Working at a job that requires you to sit in front of a computer screen all day allows for the opportunity to listen to new and various genres of music. In my time at WhiteHat Security, I've discovered and listened to hardstyle, cool jazz, various shoegaze bands, dream pop, skrillex (for a very short period), some amount of alternative/indie rock (Wild Nothing, Beach House-type), and psychedelic trance. A month ago or so I stumbled across Youtube user Hexameron's account, and discovered a love for Wyschnegradsky, Mosolov, Popov, and other Soviet avant-garde composers of the early 20th century. They were most active before the terrible 1930s in Russia, and are marked by odd tonalities, a love of Scriabin's piano sonatas, and most of all, complete obscurity. Wyschnegradsky composed and notated music based on a microtonal (quarter-tone) scale. See for example, his "Twenty-four preludes in all the tones of the chromatic scale diatonicized with thirteen sounds", excerpts available here. Mosolov, before he went all formal, was extremely avant-garde (see here for a playlist of his music). Popov, an alcoholic who eventually died of alcoholism, is an example of otherwise great composers who couldn't handle living in Soviet Russia. His Symphony No. 1 is all over the place, but he had the talent of Shostakovich. I'll leave it to Alex Ross to say it better.
This is all very engrossing and today I have finally reached the bottom of that playlist.
Update: Honorable mention to Dimitar Nenov, who wrote this very beguiling toccata.
Update 2: Another mention to Nenov for this Piano Concerto. More about that later.
Update: Honorable mention to Dimitar Nenov, who wrote this very beguiling toccata.
Update 2: Another mention to Nenov for this Piano Concerto. More about that later.
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