# Maria Yudina



## flamencosketches

Who here is a fan of hers? My girlfriend put me onto her incredible playing.

She plays in an extremely idiosyncratic interpretive style. To paraphrase Richter, her Schubert B flat major sonata was about as far from the actual score as you can get, but she still plays it beautifully:






I think she sounds great in Mozart:






There's a famous, likely legendary story about Yudina, Stalin, and this Mozart concerto:






I'll spare you the details but they are to be found. I believe they even made a movie about it called the Death of Stalin.

Her Brahms is great too:






And her Mussorgsky:






Her music on the other hand is some of the most poorly recorded I've ever heard, and this is coming from a big fan of Schnabel's Beethoven sonata cycle. However, I think she has been sadly neglected and forgotten on account of this, and I have immense respect for her and her music. Feel free to share favorite recordings of hers, or stories, or whatever the case may be.

Think this is the fourth thread I've made about Russian pianists in as many weeks; I'm definitely obsessed.


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## Larkenfield

Her Bach was also wonderful. An insightful quote about Yudina:

"She was immensely talented and a keen advocate of the music of her own time: she played Stravinsky, whom she adored, Hindemith, Krenek and Bartók at a time when these composers were not only unknown in the Soviet Union but effectively banned. And when she played Romantic music, it was impressive - except that she didn't play what was written. Liszt's Weinen und Klagen was phenomenal, but Schubert's B-flat major Sonata, while arresting as an interpretation, was the exact opposite of what it should have been, and I remember a performance of the Second Chopin Nocturne that was so heroic that it no longer sounded like a piano but a trumpet. It was no longer Schubert or Chopin, but Yudina. _-Sviatoslav Richter_


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## flamencosketches

Larkenfield said:


> She was wonderful. An insightful quote about Yudina:
> 
> "She was immensely talented and a keen advocate of the music of her own time: she played Stravinsky, whom she adored, Hindemith, Krenek and Bartók at a time when these composers were not only unknown in the Soviet Union but effectively banned. And when she played Romantic music, it was impressive - except that she didn't play what was written. Liszt's Weinen und Klagen was phenomenal, but Schubert's B-flat major Sonata, while arresting as an interpretation, was the exact opposite of what it should have been, and I remember a performance of the Second Chopin Nocturne that was so heroic that it no longer sounded like a piano but a trumpet. It was no longer Schubert or Chopin, but Yudina. _-Sviatoslav Richter_


Yes! This was the Richter quote I poorly attempted to paraphrase in the OP. I completely agree, though. She makes Mozart sound like one of the great lost Romantic composers.

And yes, I appreciate her Bach as well. Her Goldberg Variations is one of my favorites.


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## Mandryka

flamencosketches said:


> She plays in an extremely idiosyncratic interpretive style.


I don't believe she was more or less idiosyncratic than Richter, Sofronitsky, Gilels even. They were all mad.

I like her Schubert, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms -- I think she's a genius. This solo Mozart especially.


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## joen_cph

A great Maria Yudina anthology of 26 CDs was released in December by the *Scribendum* label, and it can be had for down to around 65 Euros or so.
It does comprise almost all major material; but strangely not all the Schubert Impromptus recordings, which have quite good sound; she recorded all 8.

Much easier and economical to invest in, than going for individual releases. I don' t know the quality of the transfer though. 
The WTC etc. excerpts here
https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/detail/-/art/art-of/hnum/8922817
have traditionally often been of varying sound quality.

I've ordered the set myself, since I lacked some of the stuff. A lot of what I already have is on LP.

There was also once a 8-CD set from *Brilliant Classics*, long out of print, and now expensive
https://www.europadisc.co.uk/classical/72677/Russian_Archives:_Maria_Yudina_Edition.htm
but it's of less interest now.

And the *Vista Vera *label released a very comprehensive anthology, but likely almost identical to the new 26 CD box.


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## Mandryka

Nearly everything she has recorded is crude, loud, fast, inexpressive, colourless, rigid banging. But the intensity of the banging is so great that it exerts a sort of perverse fascination. It's as if she demands to _be_, her music making approaches the Kantian sublimity of an earthquake or a tidal wave.

Stalin appreciated her, I guess her style had a certain affinity with his nature.


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## Zhdanov

her Schubert _'Impromptus'_ -


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## NLAdriaan

I have a Schubert 2cd box on the long defunct Arlecchino label by Yudina, including all impromptu's, the Trout Quintet and Sonata 21 (D960). And quite a few separate CD's, including a double set on the 'great pianists of the 20th century' series, issued by Philips/Steinway, which includes the Goldberg variations. Always liked her playing!


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## Triplets

Mandryka said:


> Nearly everything she has recorded is crude, loud, fast, inexpressive, colourless, rigid banging. But the intensity of the banging is so great that it exerts a sort of perverse fascination. It's as if she demands to _be_, her music making approaches the Kantian sublimity of an earthquake or a tidal wave.
> 
> Stalin appreciated her, I guess her style had a certain affinity with his nature.


The portrayal of Yudina in the movie The Death Of Stalin was hilarious


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## jegreenwood

Triplets said:


> The portrayal of Yudina in the movie The Death Of Stalin was hilarious


Played by a Bond girl.


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## DavidA

She was the one Stalin gave a large sum of money to as a reward for her playing of a Mozart piano concerto and she sent him a note saying she had given it to her church to pray for his soul for forgiveness for all the monstrous crimes he had committed against the people of Russia. Everyone expected her to be shot but nothing happened and when Stalin died her record was found on his turntable. In 'The Death of Stalin' the Yudina events are not quite historical although the recording was. She was, however, an unashamed Christian at the time Christianity was practically illegal and wore a cross to concerts and prayed and crossed herself before she began, according to Richter.


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## philoctetes

I like her Hammerklavier... a piece that tolerates her style quite well...


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## Zhdanov

DavidA said:


> She was the one Stalin gave a large sum of money to as a reward for her playing of a Mozart piano concerto and she sent him a note saying she had given it to her church to pray for his soul for forgiveness for all the monstrous crimes he had committed against the people of Russia.


hilarious, you west peoples are so much into making up fairy tale stories to believe in afterwards like real ones... how on earth that 'note' by her could have been disclosed by him to anyone since it contained such words?.. as for 'monstrous crime' - this notion came much later and long after his death, not even as his personality cult was being dismantled, but decades later, near the end of the century.



DavidA said:


> Everyone expected her to be shot but nothing happened


the idea that everyone got shot back then has arrived much later too, and by the very same route as the above said monstrous crime, that is from the west, as the perestroika struck the country, the borders fell and everything went out of hand... besides, if everyone was shot, how then everyone turned out to be alive later on? where's common sense? where's logic?


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## KenOC

Zhdanov said:


> hilarious, you west peoples are so much into making up fairy tale stories to believe in afterwards like real ones... how on earth that 'note' by her could have been disclosed by him to anyone since it contained such words?.. as for 'monstrous crime' - this notion came much later and long after his death, not even as his personality cult was being dismantled, but decades later, near the end of the century.


Actually, Yudina's letter is discussed in "Testimony," published in 1979. Whether or not the book is fraudulent, at least we can be sure of its publication date!










BTW, this "fairy tale" was made up in the (then) USSR, not by us "west peoples"! :lol:


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## Zhdanov

KenOC said:


> this "fairy tale" was made up in the (then) USSR, not by us "west peoples"!


no, the story doesn't even sound like Russian; it has a strong foreign accent, or at least that of someone who plays up to western stereotypes and is aware of westerners being fond of these. Russians may come across as Ancient Greeks but not to such an extent they would care that much about 'people & country' in a note to a leader. Stalin also was no way seen as being sinful at the moment, otherwise Yudina would not have even bother writing to him; rather he was seen as a great leader, of course.


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## KenOC

Zhdanov said:


> no, the story doesn't even sound like Russian; it has a strong foreign accent, or at least that of someone who plays up to western stereotypes and is aware of westerners being fond of these. Russians may come across as Ancient Greeks but not to such an extent they would care that much about 'people & country' in a note to a leader. Stalin also was no way seen as being sinful at the moment, otherwise Yudina would not have even bother writing to him; rather he was seen as a great leader, of course.


Sounds like you're not familiar with the book. It was written by Solomon Volkov, who was born and educated in the USSR. The book claims to be the spoken memoirs of Dmitri Shostakovich as recounted privately to Volkov over quite a period of time. The original, of course, is in Russian.


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## DavidA

Zhdanov said:


> hilarious, you west peoples are so much into making up fairy tale stories to believe in afterwards like real ones... how on earth that 'note' by her could have been disclosed by him to anyone since it contained such words?.. as for 'monstrous crime' - this notion came much later and long after his death, not even as his personality cult was being dismantled, but decades later, near the end of the century.
> 
> the idea that everyone got shot back then has arrived much later too, and by the very same route as the above said monstrous crime, that is from the west, as the perestroika struck the country, the borders fell and everything went out of hand... besides, if everyone was shot, how then everyone turned out to be alive later on? where's common sense? where's logic?


Well I'll believe Richter rather than you. It was him who recalled the story. There is no common sense to it of course, that's what makes it so incredible. You appear to know everything but the facts.


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## Zhdanov

KenOC said:


> Sounds like you're not familiar with the book. It was written by Solomon Volkov


i am well aware of that, hence no trust for the source.


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## Zhdanov

DavidA said:


> Well I'll believe Richter rather than you. It was him who recalled the story.


no, he did not tell anything of the sort.


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## KenOC

Zhdanov said:


> i am well aware of that, hence no trust for the source.


I think you're missing the point. You wrote, "…this notion came much later and long after his death, not even as his personality cult was being dismantled, but decades later, near the end of the century." In fact, the notion clearly existed and was written down in the 1970s, in the USSR, and published later in the same decade. Whether you trust Volkov or Shostakovich (or neither, which is my position) is irrelevant.


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## Zhdanov

KenOC said:


> I think you're missing the point. You wrote, "…this notion came much later and long after his death, not even as his personality cult was being dismantled, but decades later, near the end of the century." In fact, the notion clearly existed and was written down in the 1970s, in the USSR, and published later in the same decade.


it is you are missing the point completely. Volkov 'memoirs' were not known to Soviet readers and have arrived only by the 1990s; you are wrong yet again that you see no time gap between the years of 1953 and 1970, which is huge difference. Stalin was an undisputable hero at the time he was alive. Yudina also would by no means would have crammed so many slogan-like meanings into a note; the Orthodox christian beliefs will simply not go well with Ancient Greek paganisms like 'country & people' etc.


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## KenOC

Obviously not worth continuing this. Have a good day!


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## Selenine

I would like to point out to all fans of the pianist MARIA YUDINA the recent publication - in french -, by the swiss Editions Contrechamps (Geneva), of the book "Maria Youdina - Pierre Souvtchinsky: Correspondance et documents (1959-1970)", translated from russian and german by the french pianist Jean-Pierre Collot. Included are two CDs with very rare recordings.

This book of over 800 pages deals generally with the the links that Maria Yudina had with the West. It contains all the letters known to date exchanged between Yudina and her correspondents in Europe and America; among these: Souvtchinsky (Russian philosopher and musician exiled in Paris), Stravinsky, Stockhausen, Boulez, Adorno, Messiaen, Jolivet, Fred Prieberg (a german musicologist) and many others. These letters are translated from russian and german, and about fifty letters (out of some 180 reproduced) are completely unpublished in all languages (even in Russian). Some important Russian correspondents are also included (Solzhenitsyn, Evtouchenko, Shostakovich, Andreï Volkonsky, Arvo Pärt [the two letters of Yudina to Pärt are essential]).

Among the documents which could passionate all fans (not only french readers!):

1/ An exhaustive 13-pages discography, the most complete to date (September 2020): 78rpm, 33rpm, CDs, online contents. With QR codes for content uploaded at the end of 2019 by Melodia on the occasion of the pianist's 120th birthday. (The firm puts about 70% of the legacy recorded online, in good sound quality: Youtube, Spotify, Deezer ...). All dates have been verified in the archives of Russian radio and Melodia, thanks to the invaluable intervention of an eminent disciple of Yudina, the pianist Alexey Liubimov.

2 / Two CDs of very rare sound documents; among these: for the first time outside Russia, Schumann's Kreisleriana (the only recording by Yudina, an amazing and extraordinary live recording, Moscow, 1951) and, for the first time in the world, the voice of the pianist commenting on Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, or two different versions of Webern's Variations op.27, live at Scriabin Museum. The rest (Mozart, Mussorgsky / Kamensky, Bartók, Stravinsky, Volkonsky, Jolivet: four pieces from Mana) comes directly from the Soviet tapes and has been transferred without filtering or compression, which allows to take full advantage of the rich and expressive timbre of Yudina (this is unfortunately rarely the case nowadays).

In general, the content of the two CDs doesn't duplicate the most common boxes dedicated to the art of Yudina.

For french readers/readers in french:

3/ the french translation, for the first time, of three major texts written by Maria Yudina: '' Reflections on interpretation '', '' Pictures at an exhibition by Mussorgsky '', '' Hommage to Shostakovich " (other texts by her as well as multiple testimonies can also be found in the notes, very developed).

4/ Two texts by Souvtchinsky, an interview with the philosopher Mikhaïl Bakhtin - a longtime friend of Maria Veniaminovna Yudina -, an analysis of the pianist's playing by her disciple Marina Drozdova, as well as two important testimonies from Karlheinz Stockhausen , the second one reflecting the amazement felt by the composer when listening to some of Yudina's LPs.

Highly recommended!


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