Polina Osetinskaya.
Baroque music in world cinema masterpieces.

Polina took to the stage at an age when others are just starting to stand at the school blackboard. There were four main prodigies in her generation. Three, having grown up a bit, went West with their teachers: pianist Kissin, violinists Repin and Vengerov. Polina, who was expected to do the same, stayed. And it was her own decision: at the age of 13, she obtained the right to act as she saw fit.

She studied in Moscow and St. Petersburg, lived in these two cities, participated in only one international competition, but always gave numerous concerts. In 2007, she wrote the book "Goodbye, Sadness" about her unconventional childhood. The book, of course, became a bestseller. Firstly, by that time Polina had many fans, ready not only to attend her performances but even to come to them from other cities and countries, let alone buying the book. Secondly, "Goodbye, Sadness" is indeed a good book.

Polina has ten albums released on Sony Music, Naxos, Bel Air, Quartz, and "Melodiya," several performances - with Ksenia Rappoport, Andrey Makarevich, Lyudmila Ulitskaya, for example, and the Center for Professional Health of Musicians, into which Polina invested all her own difficult experience.

But nothing compares to her concerts. Polina gives concerts at the Salzburg Festival and Carnegie Hall, all over Europe and North America. And if the program "Baroque Music in Author's Cinema" has already been heard in Latvia, - Riga was overwhelmed by it, - then Rachmaninoff and Glinka, Desyatnikov and Silvestrov performed by Polina Osetinskaya have definitely not been seen here before.

There are as many beauties in this program as there are meanings, associations, parallels, biographical interweavings - in other words, countless.
Mikhail Glinka, Nocturne "Separation": as is known, the founder of the Russian composer school traveled a lot and lived in Europe for a long time - in particular, he began to write the symphony "Taras Bulba" in Paris; when creative crises and the bitterness of unrecognized talent piled upon him at home, he decided to move to Berlin. Leaving Tsarskoye Selo, Glinka - according to his sister's memories - "spat on the ground and said fervently: 'If only I never see this filthy country again!'" but soon died abroad...

Sergei Rachmaninoff, preludes: at the end of 1917, after the revolution, the great composer left Russia forever; he was either forbidden there, then glorified, then rejected, then - after active financial support in the fight against fascism - persistently and futilely called back by Soviet authorities...
Leonid Desyatnikov, "Bukovinian Songs": a native of Kharkov, a graduate of the Leningrad Conservatory, one of the most performed composers in the post-Soviet space, and after scandals, government interference, protests surrounding the opera "Children of Rosenthal" at the Bolshoi Theatre - one of the most discussed; in these 24 preludes for piano, he recalls Ukrainian folklore, which has been in him since childhood...
Valentin Silvestrov, bagatelles: the 85-year-old patriarch, now living in Germany and coming in winter for his concert in Jurmala, was expelled from the Union of Soviet Composers in 1970 due to views on creativity contradicting official cultural policy, and is now considered the main Ukrainian composer of our time...
Bringing all four together in one program, Polina Osetinskaya gave them her amazing pianism, flexible, intellectual, virtuosic, mesmerizing. And through the language of music, she speaks to the audience about what is happening with us and around us right now.