Scriabin

[pies]

I've heard a lot about Scriabin and have developed some interest in him.  Which of his pieces should I listen to first?

[cjp_piano]

Start at the beginning!  No, really, if you're interested, just go to the library and get as many of his CDs as you can!

He wrote things such as: preludes, etudes, mazurkas, sonatas, poems, waltzes . . .

His style changed quite a bit throughout his life, so if you aren't compelled by a certain piece, try others.

Hope you enjoy!

[phil13]

Here's my advice:

Find a couple of his early works, a few mid-period works, and a couple of his later works.

Suggested:

Early: Op.8 Etudes Nos. 2, 9, 11, and 12, Mazurkas Op.3 Nos. 1 and 4, and, of course, the famous Op.2 No.1 etude. Oh, and the Nocturne for the left hand. And the Op.11 preludes (as you can tell, I'm a big fan of Scriabin's early work, and most of his mid-period work)

Mid-period: Op.42 Etudes Nos. 1, 5 (a must) and 8, the Op.52 prelude in A minor.

Late: Vers la Flamme, Sonatas No.5 and 10. (This and Vers la Flamme are the only two late Scriabin works that I really like and could listen to over and over. The rest of it...meh. It's a biased list, I know.)

That's a good place to start, I think.

Phil

[I Love Xenakis]

Fantasy in B Minor Op. 28, Sonata No. 5, Sonata No. 6, Sonata No. 7, Sonata No. 8, Sonata No. 10, Vers la Flamme Op. 72 are my personal favorites

[superstition2]

The CDs to get are:

Ashkenazy/Maazel: Poem of Ecstasy, Piano Concerto, Prometheus. Each performance is definitive. Another good recording of the concerto is from the Chicago symphony. Stick with the Ashkenazy/Maazel first, though. Absolutely avoid Naxos' discs.

Glemser's Scriabin sonatas volume 1, Naxos label. This set has the best performance of the 7th sonata, and the first movement of the 2nd. Very good performances throughout, including the Fantasy in G minor. His later Volume II isn't as good. I wouldn't bother with it.

Robert Taub's Scriabin sonatas collection. Taub's set has great performances of several sonatas, such as the 4th, 5th, 6th, and the 10th. You can do a lot worse than Taub's set, which only is lacking in the 7th and 8th. The Glemser disc takes care of the 7th, and if you really want the 8th, get Ashkenazy's set or (if you don't care about sound quality), find the rare Sofronitsky disc. Taub's set is much better than Hamelin's, no matter how great Hamelin may be technically. Ashkenazy's set is worth getting if you're Scriabin-phile because I prefer his 1st sonata to Taub's. But, don't get it if you're thinking of only getting a single set.

Sony's "Horowitz Plays Scriabin" disc. It has the sonatas 9 and 10, plus Vers la flamme and many great short pieces.

Get these discs. They are an outstanding start to a Scriabin collection.

Later, if you want to find great (but sonically-mediocre or poor) performances, get Sofronitsky's recordings, and Richter's live 6th sonata. Sofronitsky's 9th sonata is definitive, even better than Horowitz'. Richter's 6th is definitive, but there is terrible coughing and distortion.


Scriabin performers/discs to avoid like the plague:

Ogdon.
Paley.
Ponti.
Scherbakov.

Ho-hum discs:

Hamelin's Scriabin sonatas. Hamelin has a great reputation, but even Ashkenazy's very uneven set is better because it has two definitive performances (sonata 1 and sonata . Hamelin comes very close with the 5th sonata, the only impressive performance in the set, but ultimately fails because he muddles a climactic rhythm that Horowitz drives home with perfection in his live recording. Taub's performance, although lacking pyrotechnics, is also better because it lacks that clumsy spot and isn't strident. It's a great, very different, performance. Hamelin's set isn't bad, but there's no reason to get it. Instead, I'd get Taub's, Glemser's volume 1, and Ashkenazy's (for sonatas 1 and .

Laredo's Scriabin sonatas. Some of them are pretty good (sonata 7), and some are quite poor (sonata 5). The sound quality is lacking and there's nothing in the set that makes it compelling enough to listen to because of that. It's unfortunate for Ms. Laredo, because her 7th might be up with Glemser's if she had used a better piano and had a better recording setup.

Roberto Szidon's sonatas. Some of them are pretty good, like the 8th. But the set has old analog sound quality and the pianist is heavy-handed in general.

[superstition2]

If you're really adventurous, you could find other Richter recordings. Apparently, there are recordings of him playing several other sonatas, like 2, 5, 7 and maybe 9. As far as I know, Sofronitsky recorded 2 (first movement only?), 3, 4, 8, and 9. He never played the 7th, and I don't know about the others. Horowitz recorded the 3rd, 5th, 9th, and 10th. He played the 6th once, as far as I know, but it wasn't recorded. Rubinstein premiered the 5th in England, but I don't think there's a recording of him playing the piece, sadly.

[tompilk]

Sonatas 1,2,3 are my favourite... i dont like the later stuff as much... i like big crashy chords... and i like nearly all these pieces that have just octaves in teh left hand...

[minor9th]

Yakov Kasman's new (one disc was previously released) 2 CD set of the Sonatas is very good. The sound perspective is quite close--perhaps adds to the explosive feel.

[amaryllith]

I'm not familiar with the other CDs, but I would say that the 24 preludes/2 sonatas CD by Mikhail Pletnev would make an excellent introduction to Scriabin's works. It has the op. 11 preludes, Sonatas #4 and #10, and a selection of his smaller later pieces (From early, middle, to late in chronological order). It's also an excellent recording.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00000631Z/sr=1-3/qid=1138575300/ref=sr_1_3/102-9682676-3392965?%5Fencoding=UTF8

[stringoverstrung]

The CDs to get are:
.....

Thanks Superstition2! You just saved me a lot of my most precious asset: TIME.

[prometheus]

Scriabin is very different from Chopin. He may be influenced by him but only some of his very early pieces may be considered chopinesque.

[quantum]

If you are finding that you are beginning to like Scriabin a lot, I'd recommend getting recordings of multiple performances of the same pieces.  Scriabin's music has wide reaching posibilities in performance, and different performers bring out different elements in the music. 

The more you listen the more you will realize his music doesn't take to the word "definitive" as much as other composers because of it's very wide possibilities in performance.

[superstition2]

I mainly meant definitive as in "a performance that's good enough to represent the piece". That's different from using it in the sense of "there can be only one".

[superstition2]

Thanks Superstition2! You just saved me a lot of my most precious asset: TIME.

You're welcome. I'd like to add one other note. Stay away from the Naxos disc of Scriabin's 2nd symphony. It's not good. I don't know if it's the symphony or the performance, but the overal experience is mediocre. The label has an interesting disc with two piano arrangements of his 3rd symphony and the Poem of Ecstasy. It's enjoyable to listen to, but not a necessary purchase. I don't think Scriabin did the arrangements, and the original orchestral works are better. The Naxos Scriabin 1st symphony is very nice, although the female soloist in the last movement isn't to my taste. I wonder if the Ashkenazy set of complete Scriabin orchestral works is good. That set is probably going to be my next purchase.