Composer: Mischa Spoliansky
Orchestra: Liepāja Symphony Orchestra
Conductor: Paul Mann
Format: FLAC (tracks)
Label: Toccata
Catalogue: TOCC0626
Release: 2022
Size: 1.26 GB
Recovery: +3%
Scan: yes
01. Overture (From ‘My Husband and I’)
02. Boogie
Symphony in Five Movements
03. I. And Thus Man Was Created
04. II. Ode to Love
05. III. Humoresque
06. IV. Of Weeping
07. V. And New Life Blooms from the Ruins
The Russian-born Mischa Spoliansky (1898-1985) became one of the major names in cabaret in 1920s Berlin and then, as a refugee from Nazi Germany, in London, he became one of the best-known composers of film scores. He also wrote a handful of orchestral works, which have remained unknown until now. His Boogie is a witty, tongue-in-cheek piece of orchestral jazz, and the Overture to My Husband and I, one of his stage shows, has a Mozartian sparkle and wit.
But it is his only Symphony, an epic statement composed over a period of nearly three decades, that constitutes his real achievement as an orchestral composer – the fourth of its five movements apparently offering Spoliansky’s own musical commentary on the Holocaust.