Kapustin

Nikolai Kapustin was a teenager in Moscow when he first heard jazz on the radio. Today he is best known as a pioneer of the Soviet jazz scene, a style only allowed to thrive in the Soviet Union after the death of Stalin in 1953.

The Variations, Op. 41 of 1984 are a good example of Kapustin’s fusion of jazz and classical forms. They open with a motif based on the bassoon melody heard at the start of Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, followed by a statement of the theme itself. It is then taken through a multitude of transformations, each variation an homage to a jazz style, from swing and waltz to be-bop and blues.

The last two variations provide an effective presto finale featuring active melodic passages in the right hand and stride piano accompaniment in the left.