Jimin Oh-Havenith's fourth album for audite is devoted to characteristic masterworks of Russian piano music, including Moussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and a selection of etudes and preludes by Scriabin and Rachmaninoff, three of the most famous Russian composers of the nineteenth and (early) twentieth centuries. Planned long before Putin's war in Ukraine, this release now stands as a beacon for the often-threatened freedom of art.
Central to the album is Modest Moussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition from 1874, which became world-famous in the orchestral version by Maurice Ravel, but which still presents a special creative and technical challenge for pianists due to the treatment of the piano. Oh-Havenith's interpretation reveals the tonal and dramatic potential that can be unleashed when virtuosity and programmatic vision are brought together. Alexander Scriabin and Sergei Rachmaninoff, who as professional composer-pianists acquired legendary fame, continued on this path in their extensive œuvres with highly individual means. The selection of Etudes and Préludes from 1889-1910 compiled by Oh-Havenith testifies not only to a perfect command of the piano's possibilities, but also continues the path that Moussorgsky had taken with his Russian piano music toward world fame.
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