Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade - Inside The Music with Jonathan James

Jonathan James takes us inside the music as part of our classical music series.
Discover about Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade and how the composer paints pictures through music to bring to life the tales of Arabian Nights.
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Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade is a magical musical fairy tale. We start off with a sultan, who’s clearly a baddie. [Jonathan plays evil tune]
In fact you can tell right from the music that he’s… evil. [plays downward scale]
The Russian often used this scale - [plays downward scale again] a whole tone scale - to denote someone who’s either evil or magical. It doesn’t sound evil if I do this. [plays descending major scale]
It sounds quite happy doesn’t it? So that’s the sultan and then of course we have Sheherazade, represented normally as a solo violin. [plays beautiful delicate tune]
Very, very beautiful and princess-like. And what follows are four tales where she keeps the sultan so enthralled that he won’t follow through on his edict to kill her as his wife.
So she’s there with all these cliff-hangers and passionate stories. And the first - well the first one is set here. [plays rolling arpeggios]
Where do you think? I’m hoping you’re thinking the sea. Because this is about Sinbad the Sailor. And what you’ll hear in this story and all the others, is the sultan theme and Sheherazade theme come back again and again, but just in different costumes. It’s almost as if they are playing the different characters, in the stories, putting on different accents and voices.
In the second tale a prince, a Russian prince, singing a Russian folk song. It’s played by the bassoon. [plays Russian folk tune]
And halfway through this particular story comes one of my favourite effects. It really is, ah, a dramatic moment. It’s the equivalent of a story teller sort of pulling out a puppet or a prop.
And what happens is that Rimsky-Korsakov asks all the strings just to pluck away randomly. [plays shimmering music]
Can you imagine a string orchestra plucking? And over the top of it this wonderful, smooth clarinet. [plays shimmering music with tune]
You have to hear it live to really get the most of it.
After that we have a romantic interlude and a really rousing, thrilling finale. The Russians are great at writing thrilling dances, and you’d expect this dance to end with a bang. Well, it doesn’t. And I’m not going to tell you how it does end, because, in the spirit of Sheherazade, let’s just leave that as a cliffhanger.
What makes this musical fairytale so full of magic for you? We’d love to know, so please do send us your comments, and feel free to like and to subscribe to these videos. Thanks for watching.

[@Kazyman]

As a small-time (hack) professional singer / musician / songwriter, my personal / professional opinion is that Scheherazade has some of the most beautiful movements of expression ever to grace The Planet Earth. The many soul-stirring pieces throughout this collection of muse-ical fantasy combined with intense drama never fails to collapse my very being to tears. Bravo, Sir Korsakov!

[@khaledmoftah1570]

I heard it the first time in our big isolated house when I was 9 years old in a simplified rendition as an introduction to a radio series. The tales of human heroes and the encounter with Jinn along with the fantastic music and the 9 years old imagination still sticks to my memory. Every now and then I indulge myself in this magical world which Korsakov rightly, colorfully and deeply expressed.

[@BristolBeacon]

What a great memory and beautiful listening experience Khaled. We're glad you can enjoy the musical worlds of Korsakov with such vivid memories.

[@harriette2000]

Thank you. I'm now listening to this wonderful work with a little more knowledge and a lot more appreciation.

[@Tubatasm]

This is a wonderful primer for the piece! And excellent production quality. =)

[@berwynmusic]

Excellent, these short lectures are perfect for the modern attention span! Wonderful communication.

[@howardjones7370]

In my fathers collection of classical records, The Philadelphia Philharmonic conducted by Eugene Ormandy, in 1964 I was a callow 13 year old who had just discovered The Beatles, The Stones etc., and he played this, I was transported, somewhere magical, mysterious and at times a little scary, I would wait until my parents went to work then sneak this onto the stereogram, side two also included his Capriccio Español, another wonderful piece, happy memories, I still love all of my rock, soul, pop, prog, but this was my introduction to the joys of classical music, thank you NAR-K, I salute you

[@UnathiGX]

I love the cliff hanger...!

[@joaocatan]

I really liked the video. I would like to know if at 0:43 the theme presented is in Dorian. thank you very much

[@19wongs4]

Although late, I think it's Phrygian, probably (if I'm right...which I probably am not...) it's based upon the Arabic maqam "Maqam Nahawand", it's a combination of the Nahawand, Hijaz and Kurd Jins.

[@madaghdjiansophie1796]

Je vais le jouer en 4 mains a mandelieu à l école de.musique.près de cannes.merci.pour vos comentaires sophie madaghdjian pianiste classique et jazz.