http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLlPcMgHxTQ (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JLlPcMgHxTQ)
Does anyone know the name and composer of this piece of music? I hear it played a lot by busking violinists especially around the touristy areas of Moscow, but have never been able to identify it. It sounds like a wild gypsy dance....
The youtube link here is to the wedding banquet scene from the movie The Scarlet Empress, a very over-the-top but great fun 1930s film with Marlene Dietrich as Catherine the Great, directed by Josef von Sternberg. Incidentally the movie uses a fast-moving series of adaptations of music by composers such as Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky and an interesting orchestration (with chorus) of Anton Rubinstein's piece for solo piano "Reve angelique" (op.10, No.22) - see here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srurhFxeZrg (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srurhFxeZrg) .
are you sure it's Russian? It sounds (a bit?) like part of the end of Enescu's first Romanian Rhapsody, though I could be very mistaken. (I'll need to do a real comparison a bit later :( )
no I'm not sure it's Russian at all actually! It was just an assumption, based on the fact I hear it so much around Moscow, and it's in that film about Catherine the Great...
A Google search...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025746/soundtrack (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0025746/soundtrack)
...reveals that the piece is:
"Violin Composition"
(uncredited)
Written by Josef von Sternberg
Played at the wedding feast
...Sternberg being the director of the film. Hmmmm....
IMDB is not always accurate I have found. I seriously doubt Sternberg wrote it - The Scarlet Empress is not a popular or well-known movie in Russia so I doubt a piece of music from it would have found its way to the buskers!
Quote from: eschiss1 on Thursday 08 December 2011, 15:55
are you sure it's Russian? It sounds (a bit?) like part of the end of Enescu's first Romanian Rhapsody, though I could be very mistaken. (I'll need to do a real comparison a bit later :( )
It's very similar in style and tempo to Enescu's Rhapsody No.1, but it is not our piece. Have just checked! And I checked No.2 as well for good measure.
This source...
http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=3877 (http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=3877)
says:
Sternberg states that he wrote a violin composition for one of the scenes and conducted the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra in playing the film's score.
Again, hmmmmm........
But it does seem to be bespoke to the film. The violinist is certainly appears to be playing in time to the msuic.
Quote from: Alan Howe on Thursday 08 December 2011, 18:20
This source...
http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=3877 (http://www.afi.com/members/catalog/DetailView.aspx?s=&Movie=3877)
says:
Sternberg states that he wrote a violin composition for one of the scenes and conducted the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra in playing the film's score.
Again, hmmmmm........
Aaah, well now that is interesting. I may need to retract my previous certainty that it wasn't Sternberg...! Good find! As there is so much other classical in the movie (Tchaikovsky, Mendelssohn, Wagner) I had assumed that this was also an adaptation of something.
I'm still not altogether sure about this - Sternberg's compositional ability might bear further investigation...
Any relation to Constantin v Sternberg, I wonder?