Best Schnittke

Alfred Schnittke's Requiem is a large sacred concert work composed in 1974 and 1975, initially connected with incidental music for a production of Friedrich Schiller's Don Carlos. Scored for soloists, chorus, and an unusual instrumental ensemble, it sets traditional Latin Requiem texts while adding...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 2, subtitled Quasi una sonata, is a work for violin and piano composed in 1968. Its title reflects the music's unstable relationship with conventional sonata form: recognizable tonal gestures and formal expectations repeatedly emerge, collide, and break apart und...

Alfred Schnittke's Symphony No. 1 is a large-scale orchestral work composed between 1969 and 1972 and first performed in Gorky in 1974. It exemplifies Schnittke's polystylism by colliding serial writing, jazz improvisation, theatrical gestures, popular idioms, and quotations or allusions drawn from...

Completed in 1968 by Soviet composer Alfred Schnittke, this duo sonata for violin and piano is a foundational work of his polystylistic technique. The composition layers musical quotations and stylistic shifts, transitioning between baroque, classical, and modernist textures within a single movement...

Composed in 1968, Alfred Schnittke's "Quasi una sonata" is a duo for violin and piano recognized as the Soviet composer's first major application of polystylistic techniques. The piece is noted for its sudden transitions and incorporation of disparate musical styles, creating a fragmented, postmoder...

Alfred Schnittke composed his Symphony No. 3 in 1981 to commemorate the reopening of the Gewandhaus concert hall in Leipzig. The work is heavily defined by Schnittke's polystylistic approach, weaving musical themes and motifs associated with 34 different German composers, from the Baroque era to the...

Alfred Schnittke's Piano Concerto (1979) exemplifies his polystylistic technique, juxtaposing Romantic and modernist idioms in a major work by the leading Soviet-German composer.

Composed in 1963, Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 1 is a significant chamber work from the Soviet composer's early period, also known by the designation "Quasi una sonata." The piece is written for violin and piano and exemplifies Schnittke's early exploration of avant-garde techniques and seri...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 2, subtitled Quasi una sonata, is a 1968 work for violin and piano. Cast as a continuous movement, it repeatedly attempts to establish conventional sonata procedures before disrupting them with silence, dissonance, and abrupt contrasts. The work reflects Schnittk...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Concerto No. 4 is a large-scale concerto for solo violin and orchestra, completed in 1984 and first performed in 1985 by its dedicatee, violinist Gidon Kremer. The work uses Schnittke's polystylistic language, placing tonal references, dissonant writing, theatrical contrast...

The Violin Sonata No. 1 is a chamber work composed in 1963 by the Soviet-Russian composer Alfred Schnittke. Written for violin and piano, the piece reflects the composer's brief adherence to strict serialism. This sonata represents a significant phase in Schnittke's development, occurring before he...

Alfred Schnittke composed Violin Sonata No. 1 in 1963 for violin and piano. The work is an early chamber piece by the Russian composer, written before the polystylistic music for which he became widely known. Its language relies on serial procedures and concentrated motivic development, showing the...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 3 is a late chamber work for violin and piano composed in 1994 during the final year of the Russian composer's life. Written for the violinist Oleh Krysa, the piece stands in stark contrast to the dense polystylistic collages of his earlier period. Instead, it fe...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 3 is a late chamber work for violin and piano composed in 1994 during the final year of the Russian composer's life. Written for the violinist Oleh Krysa, the piece stands in stark contrast to the dense polystylistic collages of his earlier period. Instead, it fe...

Alfred Schnittke's Violin Sonata No. 3 is a chamber work for violin and piano composed in 1994, during the final period of the Russian composer's career. Its concentrated, severe language reflects the reduced textures and dark expressive character associated with many of Schnittke's late works, rath...

Historia von D. Johann Fausten is a cantata-oratorio by Russian-German composer Alfred Schnittke, premiered in 1983. The work is based on the 16th-century German chapbook about Johann Faust, a scholar who makes a pact with the devil. Schnittke later expanded the material into a full opera, premiered...