One of the foremost Soviet experimentalist composers of the early 20th century, Alexander Vasilyevich Mosolov was famed for his futuristic orchestral work, The Iron Foundry....

One of the foremost Soviet experimentalist composers of the early 20th century, Alexander Vasilyevich Mosolov was famed for his futuristic orchestral work, The Iron Foundry. After Mosolov’s imprisonment in 1938, he fell into obscurity. Conflicts with Soviet authorities led to his expulsion from the Composers' Union in 1936 and imprisonment in the Gulag in 1937. Following an early release, which had been argued for by his Conservatory teachers, Mosolov turned his attention to much more polite yet tuneful works, setting Turkmen and Kyrgyz folk tunes for orchestra. His later music conformed to the Soviet aesthetic to a much greater degree, yet he never regained the success of his early career. Olga Andryushchenko beautifully performs earlier works on this album.