Galina Ustvolskaya was a profoundly original composer, unrivalled in the extremism of her style, who was largely ignored during her lifetime. Fiercely independent, Ustvolskaya created highly expressive, even violent music that sounds like the work of no other composer and reveals no distinct influences, while often being imbued with religiosity or spirituality. Her music has been described as having the 'narrowness of a laser beam capable of piercing metal'. Only after her death was Ustvolskaya's original and uncompromising talent finally recognised. Christian Karlsen and the London Philharmonic Orchestra present here Ustvolskaya's five symphonies. While the first appears superficially traditional (it is the only one for full symphony orchestra), it features two boys singing - through microphones, in a chanting manner - texts that speak of poverty, racism and injustice. Symphonies Nos 2 to 5 break decisively with the traditional mould; each consists of a single, rather short movement, in the manner of theatrical rituals. Written for instrumental combinations as varied as they are unusual, these symphonies became increasingly intransigent as their instrumentation contracted further and further, down to just a handful of instruments in the Fourth and Fifth Symphonies. A solo voice appears sporadically, not necessarily for singing, but rather to verbalise a prayer - a prayer asking for forgiveness but not for a better life.

USTVOLSKAYA: PIANO SONATAS FR

'It is not you who are under my influence, but I who am under yours,' wrote Shostakovich to Ustvolskaya. Certainly, though their music shares sorrow, grotesquerie and violence, Ustvolskaya has a vision all her own. The Octet appears to be an obsessive rite; violins worry over the same narrow range of notes, and cower before the relentless timpanic beating. Leiferkus’s speaking voice provides the only real music in the arid Symphony. Welcome to the Gulag. Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet, spare as it is, arrives like a shower of delightful opulence.

-- Helen Wallace, BBC Music Magazine

Classical Music

Ustvolskaya's music is dark, somber, even remote when a solitary voice holds sway. Her rejection of easily recognizable form suggests that, metaphorically, time is not a factor; as temporal references are acutely literai, the means to escape an oppressive time and place are found in spiritual, not social, values. Similarly, the chilling sparseness of textures becomes an emotionallandscape, scarred, sometimes painfully severe, where inner strength is necessary for survival. But there is, too, especially in the Duet For Violin And Piano, a sanctity of mood (shared with the later Shostakovich, when he was obsessed with death, and where, in his final works such as the Viola Sonata and Sonata For Violin And Piano, the influence of Ustvolskaya may be felt). ln moments like this, rare is the music where the human will is so immediate, so enduring.

Unfairly named 'The Lady with the Hammer' for her uncompromising use of massive thunderous chords and ostinato rhythms, Ustvolskaya was a pupil of Shostakovich but forged her own unique way into many genres. Recently, artists have concentrated, as here, on bringing out the richness of the works and their innate lyricism. This album includes all of the composer's music for violin and piano in two major works - the Sonata and the Duet. Russian violinist Evgeny Sorkin was a child prodigy and performed for Isaac Stern at the age of 10 and was compared at 16 to David Oistrakh by no less than Yehudi Menuhin. He moved to Australia and balanced teaching at Sydney Conservatory with a busy recital schedule. Natalia Andreeva is a Russian pianist who is currently Lecturer in Piano at the University of Sydney, Australia. Her 2015 recording of the complete solo piano music of Galina Ustvolskaya was very well received; she is a pianist of consummate skill who can express the power and lyricism which exist side by side in these works.

Russian composer Galina Ustvolskaya wrote six Piano Sonatas. Spanning just over 40 years, these works are like a guidebook to her musical and spiritual growth. They vary widely in style, from the Shostakovich-inspired first sonata to the angular and technically avant-garde sixth sonata. This DVD (in PAL format) features a live performance of all six sonatas, each played by a different pianist. It was recorded at Moscow's School of Dramatic Arts, in it's unusual Globe Hall, which is shaped like an octahedron. The acoustics of this space concentrated the sound and immersed the audience in Ustvolskaya's unique sound world.

Ustvolskaya was an enigma: a quiet, reserved and introspective individual who wrote powerful, massively constructed (yet short in length) music which astounded her audiences and ten years after her death is becoming highly regarded and Ustvolskaya is almost becoming a cult figure. Unrelelenting rhythms in many works brought her the nickname 'The Lady with the Hammer'. Russian pianist Natalia Andreeva has however studied the music in great depth and while fully committed to the great mechanistic climaxes also brings out the lyrical and melodic qualities which are always present, expecially in the earlier works such as the picturesque Preludes. This composer, a pupil of Shostakovich (who claimed that he could teach her nothing new), will be seen in hindsight as a pivotal figure in the development of 20th century Soviet/Russian music.