A man of his time, Prokofiev linked his name with Russian cinema. He worked with Eisenstein on the film Alexander Nevski in 1938. The two men inspired each other: some sequences were built around images, others, around music. This was a very singular set-up which made the original soundtrack more than just a dramatic enhancer, but a motor of the action in its own right. Prokofiev wrote a cantata for mezzo, mixed choir and orchestra in seven tableaux for the work. The orchestra, with its clever spacing of the deepest bass tones and the sharpest high notes, forges a space for the choir which is grandiose, and oftentimes unsettling. Prokofiev's musical language makes a modernist harmony of strained dissonances and themes with a folk feel. The musicians, choristers and instrumentalists all perform at a very high level of excellence. Led by Thierry Fisher, no stranger to repertoires that make use of imposing ensembles, they present a very fine version. Never falling into forced grandiloquence, they do justice to the work and all its historical and political resonances.
The second, lighter part of this Prokofiev album centres on his first foray into cinema, in 1933. Alexander Feinzimmer's film, Lieutenant Kijé, tells of an imaginary lieutenant, who comes into being as a result of an administrative error. It was never performed, but Prokofiev turned his score into an orchestral suite. With an often- caustic humour, the suite moves between a series of evocative atmospheres. The careful foregrounding of the wind section creates a sonic parade of uniforms, fifes and horns, creating a stylised military world, in particular in the and third movements. The second movement presents a Romance in the form of variations on a theme. Double bass, bassoon, celesta and flute all join together in this nostalgic theme. A tour de force of writing, the finale brings together all the themes of the whole work into a single, poignant tableau, in which the Utah Symphony's ability to create a multiplicity of colours and soundscapes really allows them to shine. © Elsa Siffert/Qobuz