Classical music

This is a small note for classical music, where most of contents are from Staines (2010), The Rough Guide to Classical Music.

Alexander Borodin (1833-1887)

He is a Russian.

He is an Italian and lives only in 34 years.

First success: Il pirata
His greatest opera: Norma is written in 1831.
Exhausted by the effort of composing I puritani, he fell ill and died, alone, in a dreary house in a suburb of Paris, where his last opera had just had its premiere.

He was born in Bonn, Germany and died in Vienna, Austria. We don’t have to say too much about him. Just note some of his masterpieces.

Eroica, which is Symphony No 3 in E flat major, ‘Eroica’. This video has the short introduction at the beginning.
Piano Sonata No. 14 in C-sharp minor “Quasi una fantasia”, Op. 27, No. 2 that a music critic Ludwig Rellstab call as “Moonlight Sonata”. This name is misleading since it is “a movement with almost the character of a funeral march”.¹ This video is played by Alexei Lubimov. In wiki, it says that this piece is influenced by Chopin’s Fantaisie-Impromptu in C-sharp minor, Op. 66 No. 4.
- In Piano Sonata No. 14, it has 3 movements: Adagio sostenuto, Allegretto, Presto agitato. From slowly, fast, then very fast.

Le Mal du Pays played by Lazar Berman. This piece is mentioned by Murakami in his novel “Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage”.