Kamennoi-Ostrow is the name of one of a group of islands situated in the
Neva River, some miles below St. Petersburg, “Ostrow” being the Russian
word for island, and “Kamennoi” the specific name for this particular
island, signifying at once small and rocky. This island is a favorite
pleasure resort, both winter and summer, for the wealthy and
aristocratic classes of St. Petersburg; one of the imperial palaces is
situated upon it, besides many cafés, dance halls, summer and winter
concert gardens, and the like. In winter it is the objective point for
countless gay sleighing parties, in which the lavish Russian nobles vie
with each other in the display of elaborately decorated sledges, fine
blooded horses in glittering harness, and piles of almost priceless
furs. At this time the highway to and from the island is the smooth,
solid ice of the frozen river. In summer the transit is made by boat,
and the gaiety is higher during those gorgeous summer nights, when the
midnight sun, never quite vanishing below the southern horizon, floods
the scene with its wondrous, mystical light, unlike either moonlight or
the ordinary light of day, but described by enthusiastic beholders as
possessing a peculiar, magical charm wholly its own and scarcely to be
imagined by those who have never witnessed it.
Rubinstein, who spent many years of his later life at St. Petersburg,
was naturally a frequent visitor at Kamennoi-Ostrow. In fact, on several
occasions he spent a number of weeks consecutively at one of its summer
hotels and became very familiar with all phases of gaiety at this
festive resort and well acquainted with most of its habitués. His set of
twenty-four pieces for the piano, entitled “Kamennoi-Ostrow,” is a
series of tone sketches suggested by and representing various scenes and
personages which his sojourn there brought within his experience. The
No. 22, which is probably the best of the set and certainly the most
widely known, is intended as the musical portrait of a lady,
Mademoiselle Anna de Friedebourg, a personal acquaintance of Rubinstein,
to whom the composition is dedicated. It is a portrait drawn in tender
yet glowing tints against the soft background of the summer night,
outlining, however, the spiritual rather than the physical charms and
characteristics of the lady, affording us a conception of her
individuality as well as the mood of the surroundings. The first and
principal subject, a slow and song-like lyric melody, enunciated by the
left hand, with its peculiarly warm and mellow character, reminding one,
in color and quality, of the tone of the G string on the violin, is
intended to suggest the personality of the lady, or perhaps, more
strictly, the emotional impression which this personality produced upon
the composer; while the delicate, vibratory accompaniment of the right
hand indicates the poetic setting or background, the luminous midsummer
night, in one of those island pleasure gardens, the weird light
quivering down through tremulous leaves, the mingled scent of flowers
and faint sea-breezes, the hum of summer insects, and the whisper of the
reeds stirred by the lazily flowing river.
Upon the dreamful hush of this audible silence sounds clear, but sweet
and silvery, the little bell of a Greek Catholic chapel, not far
distant, calling to midnight mass and ringing out at regular intervals,
with soft persistency, through the whole of the second strain or
movement. Below and subordinate to it is heard a curious series of
colloquial phrases of melody, subdued and fitful, like the fragments of
a murmured conversation, as if a low and interrupted dialogue were
taking place. Then the full, rich chords of the organ roll out upon the
quiet night, flooding it at once with ample waves of grave, solemn
harmony. This is followed by a brief passage of recitative in single
notes, suggesting the voice of the priest intoning the service within
the chapel. It is said to be an exact reproduction, note for note, of a
fragment of very ancient Hebrew music, once forming a part of the
religious exercises of the Jews and long ago incorporated into the Greek
Catholic service.
Then comes an effective, but seemingly irrelevant, cadenza in double
arpeggios which, though pleasing, has no apparent connection either with
the subject or the mood of the rest of the composition, but which serves
indifferently well as a means of leading back to the first theme,
presented this time with full, flowing accompaniment in a more
impassioned guise, as if to indicate the deeper, more intensified
emotions developed by the romantic scene and poetic surroundings.
The composition closes with a momentary return of the little
conversational strain, merely suggested and only just audible this time,
like whispered words of farewell; and then a few quiet chords of the
organ, lingering and slowly fading into the silence, as a pleasant
memory reluctantly dissolves into slumber.
GRIEG
1843 1907