“Seeing Russia with Teacher” is a 20th century duet suite for piano composed by Leo Ornstein. It vividly depicts the scenery of Eastern Europe’s Orthodox regions in the eyes of Ornstein as a child being guided by a teacher. The pieces in the suite are completely tonal in the common practice sense, and are mostly late Romantic in style with small amounts of modernist influences carrying through. The programmatic subject matter allows the composition to retain a 19th century flair of Romantic nationalism. The 10 pieces, all of them in binary form, that constitute the set are as follows: The first piece, “The Old Village Church”, contains a repeating theme of Russian folk music overlaying a simple line of slow-striking chords. Those chords in the secondo indicate the sonorous peeling of the bells, as they are rung in the steeple of a semi-decrepit wooden church. The second piece, “Putting a Wooden Doll to Sleep”, emulates the lilting lullaby a little girl sings to her little doll in much of the same manner her own mother sang to her. As the primo handles the sung song, the secondo part contains a languid tremolo reminiscent of a soothing rocking motion meant to make the doll fall asleep in place of a little baby. “The Sleighride”, the third piece, ostensibly illustrates a casual and leisurely trip on the back of a sled drawn by a pack animal. Here, one of Ornstein’s idiosyncrasies features; a dominant seventh chord on the subdominant key sets up the dominant that resolves to the tonic in the A theme. In the fourth piece, “The Prisoners Leave for Siberia”, the child watches as convicts are solemnly lined up and led off to the miserable katorga camps in Siberia. The style of the piece is similar to the first, but the Ukrainian work song is given a figured bass of greater dissonance than in “The Old Village Church”. The fifth piece, titled “The Carrousel”, contains an image of children skipping around in a circle to a French compound duple meter tune. The B section’s style is more in line with East Slavic folk music. The coda concludes the piece on an imperfect cadence that echoes the main theme. The sixth piece, “The Moujik in the Dark Woods”, shows that of a poor peasant (“muzhik”) of serf heritage laboring deep in the woods. The man, beset by fatigue, sings to himself in a deep voice embodied by the primo, while the secondo shows the glint of the flickering lantern light that illuminates the peasant’s workspace. The seventh piece, “Baba Tells an Old Tale” has little Leo sitting on his grandmother’s lap listening to her with intent as she tells him a story. The contents of the story, not discernable to a passerby, can be assumed to be a tragic one given the somber atmosphere of the piece. With the eighth piece, “The Cossacks Ride By”, the Ukrainian tropak dance serves as the theme of Cossack cavalry thundering down the street. As for Leo, he looks on ahead and walks by nonchalantly and inconspicuously, as late 19th to early 20th century Imperial Russia was an inopportune time for someone whose surname ends in “-shteyn” to draw undue attention to himself in the presence of Cossacks. The piece is primarily built on clinking parallel chords, fit together to a wild duple meter dance. A repeating plagal cadence serves as the finale. “The Barge on the Dnieper” has Leo sit on a boat floating on a river, as indicated by the fluid texture in the secondo and graceful melody in the primo. Finally, “Holiday in the Village” contains a galop secondo texture and quartal primo folk harmonies to represent cheerful festivities. Date: 1925 Catalogue: Severo Ornstein 552 Order: Table of Contents: 0:00 No. 1 - The Old Village Church: 0:08 No. 2 - Putting the Wooden Doll to Sleep: 0:56 No. 3 - The Sleighride: 1:59 No. 4 - The Prisoners Leave for Siberia: 2:46 No. 5 - The Carrousel: 3:38 No. 6 - The Moujik in the Dark Woods: 4:29 No. 7 - Baba Tells an Old Tale: 5:19 No. 8 - The Cossacks Ride By: 6:07 No. 9 - The Barge by the Dnieper: 7:04 No. 10 - Holiday in the Village: 8:29 Performers: Antony Gray on piano as teacher Ghapilan Koneswaran on piano as student (No. 1) Petria Koumis on piano as student (No. 2) Matthew Dominé on piano as student (No. 3) Taj Patel on piano as student (No. 4) Akhil Patel on piano as student (No. 5) Shan Joshi on piano as student (No. 6) Ijaz Rahman on piano as student (No. 7) Jennika Vadher or Nikita Shikotra on piano as student (No. 8) Sunay Vadher on piano as student (No. 9) Sahas Warna on piano as student (No. 10) Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes. ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGBCYBHzbes

Mazurka No. 2, was composed by Mily Balakirev during a time when the Russian Five, also known as the Mighty Handful, was in its formative years. Unlike many of Chopin’s or Scriabin’s Mazurkas, which are written in sets, Balakirev’s often serve as standalone pieces. Balakirev wrote this Mazurka No. 2 around the same time as No. 1, three years after his debut. This piece, unlike the First Mazurka, is very somber and reflective, almost conveying a sort of disappointment toward the listener. At less than three minutes long, it holds the honor of being the shortest Mazurka by Balakirev, being able to fit neatly within two pages. Date: 1860 Dedicatee: Lyubov Ivanovna Pogrebova Performer: Alexander Paley Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are used for non-commercial purposes. ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiuD-YJuKsk