folk-influenced choral music of his country. This may, indeed, have been his greatest legacy. Unfortunately, I can't find many pieces for you to get a decent flavour of this side of Zariņš's output. A lively Madrigal is all I have.

Romualds Kalsons (b.1936), above, is a composer who adapted to several of the major trends of the Twentieth Century, writing in Romantic and folk-inspired styles as well as composing serial and aleatory works, plus penning such Neo-Classical pieces as the inviting Concerto for Clarinet and Chamber Orchestra of 1982. A likeable vein of Copland-like high spirits and colour is mined in the folk-flavoured orchestral suite Wedding Songs from 1979 (a sort of Latvian Rodeo) - pieces that could well take the composer's name into the concert halls of Britain and America (if we could spread the word!) As indeed could the delightful orchestral Seasonal Ritual Songs of 1985. If any of you have fallen in love with Geirr Tveitt's Hardinger Tunes suites, well, here's something in a similar vein - immensely tuneful, varied in mood and brightly-coloured.  Having eased you in gently, now please try his Violin Concerto from 1977. I bet that opening made you sit up! It's an eclectic work (a reflection of its composer), tonal (but not Romantic) with strange Danse Macabre echoes. From this demanding, modern piece of Romualds Kalsons I'll now spin you 180 degrees round and introduce his Retrospekcija, a score that seems if anything to be echoing the Valse triste of Sibelius, albeit without any modernist over-layering. It's a good, old-fashioned piece of Nordic elegiac writing - or at least it is until the mood changes completely (before going back again)! Another piece by the composer that would give concert audiences a very pleasant surprise then.

Yes, Mr Kalsons is a composer of surprises. I like that, not knowing what you're going to get from piece to piece. Why shouldn't composers try out all sorts of things? Why should they stick to some narrow, restrictive 'personal style'?

What about a piece from him that might be seen to echo Stravinsky's Les noces or Orff's Carmina burana, albeit with a much lighter touch than either? Then please try his Kantāte par mūžīgo braukšanu (translation? According to Google, "Cantata for the Eternal Driving". I've been on car trips like that!). Presumably it's something horse-related. Or what about a Latvian Tango? Or something exotic, like middle-period Szymanowski, then why not try the cantata Atvadvārdi? As I like all these things this is rather like I'm receiving too many birthday presents at once!

Supla Dziesma ('Lullaby') by Maija Einfelde (b.1939), above, is a beautiful folk-song arrangement for unaccompanied chorus of the kind Kodály would have admired (though Ravel's Trois Chansons aren't too far away either). That was one side of her art. A more radical side can be heard at the start of her  Violin Sonata No.1, with its use of microtones and glissandi. Once you pass beyond this opening passage (a sort of violin cadenza) the sonata pursues a somewhat more traditional-sounding path, and pours out pages of passionate if anxious writing before giving way to a more lyrical, inward-looking passage before the movement springs back into action and comes to a dramatic close. (The work's ending can be heard here.) There is much to involve the listener in this piece.

I can't discover whether Imants Kalniņš (b.1941), above, is any relation to the Kalniņš Family, discussed earlier on. Imants is, however, to say the least, a man of many talents. He was for many years one of his country's leading rock stars, writing and performing his own rock songs with the hippyish band 2xBBM (until the Soviet authorities stepped in and stopped them). He late wrote songs for another popular rock band, Pērkons (which also ran foul of the Soviet authorities). He took part in the popular movement which helped end Soviet rule in Latvia and remains a popular figure to this day.

As for his classical music, well, please try the beautiful Blow, wind, blow!, drawn from a film of the same name. It cannot but evoke a quiet rural scene, with winds blowing through reed-beds. It has a delightful folk-song like melody out of which emerges another, even more beautiful one (with doubtless purely coincidental shades of Peruvian folk music!). Enchanting music. However, if you want to hear this composer's rock music side at the same time as you are hearing one of his classical pieces then you might like to try the head-banging first movement of his Rock Symphony from 1972. (You might recognise something from Blow, wind, blow! during its first movement). Its ostinato-powered drive is quite something to hear! The second movement (I'm almost sure of the same symphony!) is delightful, as if a symphony orchestra were performing Romantic film music amid a shower of crystals on a distant planet. (It was written in 1972, such such psychedelic imagery is entirely justified. Well, that's my excuse anyway!) The third movement sets driving rhythms against lyrical, folk-like melodic lines and is just as much fun. Such music, written over 40 years, does seem to anticipate quite a bit of the rockier end of modern American classical music - all those Michael Daugherty, Michael Torke, Christopher Rouse-type pieces.

Georgs Pelēcis (b.1947), above, a Khachaturian pupil, is a name that choral singers around the world are getting to know. The sort of piece you might know him from is Stihira for unaccompanied chorus.  His style is frequently described as "new consonant" - i.e. direct, firmly diatonic and euphonious. From what I've heard of it it's (generally-speaking) somewhat sweeter and more nostalgic in feel than Pärt, or else more Romantic or Neo-Classical. See what you think of the rather Neo-Classical Concertino bianco in C major for piano and chamber orchestra. The first movement has a slight suggestion of Richard Clayderman about it, while the second movement, marked 'Con venerazione', is a gentle prayer-like movement and the finale is a happy, vaguely Michael Nyman-like romp. If you enjoyed that then you will doubtless relish relaxing in the deeply soothing waters of Nevertheless for piano, violin and chamber orchestra - a piece that takes its time to breathe in and out, rising into bliss out of gentle melancholy and continuing to do so for almost hour an hour. It is all about being beautiful and dreamy. Some listeners will find themselves surrendering to it, smiling seraphically as they sip their sauvignon blanc whilst reclining on a soft sofa. Others will be reaching for the hardest liquor they can find and eating the sofa with boredom. I think it's that kind of music. If you want to hear more of the jog-along Michael Nyman-style side of Georgs Pelēcis then I recommend Revelation to you. Some of you will love it.

Pēteris Plakidis (b.1947), above, an exact contemporary of Mr Pelēcis (and a pupil of Jānis Ivanovs), may be seen as occupying a not too dissimilar position on the musical spectrum. His luminous unaccompanied choral piece In Memoriam from 1990 certainly has affinities with 'Holy Minimalism',  with Pärt-like dissonances adding flavour to the "new consonance", though it isn't particularly minimalist and has deep roots in tradition. Mr Plakidis also seems to demonstrate a strong feeling for folk music, as you can hear in his vibrant Mistat Linus (I've no idea about the meaning of the title) and in the genuinely life-affirming Ar dziesmu dzīvībā ('A Song to Life'). All these are choral miniatures of great potential appeal. Miniatures are all I've been able to hear from Pēteris Plakidis, so this may well give us a restricted view of the composer. The instrumental miniatures include two of a kind, Dedication to Haydn and Dedication to Brahms, that remind me somewhat of Schnittke's pastiches of
the styles of classical composers (straight takes with modern tweaks), and Night Conversations - a work that has plenty of "old dissonance" (to coin a phrase) but uses it as part of an eclectic mix (polystylism?) to create a constantly surprising little piece. Oh for a few of his large scale works! 

Aivars Kalējs (b.1951), above, is the organist at (among other places) the famous Dome Cathedral in Riga. Music for keyboard instruments seems to be his thing as a composer and, given his Lutheran background, it's hardly surprising to find such pieces as the grandly shimmering Toccata on the Chorale "Allein Gott in der Höh sei Ehr" for organ (written in the 1990s) in his list of works. Mr Kalējs is a keen performer of works by the 'French Organ School', as can be heard in that piece - and (explicitly) in his lovely tribute to the composer who opened this very blog, the Postlude in memoriam Jehan Alain. Another attractive tribute to a favourite French composer, the Gymnopédie No.5 (Homage to Satie), carries us to the composer's solo piano music and his Basso continuo with 22 variations - counterpoint with a touch of French style.

Another keyboard-playing Latvian composer Imants Zemzaris, above, was also born in 1951. What can be said about his music, without much of it to go on?

Well, listening to the dreamy melancholy of The Light Springs for violin and alto flute, which alternates between monody (for both players) and a canon-imbued duet, suggests a romantic-impressionist who values beauty and essential simplicity. This lyrical impression is also given by his piano piece, Early in the Morning - a lovely song-without-words - and his Warsaw Triptych No.1 and No.3.

Uģis Prauliņš (b.1957), above, is, like Imants Kalniņš, a man of many talents. If you listen to the Sanctus from his 2002 Missa Rigensis you will hear music written in an attractive "new consonant" style, with plainchant, 'Holy Minimalist' passages, a folk-style melody, plus plenty of lively, sometimes syncopated music. As well as classical music, the composer is involved in progressive rock music and folk music. If you fancy a little classically-tinged 'folk metal' then why not give the Latvian folk music-soaked Paganu Gadagramata a try? (More here). The spirits of the first and second pieces come together strikingly in Odo et Amo. (Howard Goodall would probably love this sort of thing.) An interesting figure.

It's a funny thing that some of the most beloved and enjoyable choral works are setting of the old Latin mass for the dead, the requiem. I would now count among them the Requiem of Ilona Breģe  (b.1959), above. Ilona herself has kindly posted this piece on YouTube so the world of the internet can get to know it and fall in love with it. It is a highly-coloured piece for soprano, tenor, chorus and orchestra that I would place in sound and spirit as being somewhat in the style of Szymanowski and Janáček's great masterpieces of choral writing, the Stabat Mater and Glagolitic Mass. That the piece was only composed in 2009 is, in my opinion, very much neither here not there. If a piece is magnificent, it's magnificent. Simple as that. The first movement is so magnificent it makes my head swim.

Religious works are a strong feature of the output of Rihards Dubra (b.1964), above; indeed, he now writes only sacred works. His music clearly has much in common with that of Arvo Pärt, though he strikes me as a more Romantic composer than the much-loved Estonian. His melodies - partly-chant-like, partly Romantic -  and luminous harmonies, not to mention his Pärt-like play of consonance and dissonance, creates music that is beautiful, soothing and uplifting. A widely-known piece of the composer's is the short unaccompanied motet Oculus non vidit. Here his 'holy minimalism' is at its most minimalist, suddenly blossoming like a time-lapsed spring meadow at the end. It's quite a gem. Choral miniatures seem to abound in the composer's art, including many lovely settings of the Ave Maria. If you can resist Ave Maria V for female voices then you must have a heart of flint! Gorgeous harmonies and finely-sculpted melodies are hallmarks of his work. His Missa Simplex is a piece that suggests an affinity in that respect with the choral works of French composers like Poulenc and Duruflé - the sort of unaccompanied piece beloved of us English and our cathedral choirs - and, as this perhaps implies, Dubra's music is certainly capable of travelling well beyond the borders of his homeland. A piece commissioned by an Indonesian choir for performance in China, Stetit Angelus, has been particularly widely-performed. It is full of lovely effects, such as the suggestions of floating, overwhelming incense.   His Missa de Spiritu Sancto for chorus and organ shows the composer's characteristic fusion of medieval, Romantic and minimalist impulses at work on a larger scale. 

The trend towards Pärt-like luminous "new consonance" continues, if Evening, Amazing Grace, A Drop in the Ocean,  O salutaris hostia, Long Road and Aiviekste by the potentially very popular  Ēriks Ešenvalds (b.1977), above, are anything to go by. This is the sort of music that choral competitions lap up as singers and audiences love it. The BBC have broadcast Ēriks's music. The composer's feel for simplicity is allied with Latvian traditional music in the composer's Dziesmu Latvija ('Latvia Song'), a string of folk songs presented directly, without the slightest trace of Berio-like distancing. It is a lovely piece - though I can hear modernists gnashing their teeth at its populism. Is Ēriks Ešenvalds a new John Rutter? Just try his Christmas Eve and see what you think.

I hope you're thinking something!

Latvia IV: Hollywood, Soviet-style

OK, moving on then. 1909 saw the birth of Ādolfs Skulte (d.2000), above. His long life saw him make the journey from Tsarist Russia, through Latvian independence, Soviet occupation, Nazi occupation, Soviet occupation again to finally reach Latvia's renewed (and hopefully eternal) independence - though not EU membership. He stayed in Latvia after the Soviets returned and achieved a distinguished career there. Skulte was a fairly prolific symphonist too, with at least nine such works to his name. They are, I think it can safely be said, rather different those of Ivanovs.

I want to introduce his remarkable music to you though with a symphonic poem, Wellen ('Waves') from 1934, a gloriously turbo-charged piece of musical impressionism depicting the majestic swelling of the sea, with big bold tunes and dense, multi-coloured orchestration. Fun, wasn't it? Oh yes! And the confident optimism of that score can also be found in the composer's substantial String Quartet from 1936 - a piece of considerable accomplishment and lyricism in a conservative idiom. It knows precisely what it's doing. Yes, the material doesn't particularly linger in memory but the pleasure of listening to the piece does. It leaves a warm afterglow.

When we next meet Ādolfs Skulte we find him writing music for the Soviet Union, pieces with very Soviet-sounding titles. Eschewing the ethical dilemmas this might involve for the listener by means of the cutting-of-the-Gordian-knot approach of simply ignoring any such concerns, let's encounter some of his symphonies and assess their musical qualities, plunging in with the large-scale Symphony No.1, 'About Peace' of 1954. This is ripe, conservative, dramatic-lyrical music, with romantic tunes sweeping over highly-coloured accompaniments with heroic dash. Before reading the accompanying notes on YouTube the first movement struck me as sounding remarkably like Hollywood film music from the 1940s - a happy convergence of opinions, though (in the circumstances) hardly a surprising one. The whole symphony could have accompanied a Hollywood movie. Two andante movements follow - one marked 'dolento', the other 'cantabile'. One, I presume, evokes war and the other peace. The dark, deep visions of Ivanovs's Fifth or Shostakovich's Eighth have no place here. This is pure entertainment. (If the composer intended otherwise, he didn't succeed!) The closing allegro is exactly what a symphony on such a theme at that time had to have - a happy ending. I have to say, having encountered the striking and rather unusual Waves and the refined String Quartet, I was quite taken aback by this symphony.  High-minded music lovers will probably regard it as pure schlock but I had huge fun listening to it.  

In the wake of Yuri Gagarin's historic flight into space Skulte wrote his Third Symphony, the Cosmic. Unlike Ivanovs, who's music was rediscovering some its bite, Skulte's Cosmic is still close to Hollywood film music, though we've moved into the Hollywood of the 1950s here - so the symphony does sound a little more modern, with even a faint whiff of jazz in the first movement - a section of big tunes, exciting action and Technicolor orchestration intended to stir the listener which, in my case, it does successfully. Then, in the central slow section, the action is suspended and we find ourselves sailing through the ethereal mystery of space itself. Ligeti's Lux aeterna it ain't, however, being instead the sort of music you might well remember from sci-fi films of the 1950s when our hero and his heroine are having a happy moment together while lost in space, looking at the magical universe around them and then into each others eyes! Of course, the finale is all noisy, jolly celebration - the musical equivalent of a ticker tape parade - as Gagarin makes his heroic re-entry into Earth's atmosphere. Again that word 'schlock' might come to mind, but it's all such fun and all so expertly done that you'd be being a self-defeating killjoy if you didn't allow yourself to indulge yourself with it!

If you enjoyed those, you'll also enjoy the Fourth Symphony, 'Youth' of 1971. I did. It seems to take us back to 1940s Hollywood again.

Frankly, these  immediately understandable Hollywood-style symphonies from Soviet Latvia are so instantly gratifying as to be rather compulsive. I feel a bit like a chocoholic faced with a huge pile of free, cheap, tasty, fattening chocolates ...and now I'm eating the Fifth Symphony of 1975 and it's such a pleasure doing so. Well might YouTubers compare the style here to that of the Frank Waxman and Bernard Hermann of the early 1950s. This is the classiest Skulte symphony, and definitely a thriller rather than an heroic epic, sci-fi film or a romantic movie.

I'm getting through a lot of popcorn tonight. I'll allow you to watch listen to the Eighth Symphony of 1984 and the Ninth Symphony of 1987 by yourselves. Suffice to say, they're still the same old Ādolfs Skulte - and just as much fun as before. What an extraordinary anachronism his music must have seemed in 1984 and 1987 - if not decades earlier!

Incidentally, Ādolfs's older brother Bruno Skulte (1905-1976), above, was also a composer. Unlike his brother he fled Latvia after the Soviet Union re-imposed its rule on the country after the Second World War, emigrating to the U.S.A. where he established a Latvian chorus and continued to promote Latvian culture. There's very little of Bruno's music available on YouTube, with the opera The Heiress of Vilkaci, an obvious gap. Still, you can enjoy his Bērnu dziesmas ('Children's Songs') - a song-cycle very much in the vein of Mussorgsky's Romantic realism and clearly owing a lot specifically to the great Russian's song-cycle The Nursery. These songs and tasters from The Heiress of Vilkaci suggest that the elder brother might well have been an even more conservative composer than his brother. They certainly whet the appetite for hearing a lot more Bruno Skulte. What though of his Latvian-sounding side? Well, (and go to 2:29 in the video) his Lūgšana ('The Prayer') gives a lovely example of that and, on a more extended scale, his Ganiņš biju is a charming pastoral piece.

The thought has just crossed my mind, as it may have done yours, that there's an irony-laden theme here, in that one brother emigrated to America and the other brother wrote as if he'd emigrated to America. 

Latvia III: Ivanovs, THE Latvian Symphonist

Let's move on to one of the better-known Latvian composers, Jānis Ivanovs (1906-1983). Ivanovs, pictured above, is regarded as the country's finest symphonist, of which he wrote 21. Like Lūcija Garūta, Ivanovs was a composer content to pursue a late-Romantic path, often drawing in nationalist fashion on the folk melodies of his homeland and able (by a happy coincidence) to continue writing in this vein after the Soviets imposed their rule on Latvia (due to this being the favoured style of the Soviet Union too). 

As it's short, let's start our exploration of the music of Ivanovs with his First Symphony of 1933. It's subtitle, Poema sinfonia, is a correct one; the having the feel of a symphonic poem rather than a symphony. It has a heroic, filmic sweep and offers the listener decent tunes (especially the rather Khachaturian-like one beginning at 3:19) plus pleasing orchestral colours. It isn't a great piece but it's a likeable one nonetheless, and has moments that sound surprisingly like Britain's very own Arnold Bax. (He will  do that elsewhere in his symphonic cycle too). The first movement of the half-hour-long three-movement Second Symphony of 1937, modelled on the famous Symphony of César Franck, begins with brooding but rouses itself and ends optimistically. Along the way the music works out its themes in the way of many minor late-Romantic symphonies, pleasingly if rather forgettably. The Andante, however, has an attractive melody and, through the composer's striking ear for orchestral colour, successfully conjures up an atmosphere that cannot but remind me of Scotland's mountains and mists. The slightly Scottish-sounding main theme helps create that coincidence. It's a winning movement. The final movement wraps things up heroically, as you would expect. The traditional four movements are found in the Third Symphony of 1938. Again, the opening movement opens broodingly and this brooding dominates despite the somewhat jaunty nature of the main theme. The best thing in this movement is the waltz-like second subject that will instantly hit fans of Rachmaninov's Symphonic Dances as being similar to his dance macabre there. The Andante second movement has another of those melodies that is likely to immediately win over the listener - a big tune in the Tchaikovsky/Khachaturian vein. The pleasures of a good tune, surrounded by imaginative scoring, cannot be underestimated. There's a definite folktune quality to the melody, which (if it is typical of Latvian folk melodies) has - like the equivalent tune in the Second Symphony something of Scottish folk melody about it. That sets it apart from Tchaikovsky and Khachaturian. Another fine Ivanovs slow movement. An amiably grotesque Firebird-like scherzo, with Tchaikovskyan asides, follows, then a finale that seems to have Tchaikovsky at the forefront of its mind. Like its predecessors, the Third Symphony has many minutes of music I'm very glad to have heard, though its the two slow movements from Nos. 2 and 3 to which I will be returning. 

With the Fourth Symphony, "Atlantis" of 1941 (second half here), Ivanovs attempts to work on a large-scale canvas. His Scriabin-like ambitions for a multi-media performance (as we'd call it these days) is echoed in the Scriabin-like character of the piece. (I'm thinking of the Scriabin symphonies). The closest sound-alike though might be Arnold Bax again. (How odd is that?) This big symphonic statement aims to evoke the myth of Atlantis and to my mind has as more of the symphonic poem than the symphony about it. That said, the first movement, Ira Dei Legenda (The Message of Plato), creates an ominous atmosphere, building expectation. Listen out for the warning bell. (You wan't miss it). The slow movement, Poseidon - Papylon, evokes the god of the sea and the capital city of Atlantis. There's some rather impressionistic writing here and a wordless female chorus adds to the Debussyan element. Ivanovs remains on form throughout this endearing movement. Next comes a fine wind and brass-dominated scherzo depicting the Aedes Sacra - religious ceremonies - of Atlantis. They ain't Anglican services, that's for sure! Finally, "On a dreadful day, On a dreadful night, The Island of Atlantis disappeared, drowned in the sea." This closing movement is intended to be the climactic movement of the whole symphony, overwhelming the listener with the horror of it all and leaving him benumbed afterwards. Well, it doesn't do that but it's a listenable movement nonetheless, despite its length. 

The first post-Second World War symphony, the Fifth Symphony (second half here), saw a change in style. Though on the same large scale as its predecessor, the serious Fifth shows a less opulently late-Romantic, more Shostakovich-like side to the composer. The first movement is a conflict movement, pitting the dissonance of war against the serene melodiousness of peace. The spirit of  peace dominates the thoughtful and masterful Andante, albeit viewed through still-sad eyes - a movement with (for a Brit) some interesting echoes of Vaughan Williams -, though admirers of Shostakovich and Prokofiev will surely recognise the influence of their men in the burlesque that barges into it so rudely. All three of those same composers flitted across my ear in the excellent scherzo-like third movement, a section full of dance energy with some glorious trumpet writing and a strange, veiled waltz episode which blossoms into lyricism.  As a piece of symphonic writing, the Fifth is the composer's finest symphony so far, rooting the listener's attention throughout its first three movements. Only the episodic finale doesn't consistently hit the heights, despite struggling to do so. It's one of those dramatic movements which fights its way towards a happy ending. In spite of that slight caveat, Ivanovs's Fifth is, to my ears, one of the towering pieces of Latvian music. I think you will be impressed by it.

As you will with the Sixth Symphony (subtitled Latvian) of 1949. This is shorter and more accessible that the Fifth but no less masterful. I actually prefer it; indeed, it's  the Jānis Ivanovs work I love the most. I say that realising that it is in some ways the result of a stifling of the composer's spirit by the Soviet authorities. The infamous 1948 decree decrying 'formalism' in music included Ivanovs's Fourth and Fifth symphonies in its condemnation and this more conventional-sounding symphony was written in its wake. Still, anyone who savours the Vaughan Williams and Prokofiev symphonies should take to it with relish too and, despite having dragged you through five earlier symphonies already, the Sixth Symphony is the place I'd advise newcomers to begin their Ivanovs symphonic cycle. It integrates elements found in the earlier symphony into a fully coherent and satisfying whole and it should be in the repertoire of major orchestras around the world, selling its composer's name. The first movement is superb. Its lyrical second subject (with its surrounding Rachmaninov Symphonic Dances-style writing) and the beautiful coda will linger in your memory. The scherzo is a high-spirited one with a lovely, delicately-scored folksong-like trio that is sure to charm you. After this delightful movement comes an irresistible Andante whose relaxed, radiant beauty speaks with a voice that will especially appeal to lovers of British music from the first half of the last century. It is warm, gorgeously melodic and delightfully orchestrated. The finale has a slow introduction that draws on earlier elements and generates an air of somewhat anxious expectancy, but the main allegro section banishes this with its optimistic folk-inspired energy. It's main tune will soon have your blood flowing and your foot tapping. Yes, the fanfares and the uplifting, Soviet-style ending are a bit less elevated but it's still a splendid movement to end a splendid symphony.

Let's leap forward to 1971, passing over seven more symphonies, the composer's rehabilitation and his rise to the position of President of the Latvian Composers' Union to arrive at three of the later symphonies.

The Fourteenth Symphony and its successor suggest a darkening of the composer's art, but no decline in its quality. The Fourteenth is rather like the Ivanovs of the once-denounced Fifth Symphony, except that it's a chamber symphony for strings only and strikes a more withdrawn and dissonant note throughout. The first movement proceeds by the serious play of lyrical and dramatic elements. The darkly beautiful slow movement is elegiac and full of pained dissonances. The dramatic finale has elements that evoke comparison with the Shostakovich of the string quartets. It is a first-rate piece, full of characteristic invention. Light relief it most certainly isn't though. Nor is the Fifteenth Symphony of 1972. Here the rest of the orchestra rejoins the strings for one of the composer's most expansive symphonic canvases. It bears the sub-title Sinfonia Ipsa. I have no idea why. Ipsa are sea-snails, as far as I know. Wouldn't it be good for there to be a symphony written about sea-snails? Maybe this is it! There is certainly something sea-like about the turbulent lyricism of the first movement. The slow movement is mysterious, its pang-like dissonances and the use of piled-up octaves to build a mighty climax giving it a deep, brooding quality. The finale keeps to the overall mood of the symphony and swirls, crashes and broods menacingly.

Ending this dip into the Ivanovs symphonic canon (the last of his completed symphonies No.21 was completed by other hands) comes the Twentieth Symphony of 1981. It shares the dark qualities of Nos.14 and 15, amplifying them to the status of tragedy. Something similar seems to have been going on in Ivanov's late music to that which was also happening in Shostakovich's late music - a strain of pessimism filling the music. It undoubtedly gives it a very personal feeling, as if the composer is allowing us a glimpse at his innermost feelings. Dramatic outburst punctuate the morose introspection of the first movement and the Adagio is even gloomier, like the music of someone lost in memory and sadness. The short third movement is marked Minuet: Reminiscenza and is wistful in character, music of sad smiles. The composer must have thought that it fitted in with the rest of the symphony, though I'm not so sure. The finale is a final big statement, not overly long but full of imposing ideas.

These black-bound late symphonies don't give the immediate pleasures of the three early symphonies, or the involving ambition of the Fourth and Fifth, or the happy nobility of the Sixth, but they are rewarding pieces nonetheless, worth spending time with - if you're not already feeling too depressed!

After that you may well be thirsting for a little more of the less despondent music of Jānis Ivanovs. The 1938 Cello Concerto is a fairly short and lyrically-charged piece, wholly late-Romantic and rhapsodic in manner. His tuneful 1951 Violin Concerto is in the same style and very much in the tradition of Russian (and Finnish) virtuoso violin concertos from the days before Shostakovich and Prokofiev (and Ivanovs). The Violin Concerto's slow movement is an especial delight, with a lovely melody and some rustic dance episodes of considerable charm. If you like Tchaikovsky's or Glazunov's violin concertos  (or Korngold's for that matter) then these two Ivanovs concertos should be very much to your taste. You can tell that the post-Stalin 'thaw' is well under way, however, by the time you come to the opening notes of the 1959 Piano Concerto. Listening to them immediately after the Violin Concerto provoked a wince. Ah yes, dissonance! Ouch!! This Piano Concerto lowers the level of lyricism found in the earlier concertos, having more of a Prokofiev-style bite to it - though, like Prokofiev, it cannot forbear lyricism completely.

It's time to move on, but not before one of these:

Further Ivanovs listening:

Piano Sonata, 1931
Pictures from Lataglian Landscapes, Suite No.1, 1935
Rainbow, 1939
Festive Prelude, 1940
Sonata brevis, 1962
Andante replicato, 1963
Three Sketches, 1966

Latvia II: Loving Lūcija

The music of Lūcija Garūta (1902-1977), pictured above, has a special place in Latvian music. I'll let Wikipedia introduce one of her major works:

A tape of the premiere of her 1943 cantata Dievs, tava zeme deg! (God, your land is burning!) on 15 March 1944 during World War II captured the sounds of battle outside of Riga Dom. The lyrics were written by Andrejs Eglītis for contest themed "Latvian prayer to God". The première featured massed choirs conducted by Teodors Reiters while the composer played the Riga Cathedral pipe organ. The cantata was banned under Soviet control of Latvia and was revived in 1990 at the 20th Latvian Song Festival with over ten thousand singers. 

This deeply-felt work for tenor, baritone, chorus and organ kept me rooted to the spot, entranced, throughout its 45 minute duration. There is much dramatic writing but also some seriously beautiful sections (such as the tenor solo beginning at 6:25). The charismatic nature of the composer's ideas cannot but compel the open-hearted listener I think and I do hope you'll give it a try. The music's affinities with French music are intriguing, giving it a quality above and beyond its general Eastern European late-Romantic feel. 

What else does Lūcija Garūta have to offer us? Well, there's her Piano Concerto in F sharp minor of 1952 - a barnstorming piece in the old high-Romantic style. (Could any music be further away from the avant-garde goings-on at Darmstadt at that time?) Audiences across the world would love this piece if they ever got a chance to hear it - especially those partial to the Rachmaninov concertos. (One for Hyperion?) As with the cantata, drama and beauty combine winningly throughout, with the refined and lyrical second subject of the first movement and the entirety of the slow movement of the piece being particular treats. The slow movement meditates on a sombrely beautiful melody that could have come from one of the old Russian masters, contrasting it with a more cheerful theme of considerable colour and charm. The entertaining finale dances, sings and sparkles in an almost Saint-Saëns-like fashion, keeping up the very high standard of invention on display throughout. It's amazing how many wonderful pieces there are lying in various homelands that remain undiscovered by the world's music lovers. The world is missing out on so much. This is a piece it shouldn't be missing out on.

And there's more (as I hope you'll be wanting much more of Lūcija''s music)...There's a similarly late-Romantic Piano Trio in B flat major that will delight lovers of Russian-style chamber music of the late 19th Century variety - and many others besides. There's plenty of enchantment in the second subject of its first movement (ah, so warm!) and, yes, there's a belter of a slow movement. The finale is cathcy, like one of those old folksong-based finales. In some ways it's a piece very much in the same mould as the Piano Concerto - and none the worse for it. It may have been a piece out of its time but who cares about that now? Performances at Wigmore Hall would do wonders for its popularity.

If you're still not done with this lady's music, then please also try her Prelude in B minor, Variations in F sharp minor or Prelude in C sharp minor for piano.

Well, who's next?

Latvia I: Early Days

It's time for me to venture out into the wide world of classical music again. Instead of crossing the Andes or the Caucasus, I'm staying inside the European Union and sailing across the Baltic Sea to Latvia. It's time for me to explore Latvia because, beyond a few names I've read over the years, I've never heard anything other than Pēteris Vasks - by far the country's best-known composer beyond its borders. As these journeys always throw up remarkable music by composers the rest of the world ought to know, I hope you'll find it a worthwhile if, probably, rather sketchy survey and will dip in as you please.

The first major figure in Latvian music, my researches tell me, was Jānis Cimze (1814-1881), above.. It was he who raised unaccompanied choral music and professionalism onto the stage of his people's culture - a stage they've excelled on ever since. Folk songs arrangements and choral songs are a key part of his output, which is what I believe we're hearing in his glorious Jāņu dziesmas Vidzemes apgabalos ('Midsummer Songs from the Vidzeme Region'). 

Kārlis Baumanis (a.k.a. Baumaņu Kārlis), above, (1835-1905) is best known for writing the Latvian national anthem, Dievs, svētī Latviju! ('God, Bless Latvia!'), but apparently this teacher and nationalist also wrote the first ever song to feature the word 'Latvia' in its lyrics. I've not been able to locate that (as far as I'm aware!), but the the quality of his music might be gauged from a winning unaccompanied choral miniature like Jāņu dziesma ('Midsummer Song'). It's hard to judge, of course, on such a small sample of a composer's output.

Jāzeps Vītols, a.k.a. Joseph Wihtol (1863-1948), was taught by Rimsky-Korsakov and. He went on to teach Prokofiev, as well as a few of the composers we are to meet later in this survey (including Ivanovs and A. Skulte). He was a leading light in inter-war independent Latvia's music and fled the country when the Soviets re-asserted themselves towards the end of his life. His remains were taken to his homeland after it regained its independence in the 1990s. As you might expect from that potted biography, the composer's music is rooted in a conservative Romantic nationalist style owing much to the Russian example which injected with Latvian spirit, often through the infusion of Latvian folk music elements.

He wrote the first Latvian symphony (1886-8), his Symphony in E minor - a work wherein the example of his teacher Rimsky-Korsakov (and his circle) can be heard most clearly - something which is only to be expected in a young composer's work. Though it isn't an undiscovered masterpiece, the Symphony is a highly competent piece that should appeal to anyone who likes, say, the Borodin symphonies or the Tchaikovsky orchestral suites. The second subject of the first movement is particularly charming. The Piano Sonata in B flat minor, Op.1, his first published work, dates from around the same time and is an accomplished Romantic sonata of the Russian Empire's Silver Age (the one that followed the Golden age of Tchaikovsky, Borodin, Mussorgsky, etc), revealing the influence of Golden Age composers, principally Tchaikovsky. Its first movement has a Rimsky-like theme which the composer modulates engagingly, especially during the harmonically somewhat ambiguous development section. The second movement is a theme and variations on a simple tune, which it takes through many a brilliant by-way (plus the odd gentler one) as the movement proceeds. If you liked that then you will also like Vītols's Three Silhouettes, Op.38, though they are a lighter affair. Similarly conventional but showing the Russian influence again is the romance-like song Mirdzas dziesma (nope, can't translate that beyond 'song'!)

Those pieces all show the composer's Russian training in action, so what of the Latvian side of his art? Well, a short but attractive introduction to this side of the music of Vītols is the Latvian Folk Song Suite. We are a long way from Bartok here, as the idiom remains resolutely late-Romantic. Likewise  with the Ten Lettish Folksongs, Op.29. Still, these are early pieces and re-affirm that we have found a fine reliable composer whose music will afford the listener many pleasures.

The work which carries the name of its composer abroad (to a certain extent) is Gaismas pils (Castle of Light), an unaccompanied choral miniature that Latvian choirs love to sing at home and around the world - and it's easy to hear why. Another beauty is the short, reverential cantata Jesus at the Well. The latter comes from 1935 and shows Vitols holding on to his conservative idiom, albeit moving well beyond the 'Mighty Handful' sound of a much earlier Latvian nationalist cantata, Beverīnas Dziedonis ('Song of Beverīna').

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Further Vitols listening:

Variācijas - Portreti ('Variations - Portraits')
Berceuse
Valse

When I heard the Melancholy Waltz of the Romantic Emīls Dārziņš (1875-1910), pictured above, for the first time I immediately thought "Tchaikovsky with a tinge of Sibelius". The echoes are strong but Dārziņš creates a convincing little orchestral piece that should have long ago become a popular classic across the world. It's that good. Sadly, the fates seem to have have rather conspired against it - just as they did its composer  - however popular it may be in Latvia. Reading about the poor man's fall from grace - due to accusations of plagiarism from the works of Tchaikovsky and Sibelius - followed by his probably resultant suicide makes me rather melancholy too. An unhappy marriage, alcoholism, a personality that didn't endear him to many people, including critics - the list goes on. Frailty, thy name is human. 

I've not been able to track down much else by Emīls Dārziņš. There is, however, a melancholy song in the spirit of the Russian romance called Mātes gars (which Google translate tells me means 'Mother Spirit') which strikes a warm chord with me. Also, given the rich choral tradition of Latvia, it's not surprising to find our Emīls writing unaccompanied choral music, such as the lovely Sapņu tālumā ('Distant Dreams'). 

I'm unable to tell you whether the emotional journey of his son, Volfgangs Dārziņš (1906–1962), was a happier one or not (though I'm hoping it was). He lost his father when he was 4, however, so that's hardly a good start. From from I can discover it seems as if he (at some stage) left his homeland of America, but kept writing Latvian nationalist music. Time to be cheerful then: Volfgangs's Piano Sonata No.2 is a captivating piece, an original-sounding fusion of late-Romantic muscularity and Impressionistic delicacy (as if Rachmaninov met Debussy). The harmonies and sonorities of the piece are deliciously imagined. Quite fascinating. I would love to hear more from him, and his father.

Let's go back to Emīls Dārziņš's generation and meet Alfrēds Kalniņš (1879-1951), above, acclaimed as the founder of Latvian national opera. Kalniņš's Romeo and Juliet-like 4-act opera Baņuta (extract only - another extract here) is usually regarded as Latvia's very first opera (though one by Jānis Mediņš, see below, is said to be in with a shout too.) It was composed between 1918 and 1920. The work remains popular in the country and, from what little I've heard of it, I'd place it firmly in the strain of late-Romantic music most associated with Smetana. Talking of Smetana - the composer of Ma Vlast ('My Homeland') - Alfrēds Kalniņš also wrote a piece with that very title, his short symphonic idyll Mana dzimtene. An evocative opening (birds a-twittering in a lovely Latvian landscape), a noble melody, lots of rich brass at climaxes, passing glimpses of rural folk dancing - all are found in this charming patriotic orchestral miniature. For a further patriotic piece why not try the composer's own arrangement of his symphonic poem Latvia for piano duet?

It's hard to assess a composer from a small clutch of small pieces (as Delius enthusiasts will tell you), but our Alfrēds seems like a pleasing composer. As more proof of that, please try his tender Elegy or his Autumn. Kalniņš may not be as great a composer as the mighty Smetana (a big ask), but the Latvians seem to have good reason to be proud of him. As for his son, Jānis Kalniņš (1904-2000), I've even less to go on - just the melancholy Larghetto serioso for violin and piano (a pretty Romantic salon piece).

Another important figure in the development of Latvian national music is Jānis Mediņš (1890-1966), above. Developing ballet and opera in the country were his priorities. Mediņš was a Romantic, as you can hear that from his alternately flamboyant and heartfelt Piano Concerto from the early 1930s - a pleasing if perhaps-too-long piece in the Rachmaninov manner (minus all those individual touches that make listeners appreciate the genius of Rachmaninov). Can we call him the Latvian Rachmaninov? His Aria for orchestra is a warm-hearted miniature that, similarly, is (to put it in somewhat crude terms) bog-standard Romantic lyricism but it will still give many a classical music fan a contenting experience.  Quite what this composer can do is revealing in his lovely unaccompanied choral songs Jānīt's kalnā, Jānīt's lejā, a set which opens with a folk-tune which will already be familiar to you if you listened to Jānis Cimze's Midsummer Songs from the Vidzeme Region earlier, and in the lush, late-Romantic piano miniatures that make up his 24 Dainas ('Preludes'), which do indeed betray a certain similarly to Rachmaninov (though it would be unwise to overstate this). 

OK, I think it's time for a lady next.