Hyperion Records

The Romantic Sketches for the Young Op 54 were composed in response to a plea for something ‘of moderate difficulty’ from Medtner’s German publisher, who had been hesitant in taking the huge commercial risk of publishing the massive Sonatas romantica and minacciosa (Op 53 Nos 1 and 2) in view of the volatile inflation prevalent at the time (1932). Medtner rather huffily obliged with four new Skazki, each preceded by a Prelude. Despite the imposed restrictions, Medtner found something unique to say in each piece. Especially worthy to sit beside their adult counterparts are the radiant Hymn (in C major in common with his other works with overtly religious connotations) and its companion The Beggar. The gentle rain which descends from the top of the keyboard towards the Hymn’s close seems to combine a poetic purpose with a didactic one since the white-note figuration has a feel of a keyboard exercise. The lamentations of the Skazka evoke that mixture of pity and contempt meted out to beggars and other unfortunates in nineteenth-century Russian literature. The Beggar was to be the last Skazka for solo piano, but the story does not quite end there, for the Two Pieces for two pianos, Op 58, are also Skazki, and one could argue that the third Piano Concerto, Op 60 (after Lermontov’s poem Rusalka), is the grandest Skazka of all.

from notes by Hamish Milne © 2007