Rachmaninow – Corelli Variationen

Discogs

Victor Eresko in 1967 was the latest pride of the Conservatory in Moscow. This recording was made there. This, the most prestigious musical school in Russia was founded 158 years ago. Its roots are a bit older, with a music school started some fifty years earlier at the suggestion of Friedrich Scholz, the head of the Bolshoi Theatre. It was founded by Nicolai Rubinstein, the younger brother of Anton Rubinstein, who founded the conservatory in Saint Petersburg. It put the brothers Rubinstein at the center of musical Russia.

In those first years composer Tchaikovsky was hired to teach musical theory. Because of it, his name was added to the conservatory in 1940: it is now called the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory. Many of the Russian musicians and composers have studied or been employed there, and it has served as the location for many concerts (looking at you Horowitz). Since 1871 it is housed in a former winter palace of princess Ekaterina Romanovna Dashkova, one of the friends of Tsarina Catherine the Great and a major force in the Russian Enlightenment.

It is a pity I couldn’t find this recording on Spotify. Maybe you have better luck finding it on YouTube. It is worth the effort I think. Especially the Corelli variations is well done.

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