"Reverie"

When composer Alexander Scriabin came to Saint Petersburg in November 1898, he brought as a gift for his patron and publisher M. P. Belyaev the full score of an orchestral work named Prélude, a short miniature in E Minor and ternary form. Until then, Scriabin had never composed for the orchestra, excepting some unpublished pieces, and for that reason he wrote this piece in complete secrecy and without consulting anybody. One day his friend and colleague – composer Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov – came to visit him and seeing the score, played the piece on the piano. He deemed it "delightful, wheated in piquant harmonies and not badly orchestrated". Belyaev considered that the term Prélude was not appropriate to describe an orchestral work, so he and Scriabin decided to rename the piece and entitled it Rêverie. As Belyaev’s editions were bilingual, having fixed the French designation, the two engaged in an extended discussion as to the apposite Russian title. They had to choose between myechty (‘daydreams’) and griοzy (‘musings’, ‘reveries’). Eventually, they agreed on the former. After hearing the work rehearsed, Scriabin wrote: "Imagine my joy, the piece sounds very well. At the rehearsal on 1 December Korsakov was so nice. He had each section go through its parts separately and spent a whole hour in it!" The piece premiered on 5 December 1898, in Saint Petersburg, programmed next after the performance of Tamara, a symphonic poem by Milli Balakirev. Rêverie was received very well, and Rimsky-Korsakov had to conduct an encore performance. After this, Scriabin made a solo performance of a selection of his études, préludes and impromptus at the piano. The piece is a short one, with duration of about five minutes.