Album Notes

USSR Symphony Orchestra/Evgeni Svetlanov, conductor/Female group of the USSR TV and Radio Large Choir/Ludmila Ermakova, director
RACHMANINOV: Symphonic Dances, Op. 45 • Six Choruses for female voices & piano, Op. 15 • Aleko—excerpts from the opera
While the Symphonic Dances of Rachmaninov are fairly well known, the other works here are less familiar and make attractive couplings for this definitive recording.

Along with Kondrashin and Rozhdestvensky, Evgeni Svetlanov was one of the three most famous Russian conductors of the later 20th century. His readings, especially of Russian music, were noted for their intelligence, balance, idiomatic flavor and frequent displays of raw orchestral power.

The Symphonic Dances and Six Choruses recorded live in the Grand Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, February 3, 1986; the Aleko excerpts date from 1973.

“What an essential champion of the soul of Russian music Svetlanov was…Svetlanov’s years of directorship of the USSR (later, Russian) State Symphony Orchestra produced a goldmine of performances that should, if we lived in a fairer world, survive and thrive as a testament to an idiosyncratic sound and the passion of their conductor.” – David Wilkins, Music & Vision Daily, UK