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Julius Meytuss (1903-1997) Orchestral music, 1930, 2'27". Historical Recording, performed by Orchestre Symphonique de Paris conducted by Julius Ehrlich, from the State Opera in Leningrad Recording – ca. 1931 Original Record label Sounds of New Music, original catalogue number: FW 06160, provided courtesy of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings Juli(us) Meytus(s), real name Yuly Sergueievitch Meytus (b. Elisavetgrad, Ukraine 1903 - d. Kiev, Ukraine 1997) was a pianist in the First Cavalry and between 1923-24 leader of the Kharkov Opera Theatre and manager of the music section of the Proletcult Theatre. In 1920, he composed a work dedicated to the building of the Dnieper Hydro-Electric Power Station -an enormous 167ft. high dam regulating the 1,400 mile long river Dnieper in the Ukraine. At the time, it was the largest hydro-electric plant in Europe and the pride of the then Soviet state. Meytuss composed his musical tribute between 1929-30, in parallel with the building of the dam itself, using percussion to portray the different stages of construction: commencement, excavation of the foundations, installation of the pylons, and completion . The musical language is close to a constructivist aesthetic, as was the Turbine Room in the Hydro-Electric Centre itself, which had won an architectural prize for its constructivist design. The historic recording included here is the B-side of the Mossolov Columbia record, probably made in 1931 - a year after the work's composition. RELATED RESOURCES: Russian Futurists from the GLM Collection (1920-1959) Sound Experiments in The Russian Avant-Garde (1908-1942) |