Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherezade

Rimsky-Korsakov, above anything else, is regarded as a master of
orchestration, the art of creating orchestral sound and color. As
Rachmaninoff said about Rimsky-Korsakov’s music: "When there is a
snowstorm, the flakes seem to dance and drift. When the sun is
high, all instruments shine with an almost fiery glow. When there
is water, the waves ripple and splash audibly throughout the
orchestra … ; the sound is cool and glassy when he describes a
calm winter night with glittering starlit sky." Nowhere is this
gift more on display than in one of Rimsky-Korsakov’s seminal
works, Scheherezade. But this work is far more than only
orchestration. It is a shining example of a number of complicated
facets of both Rimsky-Korsakov’s and Russian Nationalist music of
the time. It also displays so many of the contradictions that
marked this era of classical music, and in particular, Russian
classical music. Rimsky-Korsakov originally gave the piece a
clear narrative, but then withdrew it angrily, saying that any
programmatic narrative was merely meant peripherally, and “I
meant these hints to direct but slightly the hearer’s fancy…All I
had desired was that the hearer, if he liked my piece
as symphonic music, should carry away the impression that it
is beyond doubt an oriental narrative of some numerous and varied
fairy-tale wonders and not merely four pieces played one after
the other…” And that word, oriental, a complicated word in our
modern times to be sure, plays a huge and unavoidable role in
this piece. This was a time when Imperial Russia occupied lands
in Central Asia, and when the Russian public became obsessed with
so called “oriental” literature and music. Composers drew
liberally on these sources for their music, and Rimsky Korsakov’s
mentor, the great composer Mily Balakirev, heavily encouraged
Russian composers to use these sources as a way to set their
music apart from German composers of the time. A group of
composers, the not at all egotistically named “Mighty Five”
Balakirev, Mussorgsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin, and Cesar Cui,
almost all became famous through their use of Central Asian and
Middle Eastern themes and stories. But no piece has captured the
imagination of listeners around the world more than Scheherezade,
a piece that drew upon the collection of Middle Eastern folk
tales known and One Thousand and One Nights, and features some of
the most legendary melodies in the history of Western Classical
Music. We’re going to talk about all of this today on this
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