Black Sun

Mandelstam, Osip (R)

“Dedicated Irina Shostakovich. Since so many years I have very deep and friendly connections. Irina has an extraodrinary memory of poetry. How often she red me by phone different poems - also by Mandelstam. And all by heart ..
I have chosen the texts which are united by feeling of, I would say, existential fear and melancoly.

1. ‘Pomogi gospo’ - full of nightmare
2. ‘Ni gomori nikomu ...’ - a sort of ‘tremling’ scherzo
3. ‘Tvoi uzkim plecham’ - the poet compares himself with a black candel
4. ‘O nebo, nebo’ - full of metaphysical melancholy
5. ‘Kama’ - the poet describes his while he was transfering by a boat th the prison in the town calles Cherdyn. I feel a real horror through the prism of russian folklore.
6. ‘O, kak zhe ja hochu’ - a sudden light. Desire to the poet who fly after a ray to disappear in light, and not to be seen by anybody.
7. ‘Zhil Alexander Herzovich’ - Finally all vanishes into a simple song, at thge same time a kind of a hasidic dance.
   ‘Black Sun’ demands a lot of skill from the soloist, enormous tessitura, different vocal effects, extreme contrasts of dynamics. It demands also form the pianist a combination between a virtuosity and refined flexibility.” (Alexander Raskatov)