Mieczysław Weinberg (1919 - 1996) was a Soviet composer of Polish-Jewish origin. From 1939 he lived in the Soviet Union and Russia and lost most of his family in the Holocaust.
He left a large body of work that included 22 symphonies and 17 string quartets; according to one
reviewer he ranked as, "the third great Soviet composer, along with
Prokofiev and
Shostakovich". -
Wikipedia
I discovered Weinberg through
Alex Ross's
tweet last year, and was astonished by what I heard, even before I found out how prolific this composer was. If you like
Schnittke,
Szymanowski,
Lutosławski or the two aforementioned Soviet masters, you definitely should give Weinberg a try. His works are still not often recorded, so I put aside the one-work-one-recording rule and arranged all recordings available by opus number; two early works written before opus 1 were placed at the beginning.
Get this collection in one Spotify playlist: Mieczyslaw Weinberg: Chronological Collection (405 tracks, total time: 37 hours) Ctrl (CMD) + G to browse in
album view. See complete list of works
here. Use Alex Ross's 30-track, 4-hour
playlist as an intro. Also recommend: Weinberg's Holocaust opera
The Passenger, available on
Blue-ray.
Many thanks for this collection. I've been listening to a fair amount of Weinberg in recent weeks, so this playlist comes along with almost perfect timing. Certainly one I'll be getting acquainted with.
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