Printed on the 28th day of 2001. In 1936, Natalya Sats, the director of Moscow's Central Children's Theatre, commissioned composer-pianist-conductor Sergei Prokofiev, a veteran of Russia's classical music scene since the early part of the 20th century, to write a classical piece for children. At the time, he had been shifting back and forth between the cities of Moscow and Paris for several years, and had recently completed a ballet version of Shakespeare's ROMEO AND JULIET. He had also visited Sats' theatre with his sons a number of times and had become an acquaintance of hers. The piece she had ordered was designed to introduce children to the many instruments there are in an orchestra. In the liberetto's first draft, a Young Pioneer (that was the U.S.S.R.'s equivalent of a Boy Scout) rights a wrong by challenging an adult. That theme tended to be present in the propaganda that was aimed at Soviet children of the era. But Provokiev, unhappy with the rhyming text supplied by the then-popular children's author Antonina Sakonskaya, wrote up a new version where Peter ends up capturing a wolf instead. The piece promotes the desired virtues of the Young Pioneers (vigilance, bravery, resourcefulness) along with themes common in Soviet folklore, like the stubborness of the elders (who obviously weren't in line with the Bolshevik agenda) and the triumph of Man taming the beast of Nature. Provokiev spent a week preparing a version for piano, which he completed on April 15, 1936. He completed the orchestration on April 24, and then, on May 2, he premiered the piece at a children's concert held with the Moscow Philarmonic in the main hall of the Moscow Conservatory. But that day, Sats fell ill. She was replaced by an inexperienced narrator and few people paid attention during the performance. Later that same month, Provokiev performed the piece again, with Sats now well enough to narrate, at the Pioneers Palace in Moscow, and the performance did much better. In March 1938, Americans heard it for the first time, as Provokiev traveled to Boston to conduct the Boston Symphony Orchestra in a new performance with narration from Richard Hale, an opera star who later became a fixture of the American western. By 1938, Sats had been serving a sentence in the gulag after her lover, Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, was shot to death in June of 1937. There have been many interpretations of PETER AND THE WOLF since it was first performed in 1936. In 1946, Walt Disney did his take on it for MAKE MINE MUSIC. In 1958, ABC aired a performance of it featuring Art Carney, a comedian most famous for his role in THE HONEYMOONERS. David Bowie, "Weird Al" Yankovic, Lorne Greene, Leonard Bernstein, Captain Kangaroo, Sting, Paul Hogan and Alice Cooper are among the various artists who have made recordings of PETER AND THE WOLF OP. 67. In 2001, Sesame Street did its own interpretation of the piece, accompanied by the Boston Pops Orchestra, as conducted by Keith Lockhart, who had been conducting for the Pops since 1995. In this version, Baby Bear goes to see the Pops perform the piece and imagines Elmo as Peter, Oscar the Grouch as the cat, Telly Monster as the duck, Zoe as the bird, Big Bird as one of the aforementioned elders, and the Two-Headed Monster as the hunters. This is the version of the piece you're seeing here, and, in the same version, you might also occasionally spot Caroll Spinney, who portrays Oscar and Big Bird, sitting in the audience and enjoying the show. The Sesame Street gang did a similar version of PETER AND THE WOLF as a book and tape entry; this was in 1991. Sony Wonder #LV51719 NOTE: This VHS was distributed by Sony Music Entertainment, Inc. COMMENT: This tape is slightly damaged at some spots.

Be the first to comment