Sonata No 8 Op 84 Piano Solo

Boris Berman draws on his intimate knowledge of Prokofiev's work to guide music lovers and pianists through the composer's nine piano sonatas.

Best known for his keyboard sonatas, the music of Soler shows the influence of Scarlatti without imitating it, including the sounds of Spanish dances and Italian influences. This sonata is a radiantly joyful, merry and mischievous, lively and light musical celebration. It is in 3/8 time, with running 16th notes, ornamentation, and nice dynamic contrasts.

This edition of the Prokofiev Sonata No. 8 is based on the original, unedited edition first published in the Soviet Union. This edition stays as close as possible to the original text, while correcting some of its obvious misprints, adding fingering, phrasing, dynamic markings, and pedal. Lyric elements are evident in both the Andante dolce (first movement) and the Andante sognando (second movement). The toccata-like third movement uses the piano's full sonority while at the same time treating it also as a percussive instrument. This clearly engraved, scholarly edition is the finest edition available of this virtuosic contemporary work.

This account of the renowned composer’s neglected wife—including her years in a Soviet prison—is “a story both riveting and wrenching” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review). Serge Prokofiev was one of the twentieth century’s most brilliant composers yet is an enigma to historians and his fans. Why did he leave the West and move to the Soviet Union despite Stalin’s crimes? Why did his astonishing creativity in the 1930s soon dissolve into a far less inspiring output in his later years? The answers can finally be revealed, thanks to Simon Morrison’s unique and unfettered access to the family’s voluminous papers and his ability to reconstruct the tragic, riveting life of the composer’s wife, Lina. Morrison’s portrait of the marriage of Lina and Serge Prokofiev is the story of a remarkable woman who fought for survival in the face of unbearable betrayal and despair and of the irresistibly talented but heartlessly self-absorbed musician she married. Born to a Spanish father and Russian mother in Madrid at the end of the nineteenth century and raised in Brooklyn, Lina fell in love with a rising-star composer—and defied convention to be with him, courting public censure. She devoted her life to Serge and art, training to be an operatic soprano and following her brilliant husband to Stalin’s Russia. Just as Serge found initial acclaim—before becoming constricted by the harsh doctrine of socialist-realist music—Lina was at first accepted and later scorned, ending her singing career. Serge abandoned her and took up with another woman. Finally, Lina was arrested and shipped off to the gulag in 1948. She would be held in captivity for eight awful years. Meanwhile, Serge found himself the tool of an evil regime to which he was forced to accommodate himself. The contrast between Lina and Serge is one of strength and perseverance versus utter self-absorption, a remarkable human drama that draws on the forces of art, sacrifice, and the struggle against oppression. Readers will never forget the tragic drama of Lina’s life, and never listen to Serge’s music in quite the same way again.

With the same authority, insight, and unique ability to bring music to life on the printed page that he brought to his Guide to Chamber Music, Melvin Berger gives us an indispensable guide to the sonata form. Comprehensive, analytical, and historical, including descriptions in nontechnical language of over two hundred of the best best-known sonatas, Guide to Sonatas is designed to help all music lovers−casual listeners, experienced concertgoers, performers, conductors, or teachers−deepen their understanding and enhance their enjoyment of the classical repertoire.