PRINCE IGOR OVERTURE

Alexander Borodin (1833-1887) Reconstructed and orchestrated by Alexander Glazunov (1865-1936)

Borodin was not a composer by profession, but a distinguished research chemist on the faculty of the St.Petersburg Medico-Surgical Academy. However it is through his achievements as an amateur composer that he has gained immortality, although he himself considered the founding of a School of Medicine for Women as his personal greatest achievement.

A problem of only composing music as a hobby was that he had trouble finishing anything – he was just too busy on his medical work, although he was overflowing with musical ideas. It was in 1869 that Vladimir Stassov brought him the libretto of an opera based on the 12th century conflicts between the Russian Prince Igor and the Polovsti tartars of Central Asia. Borodin could see the subject afforded the opportunity to contrast the musical styles of Russia with that of the East and set to work with enthusiasm. However his professional responsibilities and other musical projects, such as his masterful second symphony meant that at the time of his premature death from a heart attack, Prince Igor remained in various states of completion and it fell on his composer friends, Rimsky-Korsakov and Glazunov to complete.

Borodin had composed, but had not written down the overture at his death. However he had played it on the piano to Glazunov (a fine composer in his own right) who reconstructed it from memory “roughly according to Borodin’s plan” and orchestrated as best he could in Borodin’s style.

The overture opens with meditative calm which is disturbed by antiphonal calls to arms passed around the orchestra. These lead into a Russian dance, an Oriental sounding clarinet melody and a noble horn solo, possibly representing Prince Igor. The remainder of the overture develops these fine and memorable themes.

Instrumentation (key to notation): 2+1 2 2 2 : 4 2 3 1 : T Str

Programme Notes by Jonathan Hodgetts

www.SalisburySymphonyOrchestra.org.uk