Tcherepnin: My Flowering Staff

Featuring

Inna Dukach
Paul Whelan
Tatyana Kebuladze
Acmeist Male Choir
Alexander Tcherepnin

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Composition History

Alexander Tcherepnin, a St. Petersburg-born composer, began setting Sergei Gorodetsky's collection of 37 poems, "My Flowering Staff," to music around 1920 in Tiflis (Tbilisi), Georgia, after fleeing revolutionary turmoil.

Compositional Technique

Tcherepnin's songs in this cycle reflect his experimentation with a unique six-step scale built on alternating semitones and minor thirds, which unifies the music with a characteristic piquancy.

Critical Reception

The original publisher, Heugel, chose not to issue Tcherepnin's 35 completed songs as an integral cycle, instead releasing them in three separate folios, which concealed the full scope of the composer's project.

Performer Biography

Pianist Tatyana Kebuladze, a native of Kyiv, Ukraine, studied at the Glière State Music College, the alma mater of Vladimir Horowitz, and now serves on the piano faculty at Rutgers University.

Performer Biography

Soprano Inna Dukach, praised for her 'stunning' and 'golden-toned' voice, made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 2018 as the title role in Madama Butterfly.

Composer Biography

Alexander Tcherepnin's early compositions, including these songs, often served as private personal gifts to loved ones, sometimes presented as hand-drawn 'vouchers' to be redeemed later.

Recording & Production

This album presents the first complete recording of Alexander Tcherepnin's 36-song cycle, "My Flowering Staff," as he initially conceived it, including previously unpublished songs.