Achim Breiling ([log in to unmask]) wrote:

>...  These are strange symphonies indeed, but what powerful music!
>Some kind of pityless rituals of human emotion.  Sombody called Galina
>Ustvolskaya *the lady with the hammer* and you have to listen to these
>works to understand why!

Well, I haven't heard the symphonies, but I did hear one of her pieces
earlier this year; this is what I wrote about it (it was just one work in
a concert whose main attraction was Cage's Concerto for Prepared Piano)

   The idea of the Day of Judgement and (particularly) the medieval
   plainchant, the Dies Irae, which describes it, have fascinated
   composers for centuries.

   What seems to single out Galina Ustvolskaya's Composition No.2 (Dies
   Irae) -- apart from its unusual instrumentation of piano, eight double
   basses and percussion (a large wooden box to be precise) -- is that
   while it constantly made reference to and hinted at the plainchant,
   it never, as far as I could tell, quoted it directly.

   Nevertheless, the percussive piano, aggressive basses and the
   extraordinarily vehement percussion, combined to make up an experience
   for which apocalyptic seems the only appropriate word.

Deryk Barker
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