Notes on the Program By James M. Keller, Program Annotator, The Leni and Peter May Chair

Piano in F-sharp minor, Op. 20 lexander Scriabin was not the first exam- premiered a year later. It was published in A ple in history of a rebel issuing from an 1898, the same year Scriabin was named aristocratic family. His father was a lawyer to the faculty of the Conservato- in the Russian consular service (a profes- ry. This concerto was Scriabin’s first work sion considered déclassée by the more con- to use an ; although in 1889 he servative members of the family), and his had composed a Fantasia for and mother was an accomplished , a pu- Orchestra, the orchestra part of that piece pil of at the St. Peters- remained in piano score and was never burg Conservatory. Alexander was an only orchestrated. Although some of the piano child, and he lost his mother to writing in the concerto comes across as shortly after his first birthday. Since his fa- Chopinesque in its arching phrases and ther was often away on foreign assignments, elaborate right-hand filigree, the roles of Alexander was raised by his grandmother, the piano and the orchestra are far more aunt, and great-aunt, who coddled him be- tightly interlaced here than in Chopin’s pi- yond description. They also encouraged his ano , where the orchestra plays interest in music. As a teenager he studied strictly accompaniment. Scriabin keeps the piano and composition alongside his life- piano almost constantly active, but not al- long friend , and when ways in the spotlight; sometimes the soloist he was 16, he entered the Moscow Conser- recedes to seem almost an obbligato voice vatory to study and composi- within the orchestra. tion with (who championed him) and (who had doubts), In Short as well as piano with Wassily Safonoff. Scriabin met with limited success in his Born: January 6, 1872, in Moscow, composition studies but he did graduate from Died: April 27, 1915, in Moscow the Conservatory in 1892 with a second-place Work composed: October and November medal in piano — no dishonor since Rach- 1896, with and revision maninoff took first. By all accounts Scriabin continuing through May 1897 was an excellent but not quite top-notch pia- nist, limited by the fact that, being of dimin- World premiere: October 23, 1897, in Odessa, with the as soloist and Wassily utive stature (peaking at five-feet-one), his Safonoff, conductor hand spanned only an octave — not to men- tion that his right-hand technique had been premiere: impaired by overzealous practice of virtuoso December 6, 1973, Georg Semkow, conductor, , soloist works by Balakirev and Liszt. Scriabin’s early compositions were mostly Most recent New York Philharmonic piano pieces building on the tradition of performance: May 23, 2012, Alan Gilbert, Chopin, but in 1896 he composed the Pi- conductor, , soloist ano Concerto in F-sharp minor, which he Estimated duration: ca. 27 minutes

NOVEMBER 2019 | 25 A near-crisis occurred when Scriabin’s comment. “Your absent-mindedness and publisher, , sent the score carelessness are simply phenomenal,” wrote to Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov for his apprais- the exasperated publisher to Scriabin. A few al. Rimsky’s judgment was withering. He months later, having effected revisions, Scri- found the score disordered and had issues abin wrote to Belyayev asking for Rimsky’s with aspects of the notation, but he was address, which he had by then misplaced. particularly dismissive of the orchestration, Rimsky’s response to that draft was again a field in which he was an acknowledged negative, and he handed it off to Lyadov master. Scriabin wrote a simpering reply to with an excoriating cover letter: “Look at Rimsky’s criticisms, apologizing profuse- this filth. …I have! … I am in no condition ly, invoking his neuralgia as an excuse and to cope with such a mush-headed genius.” promising to thank Rimsky for his support Nonetheless, the concerto reaped success “by industriously exterminating my care- at its premiere, and when Rimsky came to lessness.” He then made matters worse write his memoirs, he allowed that Scriabin by mistakenly mixing up his response to was a “star of the first magnitude.” Rimsky with a letter he had written to com- poser , placing each mis- Instrumentation: two and piccolo, sive in the other’s envelope. It took little to two , two , two , offend Rimsky, who marched into Belya- four horns, two , three trom- yev’s office, placed Scriabin’s letter-and- bones, , and strings, in addition to envelope on his desk, and left without the solo piano.

Scriabin (not) at the Philharmonic

In 1906 Alexander Scriabin traveled to America at the invitation of , the conduc- tor of the Russian Orchestra Society in . From that December into March of 1907, Scriabin gained some acclaim through his performances not only in New York but also on the recital stages of Chicago, Detroit, and other cities. However, the visit also had its downside. Scriabin had married fellow pianist Vera Ivanovna Isakovich in 1897 (the year of the Piano Con- certo’s premiere), but in 1906 he left her and their two children and entered into a public affair with Tatiana de Schlözer, who also was from a musical family. When Scriabin’s mistress and muse joined him in America the scandalous odor of infidelity was too potent for many parties. Wassily Safonoff, who had manned the podium when the was premiered in Rus- sia, was by then the Music Director of the New York Philharmonic. He hap- pened to be a good friend of the real Mrs. Scriabin, and he therefore issued the fiat that Scriabin’s works should not be performed by his orchestra. The composer and Tatiana ended up leav- ing New York City in a huff.

Scriabin, at far right, with Tatiana and , who published early studies on the composer’s works, near the Oka River in Russia, 1912

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