César Cui

Cesar Cui

César Cui ( Russian Цезарь Антонович Кюи / Zesar Antonovich Kjui ; born January 6, ^jul. / 18th January  1835 ^greg. In Vilnius ; †  13. March 1918 in Petrograd ) was a Russian composer , music critic and officer ( military engineer ) of the Russian army with French ancestors on the paternal side.

biography

Cui was the son of the French officer Antoine Cui (Russianized Anton Leonardowitsch Cui), who had stayed in Russia after Napoleon's withdrawal from Moscow, and the Polish-Lithuanian noblewoman Julia Gucewicz from the family of the architect Laurynas Gucevičius (Polish Wawrzyniec Gucewicz, after some Sources of his daughter). Since he showed an early interest in music, he received music lessons from the age of ten, including in 1850/1851 with Stanisław Moniuszko , who was then in Vilnius. In 1851 he entered the St. Petersburg engineering school; four years later he moved to the local military engineering university , where he studied fortification until 1857. He then became a lecturer in this subject at the engineering academy and, in 1878, a professor. In later years he was made lieutenant general. In addition to his military career, however, Cui continued to occupy himself with music: in 1856 he met Mili Balakirew , who guided him musically in the following years, and with this he laid the foundation for the so-called Group of Five , also known as "the mighty heap" referred to as. He particularly distinguished himself as a music critic who initially vehemently propagated the aesthetics of the mighty heap . Later he distanced himself from this group and sometimes even wrote violent reviews of their works (such as Modest Mussorgski's " Boris Godunow "), with which he did not insignificant damage to his old companions. The first symphony by Rachmaninoff he compared in a critique in 1897 with a program symphony on the seven plagues of Egypt .

From 1880 onwards, Cui increasingly turned to French opera and shaped the French image of Russian musical life with his writings. In the last years of his life, Cui was blind, but as the last survivor of the "Group of Five" he enjoyed recognition as a kind of living legend. His tomb is in the Tikhvin cemetery in St. Petersburg.

style

The great paradox of César Cui's music is that, although he aggressively defended the aesthetic position of the Mighty Heap in his writings, namely the creation of a Russian national style, even in his works he rarely followed the directives he advocated. In a letter written in French to Felipe Pedrell , he himself provided an explanation:

A Russian opera subject would not suit me at all. Although Russian, I am half of French, half of Lithuanian descent and I have no sense of Russian music in my veins ... That is why all the subjects of my operas, with the exception of my first opera “The Prisoner in the Caucasus”, are foreign and will be stay too.

Only occasionally did he use folk melodies or use harmonic and melodic peculiarities to emulate the characteristics of Russian folk music; often the national element is completely absent. This is why the music of Tchaikovsky, who is insulted by the Mighty Heap as a “Westerner”, has a considerably more “Russian” effect than Cuis music. Rather, what becomes evident in Cui's works is his admiration for Robert Schumann . Although Cui composed 15 operas , he preferred rather small, miniature genres such as songs and piano pieces. Of course, in these works it often emerges that Cui always ran the risk of slipping into shallow, pleasant salon music . It was already clear during his lifetime that compositionally he was by far the weakest member of the Mighty Heap . In any case, he was of greater importance as a music critic, which is due to his not inconsiderable literary talent. However, this importance was diminished by the above-mentioned reviews, which testify to an arch-conservative musical attitude. Today Cui is hardly known as a composer.

Works

Cui's portrait by Repin

Orchestral works

• Orchestral Suite No. 1 op.20 Suite miniature (1882)
• Orchestral Suite No. 2 in E major op.38 (1887)
• Orchestral Suite No. 3 in G minor, Op. 43 In modo populari (1890)
• Orchestral Suite No. 4 op.40 A Argenteau (1887, orchestration of 5 piano pieces)
• Suite concertante op.25 for violin and orchestra (1884)
• Three Scherzi op.82 (1910)

Operas

• The prisoner in the Caucasus (1857/58, rev. 1881/82)
• The Mandarin's Son (1859)
• William Ratcliff (1861-1868)
• Angelo (1871-1875)
• Le Flibustier (1888/89) based on a model by Jean Richepin
• Mademoiselle Fifi , opera in one act after Guy de Maupassant (1900)
• The binge during the plague (1900)
• Mateo Falcone (1906/07)
• The captain's daughter (1907–1909)
• Little Red Riding Hood , fairy tale opera (1911)
• Puss in Boots , children's opera (1913)

Other vocal music

• Cantata for the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty op.89 (1913)
• Choirs a cappella
• sacred choral works
• approx. 350 songs, a. a. approx. 50 children's songs
  • (including :) Vingt Poèmes de Jean Richepin Op. 44

Chamber music

• String Quartet No. 1 in C minor op.45 (1890)
• String Quartet No. 2 in D major op.68 (1907)
• String Quartet No. 3 in E flat major op.91 (1913)
• Violin Sonata in D major op.84 (before 1870)

Piano music

• Sonatina op.106 (1916)
• A Argenteau , 9 Character Pieces op.40 (1887)
• 25 Preludes op.64 (1903)
• Theme and Variations op.61 (1901)
• numerous other smaller pieces (mazurkas, waltzes etc.)
• Pieces for piano for 4 hands

literature

• César Cui, La musique en Russie . Paris, Sandoz et Fischbacher, 1880 [Reprint: Leipzig, Zentralantiquariat der DDR, 1974]
• Marie de Mercy-Argenteau: César Cui, esquisse critique . Fischbacher Verlag, Paris 1888.
• Sigrid Neef : The Russian Five: Balakirew - Borodin - Cui - Mussorgsky - Rimsky-Korsakov. Monographs - documents - letters - programs - works . Ernst Kuhn publishing house. Berlin 1992 ISBN 9783928864046
• Lyle K. Neff: Story, style and structure in the operas of Cesar Cui . Ann Arbor, Blomington, Ind. 2002 (3 vol.)
• Victor I. Seroff: Le groupe de cinq. Balakirev, Borodine, Moussorgsky, César Cui, Rimsky-Korsakoff . Plon, Paris 1949.
• Edward Wrocki, Cezary Cui. Życie i działalność. 1835-1918 . Warszawa 1925. nakład redakcji Rytmu.
• Муселак, Анри (Musielak Henri), Французское происхождение русского композитора Цезара Антоновича Кюи . Советская Музыка. 1979 n ° 10
• А. Ф. Назаров, Цезарь Антонович Кюи . Музыка, Москва 1989.

Web links

Commons : César Cui  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Literature by and about César Cui in the catalog of the German National Library
• complete catalog raisonné
• Sheet music and audio files by César Cui in the International Music Score Library Project

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Eduardas Budreika: Antuanas Kiuji ir jo Lietuviska Seima . Retrieved February 4, 2020 (Lithuanian)
2. ↑ Recording with Jean Bermes, baritone, Denis Ivanov, piano.